Ticket price issue: OTT the only choice for Telugu producers

Andhra Pradesh: The Andhra Pradesh government's decision to introduce reduced movie ticket prices has left the Telugu film industry in dire straits.

With the directive of the government, the distributors or producers cannot hike the tickets for their movies and have lost control over many other trade-related issues.

At this juncture, big-budget Telugu movies won't make profits, as the movie ticket rates will be locked up by the state government in Andhra Pradesh. In fact, some movies might not even recover half of their investment even if the film is a huge hit.

With biggies like 'RRR', 'Radhe Shyam', and 'Pushpa' prepared for releases, the ticket pricing has led to a major upheaval among Tollywood film distributors. Even at this juncture, most of the production houses are silent.

A section of Tollywood and movie-goers are hurt by this silence by the bigwigs of the industry. "When unnecessary speeches, debates, and controversies get highlighted, why not raise questions on such serious issues? Where is MAA now?," a Twitter user wrote, questioning why Tollywood producers and actors are mute on the ticket issue.

Left with few options, some producers think the only resort could be to opt for OTT digital release of their movies until the government relaxes the rules on ticket pricing.