A scene from “Unsilenced.” Photo: Yes Studios

Yes Studios, the Israeli producer and distributor of the international acclaimed shows Fauda, Your Honor and Shtisel, announced on Tuesday at Series Mania the launch of a new scripted television series about sexual violence that is based by true events.

Inspired by the novel The Confidante by Odelia Carmon, the new six-part series Unsilenced is about “the lengths to which an influential perpetrator, in this case a president — and his allies — will go to silence victims, protect themselves and keep their crimes out of the public eye, and how women bound by experience can come together to seek justice,” according to a synopsis of the show provided by Yes Studios.

Set in the early 2000s, before the #MeToo movement, the series is about a recently elected president who continually forces himself on a young, ambitious woman who is a new member of his team. Wanting to keep her job, she turns to the president’s chief of staff for help, but he displays complicity with his boss by first looking away at what is unfolding in front of him and then, as things escalate, concocting a campaign to discredit the young woman and keep her silent.

“Refusing to be silenced for being a victim, she bravely pursues her claims of abuse, and is eventually joined by other women that the president had attacked as he rose through the political ranks,” Yes Studios explained. “Her courageous act, facing up to the
most powerful man in the country — and by association, the wide-ranging and equally guilty cohort that had continuously closed ranks around him — eventually sees the president convicted and imprisoned.”

Each of the first five episodes is told from a different perspective: two from individual victims — including the lead protagonist — and then one each from the president’s chief of staff, the president’s wife and finally the president himself. All the stories come together for a resolution that unfolds in the sixth episode.

The series stars Yaakov Zada Daniel from Fauda fame, Avraham Shalom Levi from Shtisel, Nelly Mira Rubin, Dana Meinrath and Irit Nathan Benedek. Yes Studios noted that while the show’s storyline was inspired by actual events, some characters and situations have been “changed for dramatic purposes” and “should not be taken as an accurate representation of history.”

“Impactful stories like the one so skillfully captured in Unsilenced have driven female empowerment and encouraged women
to use their voices against those who exploit positions of power,” said Sharon Levi, managing director of Yes Studios. “The lead character, operating in the pre-#metoo era, was a pioneer and while we also hear points of view from several finely drawn and complex characters in this series – including from the president himself – there is, in reality, only one truth.

“We are confident that Unsilenced will be in demand internationally, both as a completed series and a format, and that the main story arc and different perspectives in each episode will provoke discussion amongst audiences everywhere.”

The series was created by Levi, Tamar Marom, Moish Goldberg and Einat Zilber Damari, with Odelia Carmon as co-creator. It was written by Levi and Marom, directed by Goldberg and produced by Great Productions and Yes TV.