Ahmad Hussam and Nick Armero, two filmmakers in the United States, launched a social media campaign to push Netflix to stream their television show on Muslim hero Salahadin Al-Ayoubi.
Saladin is a revered figure for Muslims around the world for liberating Jerusalem from the Crusaders.
The filmmakers had initially crowdfunded their project on Kickstarter two years ago to produce a pilot for the series. The campaign, which garnered worldwide attention, racked up more than $84,000 in donations. Instead of producing the first episode, they were contacted by producers from all around the world, who advised the Hussam and Armero to save the money and secure more funding from investors.
"We weighed our options. Would we rather have a short wepisode and nothing more or a multi-season series on a major network?" Hussam said in a video to fans.
Hussam, who stars in the title role, said that the idea behind Salahadin came from a need to see diversity in the representation of Middle Easterners and Arabs in the entertainment industry.
"I didn't want to support the stereotype," he said, leading him to go into storytelling in order to shatter mainstream narratives surrounding Middle Eastern characters in film and television.
With Netflix looking to conquer the world, the filmmakers believe that their show is "the perfect fit" to tap into a difficult market like the Middle East.
By launching their campaign on social media, actors, producers, and showrunners from the streaming giant have warmed up to the idea of an original series devoted on the early days of Salahadin Al-Ayoubi.
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We SNUCK into the Netflix headquarters and pitched our show. This has never been done before. Please help us make...
Posted by Peace House on Monday, August 31, 2015
A week later, Netflix finally replied, and put the filmmakers' project on their agenda as even Netflix CEO Reed Hastings was impressed with Hussam and Armero's pitch video.
The duo were also behind the widely popular video of Muslims in the U.S. reading hate comments after a Muslim daycare was burned down in Tampa Bay.