Promotional poster for the Saudi series “Threads of Moazib” (Al Jazeera)

The Saudi historical series “Threads of Moazib” succeeded in moving from Al-Ahsa Governorate, where its events take place, to cross the Kingdom’s borders and reach most Gulf homes after achieving high viewing rates.

Although “Threads of Moazib” is classified as a Gulf heritage drama that does not usually enjoy great public demand, it has become among the 5 most watched Gulf series during the 2024 Ramadan season.

The work’s exceptional state of success is due to several factors, perhaps the most prominent of which is its treatment of a historical era in Saudi heritage that no artistic work has addressed before in this way, as its events take place in the sixties era, and it monitors the “bashout” industry that was popular in that period. In addition to highlighting the human relations between merchant owners and their workers.

A 24-year wait

The dream of presenting an artistic work about life in Al-Ahsa Governorate, which is rich in traditional arts, occurred to the writer Hassan bin Ahmed Al-Abdi 24 years ago, but most production companies rejected the project because of its high production cost.

The initial text of the script fell into the hands of artist Ibrahim Al-Hassawi in 2011, who was impressed by it, especially since he knew that Al-Abdi was working in the profession of “bashout” knitting, and he worked to convince the “Noon Funoon” company to produce it.

The script was developed to suit the current viewer through more than 5 large writing workshops, which included 20 writers specialized in the field of television writing, such as Muhammad Al-Bashir, novelist Bashayer Muhammad, and journalist Muhammad Al-Bashir, and Hana Al-Omair supervised the writing.

Then the time came to choose the director of this exceptional epic, assigning it to directors Manaf Abdul and Abdul Aziz Al-Shalahi, who had previously directed a number of distinguished cinematic films, most notably “The Zero Distance” and “Haw Bal.”

Realism is the most important thing

Actors were chosen, many of whom have origins in the Eastern Province or Al-Ahsa, so the dialect was pure. Among these actors were Ibrahim Al-Hasawi and Abdul Mohsen Al-Nimr, in addition to the participation of some Arab Gulf stars, who worked for months to perfect the dialect, most notably the Emirati Abdullah Al-Jaryan. Bahraini stars Reem Arhama and Dana Al Salem.

The creators of the work are credited with the extreme realism that overshadowed everything. For example, the design of the sites was precise to the point that it made people of previous generations feel that they were inside the city of Al-Ahsa in the 1960s. Egyptian interior designer Karim Abdel Naeem worked on it for 6 months, and it was built entirely using bricks and cement. .

Escalation of events

“Threads of Moazib” did not rely on the policy of prolongation and prolongation, which has become a custom associated with Arab drama, and the events were escalating and exciting, leaving the viewer in a state of constant suspense, so there was great interaction among the pioneers of social networks about its events, and the happiness of some of the audience is attested to the shocking fall of the “character” Abu Issa,” which caused conflicts within Al-Ahsa over this.

The series is considered a historical lesson that conveys the changes that have affected Saudi society as a whole, not just the heritage governorate of Al-Ahsa.

Source: Al Jazeera