Keshet Embarks on ‘Massive Adventure’ With Thriller ‘Unconditional,’ About a Mother Looking for Her Daughter and Finding Herself
“Unconditional,” set to woo buyers at the London TV Screenings on Feb. 26, might be Keshet’s biggest project to date and, distributed internationally by Keshet International, one of its biggest plays at the event, but creators Adam Bizanski and Dana Idisis started out small.
“For us, it really started with this mother whose daughter was arrested. She’s a normal woman and she’s never really left her neighborhood before, and now she needs to embark on this massive adventure. That’s how the show got so big,” says Bizanski, who also wrote the script.
In the thriller, produced by Spiro Films and directed by Jonathan Gurfinkle, a mother-daughter vacation turns into a nightmare when 25-year-old Gali is arrested for drug smuggling during a layover in Moscow. But Orna refuses to give up on her child.
“With stories like these, you do tend to think of Liam Neeson and ‘Taken,’ for example,” adds Bizanski, admitting that following a mother instead of a revenge-hungry father brought a new angle to the show, based on a true story.
“You would expect her to say: ‘We need to free my daughter. Where’s my husband?’ But Orna’s husband suffers from early onset dementia. He doesn’t always remember his child is gone. She’s completely alone.”
Idisis adds: “At first, she agrees with what the society thinks of her. She asks herself if she’s the right person to do that, but it’s on her. As a woman, this character was so appealing to me. Adam is also connected to his feminine side, although his beard hides that.”
As Orna’s journey becomes more complicated, she must come to terms with a very uncomfortable realization: She doesn’t know her daughter at all.
“It’s one of the things we had the most fun exploring. Orna has always thought her daughter was just like her, timid and shy. She slowly discovers it might not be the case, but she also draws strength from that. She says: ‘My daughter did that, so maybe I’m capable of doing it too,’” notes Bizanski.
“They love and care for each other – it’s something we’ve never considered changing. But their love evolves. At a certain point, it’s about acceptance: accepting who your daughter is and accepting your role as a mother.”
Idisis observes: “Orna understands that sometimes, she chooses not to ask certain questions. It was convenient for her. She discovers things about her daughter, but she discovers things about herself, too.”
At the same time, she needs to pressure powerful politicians, reach out to press and travel to places she never thought she would visit. The show, shot in India, Georgia and Israel, “takes place globally,” notes Bizanski.
“It takes place in Russia, in India, in Israel. There’s a lot of bad stuff happening pretty much everywhere. When we imagined Orna’s journey, we thought about taking her somewhere frozen, somewhere cold. The script was written before the [Russian-Ukrainian] war, so a lot has changed since then. But at the time, there was a lot of information on how these types of scenarios would play out in Russia.”
While Orna and Gali’s hardship looks like a “bureaucratic error” at first, things escalate quickly.
“She’s not just fighting paper. You do arrive at places of suspense and action and risk and adventure. That being said, I’m a sucker for bureaucracy,” laughs Bizanski.
“As long as you show it in a dramatic way, it can be fascinating to watch all these strings being pulled. She needs to figure out if she should cancel her interview because it might make negotiations with Russia easier or if she should publicly force the government to have these negotiations in the first place.”
Both creators see international format potential in the show.
“Honestly speaking, I think we always think about it when we’re working. We want to create things that will be seen and it’s always a question that comes up. This is an international, universal story. We would love to see it adapted,” Bizanski says.
“Unconditional” will premiere on Keshet 12 this summer.
More from Variety
Best of Variety
Sign up for Variety's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
Solve the daily Crossword
