Hoorae’s Microdramas Found 580 Million Views. Can TikTok Get Hollywood Working Again? — Watch

The couples have secrets(!). The TV has been hijacked(!!). And somewhere between the next confession and its immediate cliffhanger(!!!), Issa Rae’s Hoorae Media is trying to figure out how to get Hollywood back to work. In “Screen Time,” the production company’s first microdrama, released on TikTok earlier this year, a double date becomes a waking nightmare when a sinister figure takes over one couple’s living room TV screen and demands the lovers come clean(?!)… or risk exposure.

For the people who made the juicy series, the stakes are less lurid but plenty urgent: Can a thriller told in minute-long segments sustain a business that keeps indie filmmakers, cast, and crew on set? So far, there’s reason to keep watching and, more encouragingly, to keep experimenting.

By the time Hoorae executives Jax Clark and Dzifa Yador joined IndieWire’s Future of Filmmaking Summit on Saturday, October 17, “Screen Time” had accumulated nearly 580 million views across TikTok and its dedicated microdrama app, PineDrama.

“My favorite comment is, ‘Who put Netflix on my TikTok?’” Yador said. “It just really validated the fact that we did not abandon what it takes to build a premium product.” 580 million views is a lot of attention, by any standard. Whether that attention can sustain the people making microdramas is the question behind Hoorae’s developing business — and in a room full of eager film folks ready to roll up their sleeves, Clark and Yador made an appealingly practical case for finding out where bite-sized verticals can take their company and collaborators.

“Obviously we work in television, we work in film, and now to be back in digital, which is where Issa really got her start and started building her audience has felt like a very beautiful full circle moment,” Clark said. (Notably, fellow summit speaker and inaugural Future of Filmmaking Award honoree Curry Barker knows something about that online runway: His reported $800 YouTube feature “Milk & Serial” preceded his theatrical breakout with “Obsession.”)

For Yador, the challenge was adapting Hoorae’s storytelling to the digital world’s existing habits.

“It wasn’t about trying to reimagine what storytelling is because we do that so well already,” she said. “Kudos to Jax and Issa and the entire team, but it was about how do we repackage it for the now, understanding where people are spending the most of their time on phones and how to continue to elevate the space so that it feels very much like a Hoorae product.”

Clark further described Hoorae’s ambitions as extending to creatives stuck in industry assistant jobs or “whatever writer purgatory they’re in,” with productions offering experience on set and in post. Anyone hoping to rescue an unproduced screenplay by rotating it 90 degrees should temper their expectations, she said. But if you’re willing to adapt to the microdrama world, there’s real opportunity.

“This isn’t a format where it’s like, ‘Hey, I have a feature script that no one invested in and now I’m just going to chop it up into minutes and we can make this a microdrama,’” Clark said. “It’s not an apples to apples conversion that happens. Part of it is talking to creatives who are willing to try something new and build something that maintains the integrity of the medium.”

Surely, though, anyone with a phone and a flair for betrayal could give it a shot, right? Maybe.

Jax Clark and Dzifa Yador at IndieWire’s Future of Filmmaking Summit

Yador said Hoorae spent two years studying vertical storytelling before diving into the space, and they don’t regret the prep. With “Screen Time,” Clark said, the central question was familiar to anyone who enjoys a good erotic thriller: “Can you really trust the person you go to sleep with every night?” But to make that hook work specifically for vertical, Hoorae assembled a team combining traditional filmmaking experience with unique expertise relevant excelling in the microdrama format.

“We have a blend of just talented filmmakers, but then we also have the top of the class in terms of people who have done verticals before,” Yador said. “We feel really confident working with actors who maybe haven’t done this before because we know we have the team to help educate them.

Amusingly, for cast members already accustomed to verticals, an assignment from Hoorae can actually mean dialing things down: “It’s actors who are maybe used to coming out on a hundred for every scene and we can tell them, actually we can ground this and we want you to try something new here and maybe play this more seriously and maybe riff a little bit,” Clark said.

