Sunderland ‘Til I Die: The Football Reality Show Success No One Saw Coming

How do you create an international streaming success based on a forgettable English football team with no star players and terrible results in the last few years? That is what we will find out when director and producer David Soutar of the Netflix hit show Sunderland ‘Til I Die, comes to the Nordic Media Festival.

This documentary series provides a unique glimpse into the everyday minutiae of football that rarely gets any attention in the press. We get to join players to the psychologist, see the coach engaged in fisticuffs with an enraged fan, and we hold our breaths together with the director of sports when the window shuts on difficult trades and transitions.

How did they negotiate this incredible access? The former captain of the team said in an interview once that 99 percent of the squad hated the whole idea of being in a documentary series. How did the director convert the entire locker room?

Like Top Gear was the car show for those of us who don’t care about cars, Sunderland ‘Til I Die is the football show for those of us who don’t necessarily like football. Before you know it, you’ll be standing on your couch, cheering for a goal being scored in the lower English leagues - eighteen months ago.

Coming to the Nordic Media Festival is David Soutar. He produced and directed the first Netflix acquisition of production company Fulwell73, Sunderland ‘Til I Die. The show is the first English sports documentary series on Netflix that has received worldwide rave reviews.