The Morning After

Paradoxal, Both Worlds, SWR – FabFiction and Prime Video today announced the start of principal photography of the television series The Morning After. The series, created by Thierry Cassuto & Karen Jeynes (Recipes for Love and Murder, Puppet Nation) and set in Cape Town, South Africa, stars award-winning up-and-comer British actress Amara Okereke (In The Lost Lands, Red Rose) as young aspiring singer Nina Morgan from Hull (UK), who gets adopted by a group of local young misfits after she washes up one morning about 6000 miles from home, alone and naked on a Cape Town beach, with all of her stuff missing and a story that’s clearly got a few holes.

The series also stars Tarryn Wyngaard (Devil’s Peak, The Watch) as neurotic emotionally messy lawyer Cleo, Gaosi Raditholo (Warrior, The River) as ballbreaker model Mandisa, Carmen Pretorius (Lien se Lankstaanskoene, Table Manners) as rich kid turned artist Michaela,, Danica Jones (Asinamali, Aya) as no nonsense camerawoman Pauline, Richard Gau (Prime, Aya) as the Peter Pan like aspiring techbro Justin, and Khaya Dladla (House of Zwide) as nightclub impresario Tarquin.

The Morning After is produced by Paris-based Paradoxal and Cape Town based Both Worlds Pictures, with the support of the South African Department of Trade, Industry and Competition (DTIC), and with Natixis-Coficiné providing cash flow finance. The series is the latest outcome of the Paradoxal and Both Worlds production partnership agreement of 2020, following up on the ten-part series Recipes for Love and Murder starring Maria Dole Kennedy, released in 2022 on Acorn, M-Net, Showmax and sold globally by Global Screen (a Telepool company) and AMC Networks.

Entirely filmed in Cape Town and vicinity, The Morning After is directed by Cindy Lee (Girls of St Agnes, Desert Rose) and Karen Jeynes (Recipes for Love and Murder), with Executive Producers Rémy Jacquelin for Paradoxal, and Thierry Cassuto, Karen Jeynes and Thato Cassuto for twice International Emmy Awards nominated Both Worlds Pictures.

When 25 year old Hull party-girl Nina wakes up naked on a beach in Cape Town, South Africa, about 6000 miles from home, it’s possible that her life isn’t going exactly according to plan. Local and beach cottage mates Michaela, Mandisa, Cleo and Justin quickly rescue her from that immediate predicament, and exact revenge on the guy responsible, but ultimately Nina’s going to have to be the one to rescue herself from herself. The others soon learn the real reason Nina’s in town – she’s supposed to be at New Life, an upmarket rehab center, but it was “full of junkies” so she bust herself out on day three. She’s got a ticket home in three months’ time, but until then she’s on her own. Sometimes she’s on her own in Justin’s bed, but basically she’s on her own. Determined not to give her stepfather the satisfaction of seeing her fail, Nina takes on a series of hustles to earn enough for rent, food and weed, putting her singing talents to good use, and relishing the world-renowned carefree sunkissed Cape Town lifestyle.

The series will premiere in sub-saharan Africa on Prime Video and in Germany on ARD’s SVOD service Mediatek, with international sales handled for now by Paradoxal.

Rémy Jacquelin, President of Paradoxal and executive producer said: “This is a very special project which time has finally come for Paradoxal and Both Worlds, the second in our slate which got disrupted by Covid. It’s a fun, sexy and bingeworthy comedy-drama set, with an amazing young cast in stunningly beautiful Cape Town, and we can’t wait to share it with viewers from all around the world”

Karen Jeynes, co-creator, writer and executive producer, added for Both Worlds: “It’s so rare that Cape Town gets to show off as itself on television, we’re so used to being a location for other shows. The Morning After invites you into the lives of a cast of young and exciting characters, all trying to live the Cape Town dream – with a couple of hilarious disasters along the way.”

Brigitte Dithard of SWR, adds: “It’s an exciting experience for SWR to be making its first co-production with South Africa as part of the FabFiction initiative. We have great confidence in the concept and the creatives and are looking forward to launching the series in Germany.”

About Both Worlds: Both Worlds Pictures is a South African film, television and digital production company with a proven track record of producing premium content for African and global audiences since 1998, including comedy, drama, animation,, live events, game-shows, documentaries and feature films for leading local and international partners. The company recently produced Recipes for Love and Murder, a 10 episode premium TV series based on Sally Andrew’s best-selling novel, as a coproduction with Mnet, AMC, AcornTV, and Global Screen. Both Worlds’ productions have been recognized by two nominations at the International Emmy Awards, 27 South African Film and Television Awards (SAFTAS), 10 IAB Bookmarks, 2 WGSA Muse Awards and by the 2010 Financial Mail Newsmaker of the Year Award.

About Paradoxal: Founded in 2019 by Rémy Jacquelin (formerly Senior Vice-President Sales and Acquisitions at TF1 and Gaumont’s Director of International Sales), Paris-based Paradoxal is a company that specialises in the development, financing, packaging, coproduction and production of high-end content for European broadcasters and international platforms. The company helped finance and coproduced Recipes for Love and Murder with Both Worlds.

About SWR -FabFiction: SWR is part of the ARD network, a public service broadcaster in Germany. In 2020 it set up an international co-production initiative called FabFiction with two other broadcasters in the network, WDR and NDR. Since then, this initiative has co-produced several series with Scandinavia, Belgium, the UK, Australia, Israel and now South Africa. The series are mainly for our player.