Here's why Bin Roye may fare even better on TV

Is upcoming TV drama Bin Roye simply the film spliced into 24 episodes? Not quite.

Here's what a chat with the cast and producer revealed:

Already seen the film? No problem. The drama's quite different.

Lead actor Mahira Khan laid it all out for us.

The TV serial is faithful to the original source, Farhat Ishtiaq's novel Bin Roye Aansoo.

"The drama is the same as the novel. There is a totally new track that [wasn't a part of] the film," she revealed. So there are never-before-seen scenes that will be in the TV version.

It made sense to adapt the novel to two mediums

"Bin Roye was originally intended to be a drama serial and then during its script development we felt that it has very good content for film. So we wrote a script for the film after the drama had been written," reveals producer Momina Duraid.

"I don’t think it's risky to launch a film as a drama, because how many people go to cinemas to watch a film. Compare that with the public who watches dramas, and the number difference is huge. You must have noticed that we have not let the film release anywhere else. You can’t find it online or on DVDs and there is also a massive readership for the Bin Roye Aansoo novel, which would want to see the version of it."

But this film-to-TV transition is probably a one-off

Bin Roye hero Humayun Saeed said while the Bin Roye experiment makes sound business sense, it demands too much time from the cast.

"I would make a production for both TV and film, but it's too much of a headache. When Bin Roye was being made, not many movies were under production, but now that so many movies are being made at the same time. I don't really think this sort of an experiment will be done because it requires a lot of time and effort from the actors and everyone is busy and have so many other things to do."

Bin Roye may fare even better on TV

"I think it’s really an interesting experiment and I hope it succeeds," said Adnan Malik, who also has a cameo in the drama serial. "Bin Roye the film did very well considering the issues it had while it was made. I think it came out strong; Mahira had a strong performance and Humayun bhai did very well. I watched it till the end and I quite enjoyed it, so I thought it was 7 out 10 as a film. But as a drama, I have some trailers and the promos looked really good. In fact, I think it might do better as a drama than a film. I think it [was more suited] for the long form."