Having officially premiered the first ever Filipino series at MIPCOM last year, Cattleya Killer, ABS-CBN, announced today its tentpole international co-production for 2023 entitled The Bagman, a spin-off of the original locally produced digital series Bagman for the Filipino audience. This 8 x one-hour action-packed drama series will be produced by Philippine-based companies: ABS-CBN International Production Division and Dreamscape Entertainment, Rein Entertainment, and Nathan Studios Inc.
Being offered at next week’s FILMART in Hong Kong for the first time, The Bagman will star ArjoAtayde, reprising his character Benjo Malaya from the original Bagman series, a role that won for him the 2020 Asian Academy Creative Awards Best Actor.
‘Having had the privilege of being the first Filipino company to screen a series at MIPCOM, we are honored to be following up on the success of Cattleya Killer with our new premium drama series The Bagman. We continue to advocate Filipino representation in a manner that is engaging and entertaining in today’s global marketplace. Thanks to our talented co-production partners, Dreamscape, Rein Entertainment and Nathan Studios, I have no doubt The Bagman, packed with action, suspense, and dark humor, will have audiences around the world on the edge of their seats’said Ruel S. Bayani, Head, International Production Division, ABS-CBN.
The original digital series, Bagman 1 and 2, which sold to Netflix Philippines, follows the story of Benjo Malaya, a neighborhood barber who landed a job as the governor’s henchman and gets caught up in a dangerous web of crime, corruption, and political turmoil.
Now with The Bagman, when convicted prisoner and former governor, Benjo Malaya, learns the tragic news about his missing family, he is left with no choice but to return to the vicious underworld that he turned his back on, and take on a new mission, this time, as a Bagman for the sitting president of the Republic of the Philippines to stop an impending and civil war.
