A Director’s Take On Microdrama: Dan Löwenstein On Vertical Trends & Why He’s Launching His Own App

EXCLUSIVE: Dan Löwenstein started making microdramas in early 2024 and has now made over 20 vertical series. With the traditional biz laser-focused on all things micro – fueled by bullish analyst forecasts – Löwenstein gives Deadline a director’s eye view on microdrama and tells us he’s planning to launch his own app.

The learning curve was steep after Löwenstein was offered his first microdrama gig. “I went into prep on the script and then the next day we were shooting,” he remembers. Fast-forward to late 2025 and he is, in microdrama terms, a veteran, with buzzy projects such as Pride and Prejudice and big hits including The Mafia’s Obsession under his belt.

“It’s its own format, and you can’t compare it to anything that’s out there in terms of the way you shoot it,” he says of the burgeoning genre. “In terms of the stories, they’re so data-driven. The platforms go on what sells. It’s very money-orientated, as the [wider] industry is, of course, but this feels so transparent.”

The pile-‘em-high and sell-‘em-cheap business model requires cast and crew to work fast. Daily soaps are maybe the closest traditional TV gets, but the pace required to make a series spanning dozens of episodes and costing a couple of hundred thousand dollars is dizzying.

Löwenstein says he has motored through 26 pages of a script in a single day before, but reckons the sweet spot is somewhere between 12 and 15. “Twelve is like shooting three pages of a feature and has a similar kind of balance…and you’re not spending hours setting up a technocrane outside to get a shot through a window or something. It’s always very simple: Frontal coverage of the main actors.”

Play The Hits: Romance, Rich CEOs & Bullies

With the likes of ReelShort and DramaBox leading the way, microdramas have often fallen into a handful of recognizable narratives, mostly revolving around romantic themes. Werewolves were hot for a minute, while the billionaire-CEO-and-intern love story endures. Another trope revolves around a bully and victim who reconcile. “That one goes from bullying to love, and then you have your kind of payback moment, which is always really important,” Löwenstein explains.

“It’s on the verge of being very cheesy a lot of the time, so the art, for me, and using the experience I’ve had, is trying to decrease that, but still do the tropes. I’m locked into what the client wants, but at the same time, there is a way of making it feel more real and more human.”

Meanwhile, the genre mix is widening with smaller platforms like Tallflix trying out new ideas such as survival drama Game of Choice. In the era of Squid Game and The Running Man reboot, survival is well-trodden ground in mainstream film and TV, but in microdrama it is an evolution. Löwenstein says: “I’m hoping that the success of Game of Choice opens up the eyes of the bigger platforms, because they can see that it doesn’t have to be a romance related story.”

Don’t Call My Agent

Fox Entertainment recently bought into Ukraine-based vertical video business Holywater, which operates platforms such as My Passion, My Muse, and the European scene is growing a fast clip. If the U.S. is ahead of Europe, a lot of bets are being placed on this side of the Atlantic, with the likes of Zone of Interest backer Access Entertainment and other high-end film and TV producers surveying the scene.

Löwenstein is working with Spirit Studios and Night Train Media on a new microdrama – which we were first to report on in October – that is unique in being a UK-Germany-financed project. Based in the UK, the director says he is getting hit-up by all manner of big-name producers, studios and labels as the industry tries to get its head around microdrama. “They’re more into information gathering at this point. A few of them are really close to developing something, as more of an experiment to see if they can put their skills to work in that format.”

He adds: “L.A. is a little bit ahead of us in terms of taking them seriously. Actors in the UK, some of them anyway, are like, ‘Don’t tell my agent,’ whereas in LA, they’re shouting about them. They are ‘vertical actors’, and they’re happy with it. There are some that really bring the money in. If you cast them in your vertical, you’re more likely to be able to sell it to a platform.”

Recognizable talent is starting to show up in European micro projects. We were first with the news that Lock Stock star Nick Moran will be in Swipe!, an upcoming vertical drama from British indie Shogun Film and local distributor Trinity Content Partners.

Start-Up Frenzy

Löwenstein has his own label, House of Create, and is preparing to launch his own microdrama app, hopefully in 2026. “That is the plan,” he says. “I’ve got a great team already in place, and we’re looking for investment. We’ve got a first round already in for the tech side of things, so that’s looking really exciting. We’re quite close now.”

The helmer might have a head-start in terms of experience, but is certainly not alone in getting a microdrama start-up underway. Last week we had the scoop on Shorties, a new vertical studio based in L.A., London and Istanbul, and that counts former Netflix and CBS brass among its founders. Not long before, was the news that Bill Block, the former Miramax boss, was launching vertical drama platform GammaTime. In August, Terrifier distributor Cineverse and Lloyd Braun’s Banyan launched MicroCo with industry vets Susan Rovner and Jana Winograde taking exec roles.

Micro-Economics

Whether in L.A., London, Kyiv or Istanbul, the trick for the newbies will be to harness what is working in the format without becoming another Quibi. They will need to churn out hit series for less than the Jeffrey Katzenberg-backed platform was splashing on a single episode in some cases. The ballpark for a Europe-produced microdrama is $150,000. We hear the first UK-produced projects will see that edge closer to $250,000. For context, a high-end UK TV drama can come in at $4M an ep. Put another way, that is the cost of 16 top-end vertical series.

“The main thing, from my point of view, to really engage the UK audience is to get UK writers who understand the format, the tropes, and also, embrace what it is and do not try and battle it, because as soon as you do that, it just becomes something different,” says Löwenstein.

Having mastered micro, Löwenstein is now going old-school and about to shoot a regular-length movie. That will, he says, require a degree of unlearning. “I’m about to go and shoot a feature in Cyprus, and it’s with some very serious actors, so I’m like: ‘Okay, I need to rewire my brain.’”