Everything You Need To Know About Netflix’s New Series Paranormal

Bazaar spoke to director Amr Salama and actress Ayah Samaha ahead of the series’ release to the public about the challenges, the costumes, and their favourite memories from filming the series

The 81-part book series, Ma Waraa Al Tabiaa which spoke to readers across the region and sold over 15 million copies has been reborn, this time as the bone-chilling Netflix original Paranormal.

Following the story of Dr Refaat Ismail, a sceptical Hematologist with a somewhat awry outlook on life, the show manages to be the perfect amount of eerie and interesting as him and his near-and-dear experience paranormal activities – locking in even the most paranoid viewers.

Played by Ahmed Amin, Dr Refaat is not your cliche hero and protagonist. He’s cynical, awkward and uses Murphy’s laws as an explanation for everything. But in being so unique and individualistic, he is bound to capture the hearts of viewers and have them rooting for him right from episode one.

For Amr Salama who grew up reading the books, the most difficult part was deciding which stories to tell and condense into a six-episode season.

“I think the main criteria [when picking] was my personal love for the books and the ones that marked my youth the most,” he said. “There were many other factors too, we wanted something that’s close to the Egyptian traditions, something we can implement and start with, but the main criteria was my love towards the books and I really wanted to see that onscreen.”

Despite the role being unlike ones she’s played before, Ayah Samaha, who played Refaat’s fiance, Howaida, was extremely excited to be part of the show.

“Her (Howaida’s) relationship with her boyfriend was of another kind, considering that on the one hand she was raised in his house yet, on the other hand, she was still his fiancé,” said Ayah. “Every detail about the series and the character was exciting for me, I wanted to work on the show and knew it would add so much to my knowledge and experience.”

With the show being set in the 60s, a lot of work had to be put in to it to bring the show to life and keeping it in line with the costumes, settings and flair of that specific era.

“I think the biggest challenge was shooting outside on the streets, the inner decor is expensive but implementing it is easy whereas it’s so hard to find streets that make you remember the 60s,” said Amr. “We ended up using lots of graphics and visual tricks to get Cairo back to the 60s.”

However, for Ayah, playing the role of a woman in a different era was a treat.

“I wanted to get close to people who were living in that period of time, whether they were relatives or connections, I wanted to know people’s perceptions in that era and how ladies used to dress in colours and look like,” she told us. “I wanted to know all those details in order to create the character of Howaida.”

Looking back now at the production process, Amr’s favourite memory was punishing everyone who arrived to work late by making them pay a small amount of money, and then giving that money to the person who worked the hardest throughout the week, and then celebrating every weekend all together!

The first episode of Paranormal was released on Netflix today, give it a watch and join the adventure by following Netflix MENA on Instagram for updates about the next season.

Image supplied.