I’ve recently become sucked into Norway’s hottest new series: ‘Skam’.
This “racy, emotionally intense, true-to-life Norwegian web and television series”, as Rachel Donadio from the New York Times puts it, has taken Scandinavia by storm. Starting out as a web series in Norway in 2015, the program has been transferred to television and has premiered in both Sweden and Denmark, due to its ever-growing popular demand. Nearly one fifth of Norway’s population sat down to watch ‘Skam’ as it premiered weekly on NRK, the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation. It also has the largest number of Norwegian viewers for an online series, ever, with over 1 million people streaming the weekly episode on the site, at a time.
Being a major fan of the original Norwegian ‘Skam’, I’m not sure how I like the sound of an American version with new actors and characters but still a similar concept. I believe that some things are better left untouched and alone. Besides, there’s no reason to remake a perfectly amazing show, anyway, whether or not it's for the language or culture. I watched all three seasons of ‘Skam’ with English subtitles and I still got the same effect as if I had watched a show in English.
I can’t even imagine the series without it's amazing cast that includes Josefine Frida Petersen (Noora), Tarjei Sandvik Moe (Isak), or Lisa Teige (Eva). These actors have mastered the portrayal of each of their characters, despite how far their own personalities are from that of their characters'.
The point I’m trying to make is that I don’t see a reason for creating an Americanized version of what is already a successful and captivating portrayal of the teenage experience, just so we can put American brands, products, and language into it. Don’t forget the unrealistic attachment teenagers will develop based on the media’s obsession to the actors’ real lives. In this country, we turn actors in icons, idols, and celebrities. There is no reason to do that, especially when the people we are dealing with are still children. Norway does a fantastic job of keeping their actors out of the spotlight and keeping their private lives, well, private. These actors aren’t put in the public eye, and do not participate in hundreds of media interviews. It’s rare to find them in the media unless they’ve put themselves there intentionally, and that’s how it should be in this country, as well; that’s how it should be everywhere. We shouldn’t know everything and anything about the actor’s real lives; we should only be able to see how great and skilled of an actor they are on screen, and no more than that. We place too much importance on the details of an actor’s personal life, rather than on the character they are portraying. Norwegian TV series aren’t successful based on who stars in the shows, but rather the content and level of quality the shows encompass and portray to their audiences.
Our society in America is too nosey when it comes to the lives of other people. I think the problem is that we all want to feel like we’re not alone; we want validation that the characters we identify with are real and are experiencing these things right along with us, because if they can get through it and come out okay, then we can too.
“Det er bare du som kan føle det du føler”
“Only you can feel what you feel.” (Isak to Even)
In our society, we can’t be different; we don’t want to be different, but rather, we just want to fit in. Not only does ‘Skam’ exemplify what it means to be different and to be yourself, but it shows it’s audience that it’s okay to be different and to be yourself.
It’s a simple message like that, that I think American audiences should really pay attention to. However, I believe they should hear it from the show’s original Norwegian cast, rather than an entirely new group of way too old twenty-somethings getting payed too much to portray the ’16-year-old American teenager’. An American cast will take this show from being real, raw, and “true-to-life” to unrealistic, cliche, and hyperbolic.
My final message is to watch the original series before you hop on the Americanized bandwagon; there will never be anything quite like the original.