Legibility is key, and even a carefully considered character arc has to survive the instability of a scrollable feed. After all, a viewer might meet these people in the finale and need to watch in reverse.

“Wherever you get dropped in has to feel just as propulsive and just as noteworthy as your pilot episode and sticky enough to keep you in there,” Yador explained. “And there’s kind of a machine in terms of the mechanics of how you develop a microdrama. And those are the engines that we’re talking about and they exist even in the finale.”

TikTok helps Hoorae navigate that unpredictability. Yador credited the platform with joining as a distribution partner as “Screen Time” production was wrapping, and with providing insights into what attracts viewers. The partnership, announced in April, provides exclusive distribution on TikTok and PineDrama, with Hoorae’s shows available for free with ad support.

That backing matters for filmmakers wondering whether they could follow suit. Hoorae has Rae’s reputation, a talent network, and a platform partner — while uploading your own thriller and waiting for the algorithm to fall in love is a different proposition. Still, for this pioneering and hopeful group the relationship has already supported an expanding slate. Following “Screen Time” came “The Compatibility Experiment,” about a couple testing their relationship on a reality dating show, and “Parental Advisory,” which brings affairs, rivalries, and potential murder to the PTA.

“We didn’t want to just try to do exactly what everyone else was doing or what other people were projecting would work,” Clark said. With 10 more microdramas in the works for next year, there should be plenty of secrets to go around. But who pays to keep the confessions coming?

There is serious money in microdramas, although it often comes from asking viewers to pay for the next revelation. Omdia forecasts $1.5 billion in U.S. microdrama revenue in 2026, while its earlier global research found more than 60 percent of revenue came from subscriptions or transactional payments. Hoorae’s approach requires a different calculation, and asked what 580 million views had done for Hoorae financially, Yador described developing relationships instead of revenue.

“It’s important to us that the brands feel integrated into the content rather than it just being slapped on and then you just call it branded content,” Yador said, adding that Hoorae’s in-house sales team seeks brands willing to protect the creative, getting specific about who should hold a product and why. “We’re quite intentional about how we’re engaging with brands that way. And so I think to the consumer lens of it, I think it feels natural and tasteful rather than on the nose branded content.”

Clark said digital production also allows closer collaboration with advertisers than film and television projects involving more partners. “It’s actually been pretty fun building story and these relationships at the same time in a way that also is constantly feeding the financial model in a way that can make sense,” she said. How consistent that model really remains unclear, but Hoorae is enthusiastic.

“This is a volume game,” Yador said. “’How much can you make in X amount of time with X budget?’ — is always a math equation that we’re trying to solve for that feels very one-to-one with just kind of vertical universally. For an industry still contending with declining production in Los Angeles, the prospect of more work is welcome. And what that work pays for matters just as much.

“Screen Time” is a SAG production, with The Wrap reporting on a Verticals Agreement that establishes minimum pay, overtime, and pension and health contributions for Hoorae workerks. Covered productions remain a fraction of the market. And still, Clark and Yador sounded excited to be making things and building profitable artistic environments. As creators, the obstacles were familiar even when the delivery system wasn’t: Find the fans. Make it work. Have we tried a… kiss?

“When we’re on set, we’ve scripted things that this needs to hit, this will drive engagement and it’s not popping,” Clark said, laughing. “So, we’re like, okay, well maybe they need to kiss! Maybe we need a slap! Maybe we need something else here. We’re able to try things in the moment.”

The hope is that those bursts of experimentation can keep adding up to lasting employment at Hoorae. Considering what wanted for the brand’s future, Clark returned to the work: “More TV, more film, more verticals, more people being able to get back to work and sustain themselves on this art.”

Watch the complete panel from our Future of Filmmaking Summit in the video above.

IndieWire Future of Filmmaking 2026 Summit is presented by AT&T Untold Stories, an impactful multi-year collaboration between AT&T and Tribeca Festival that awards $1.2 million dollars, mentorship, and comprehensive support to the next generation of filmmakers looking to bring their films to the big screen. For more information, visit here.