ISLAMABAD: Turkey and Pakistan have announced plans to co-produce a television series on the life of Salahuddin al-Ayyubi, a revered Muslim general popularly known in the West as Saladin.
The TV series will be produced by Pakistan’s Ansari & Shah Films and Turkey’s Akli Films. The series, featuring actors from Turkey and Pakistan, will be shot in Turkey and is planned to have three seasons.
“Contract signed between Akli Films and Ansari&Shah Films,” Akli Films owner Emre Konuk said in a tweet. “May this international project, which will be prepared with the cooperation of Turkey and Pakistan, be beneficial to our country and our art world.”
A happy news on a blessed Friday night! Contract signed between Akli Films and Ansari&Shah Films about ‘Sultan Selahaddin Ayyubi’. May this international project, which will be prepared with the cooperation of Turkey and Pakistan, be beneficial to our country and our art world.
— Emre KONUK (@emrekonukk) August 20, 2021
Konuk said he was happy to realise the project, despite being aware of the difficulty in portraying “this great person who left his mark in history and all over the world.”
The first sultan of Egypt and Syria and founder of the Ayyubid dynasty, Salahuddin (1138-1193) led the Muslim military campaign against the Crusader states in the Levant. After the battle of Hattin in 1187, he retook Jerusalem from the Crusaders who had conquered Palestine 88 years earlier.
