SINGAPORE — To continue reaching out to senior citizens, dialect drama 吃饱没? (translated as Jiak Ba Buay or Eat Already?) will be returning for a second season in late February next year and a new dialect variety show will also be introduced.  

There will be 10 episodes in the second season of 吃饱没?,  which aims to better communicate government messages and information to seniors. The programme is a collaboration between the MCI and Mediacorp, in partnership with Chuan Pictures and Tribal Worldwide. As with season one, season two will be directed by Royston Tan.

Said Tan: “Weaving government messages for seniors into a dialect TV drama while keeping it entertaining has been a challenging but meaningful experience. We adopted a humorous approach to the screenplay, and tried to crunch complicated policy terms into witty, memorable bite-sized information. I’m glad the drama has resonated well with seniors, and hope they will continue to follow the series into the new season.”

After 吃饱没? airs its last episode for season one this Friday, a new 10-episode dialect variety series will then be shown during the same time slot — Friday, from 12pm to 12.30pm, on Channel 8 — from Dec 2, 2016 to February 2017.

The new variety show, titled 欢喜就好 or Happy Can Already!, will be produced by Mediacorp and J Team, led by local director Jack Neo. It will also seek to keep seniors informed on issues such as healthcare, retirement adequacy, SkillsFuture and SGSecure.

Minister of State for Communications and Information and Health Chee Hong Tat said:  “The new dialect variety show allows us to try out a different concept to reach out and communicate with seniors. Similar to 吃饱没?,  the end in mind is to enhance our communication with seniors using an entertaining format and in a language which they are most familiar with, without changing the existing policies on dialect usage in broadcast media.”

The drama series 吃饱没? has so far garnered more than 1.6 million online views.