“But, at bottom, all good stories are the only kind of story, the story written by an individual man from his individual truth”, Ray Bradbury, “Zen in the art of writing”.
Extraordinary life stories, such as those of heroes and fantastic beings, permeate fictional narratives for the publishing market, television, films and comics. Raphael Draccon and Carolina Munhoz were chosen as Pop Junctions case studies for being a romantic and professionally successful duo in these areas of entertainment and culture. Before meeting, they had already followed successful paths and formed an incredible fandom in Brazil as bestsellers, admired by references such as Paulo Coelho. The fandom has already spread to the rest of the world with hit series for Netflix, HBO Max and a DC comic, which has just been released. Together they have sold over a million copies of books.
Raphael Draccon and Carolina Munhoz were also chosen as case studies because they bring together unusual and strong characteristics as content creators, able to read a world and translate it to increasingly sophisticated and broad audiences in an aesthetic and a universal language without losing their creative DNA. It is unusual to find successful cross-platform creators in every medium in which they offer to work, especially considering that after having conquered a prosperous space in Latin America and Portugal, they are increasingly becoming a reference on one of the main and most competitive audiovisual markets in the world: Los Angeles.
Raphael Draccon was born in Rio de Janeiro (Brazil) in 1981, and began his professional career at the age of 16 in local newspapers. At 18, he became a teacher in a martial arts dojo (big fan of Bruce Lee!). At 19, he entered film school, specializing in film writing. At age 20, he received an American Screenwriter Association (ASA) Merit Award for his first feature screenplay, the supernatural drama “In Your Hands.” The script was delivered by Stuart Manashil, of Creative Artist Agency (CAA), to Will Smith, as well as James van Praagh, best-selling writer and producer of the “Ghost Whisperer” series.
From the age of 21, he became a screenwriter, screenplay evaluator and script doctor for several production companies such as O2 Filmes (director Fernando Meirelles, of City of God). At 22, he wrote the first novel in the series of fantastic literature: “Dragons of Ether”. He was a finalist in the “Best Videoclip” category, with singer Cláudia Leitte, at the Multishow Awards and Meus Prêmios Nick, on the Multishow and Nickelodeon television channels.
At 25, he became the youngest author to sign with the Spanish publisher Planeta do Brasil, remaining for six months among the best-selling authors. Two years later, he joined the Portuguese publishing holding Leya in Brazil. He wrote the “Cavernas & Dragões” column in “Sedentário & Hiperativo”, nominated for MTV VMB with more than 2 million unique visits per month, and became a member of the largest Brazilian Internet cinema podcast, Rapaduracast.
He was responsible for the nomination of the work of George RR Martin, “Crônicas de Gelo & Fogo”, for the publisher Leya BR and made his debut in the Portuguese literary market with the book “Espíritos de Gelo”, from l publisher GaiBooks. His fantastic literary series “Dragões de Éter” reached the milestone of 500,000 copies in Brazil. The first book in the series was released on August 16, 2011 in Portugal by Editora Dom Quichotte. At 30, he became editorial coordinator of the Leya BR holding company and editor-in-chief of fantasy literature at Fantasy – Casa da Palavra editions.
In 2013 he was invited by HBO to be one of the ambassadors of the official exhibition of Game of Thrones in Brazil and officially joined the room of the authors of the editorial group Random House thanks to the sale of the rights in Spanish of ” Dragões de Éter” series at Random House Mondadori. During a launch tour in Mexico, “Dragones de eter – Cazadores de Brujas” reached number 4 in the top 10 in Mexico. Raphael Draccon is the author of 11 books.
In 2015, he joined the screenwriting team of Rede Globo de Televisão, one of the ten largest television broadcasters in the world. Currently, he and Carolina Munhoz were considered by the US government to be an “alien of extraordinary ability”, receiving an Einstein visa and moving to California. In 2019, they made their Netflix debut as writers and executive producers.
Carolina Munhoz is 32 years old. She is a journalist, screenwriter and novelist – chosen as best writer by the Young Brazilian Award and by the Shorty Awards in New York. She is the author of 10 best-selling fantasy books in Brazil. Paulo Coelho mentioned her and the name of Raphael Draccon at the Frankfurt Book Fair (the most important in the world), as a Brazilian writer who should represent the country on the world stage. She was screenwriter and script doctor for Rede Globo de Globo Filmes. The writer has more than 250 fan clubs, 300,000 books sold and 200,000 followers on social networks, reaching four times the Trend Topics of Brazilian twitter.
Raphael Draccon and Carolina Munhoz currently have two original Netflix series as writers and producers: “O Escondido”, with two seasons, and “Cidade Invisível (Invisible City)”, which reached the Top 10 of the 60 countries, remaining first in Brazil for weeks. . They were recently signed by HBO Max; they will be responsible for creating and developing original television series and films. They are represented by Hollywood agencies CAA and The Gotham Group.
Both are authors of 1 of the 8 comic book stories, “DC’s Harley Quinn Romances #1”, which has just been released in the United States. This is a special edition celebrating Valentine’s Day called “Dating App Disaster” about one of the greatest Brazilian superheroines in the world of comics: Beatriz da Costa, known as Fogo.
There are a lot of interesting topics to cover and so this interview will be split into two parts. We will address biographical aspects to understand how the trajectories of authors are inspiring for young talents, aspects related to content creation, editorial and audiovisual business, interaction with technology and platforms, relationship with fandom and influence in the design and development of projects, the relationship between creators and major entertainment companies, and future projects will also be discussed.
Add comment