The Norwegian premium drama directed by Per Olav Sørensen premiered on Sunday on NRK1.

NRK media analyst Håkon Lund Sørensen told nordicfilmandtvnews.com: "750,000 viewers saw the first episode of Nobel, this gave the series a market share of 45 %. These figures are almost twice as high as the slot average for NRK1. Also, already 40.000 have seen the first episode on NRKs streaming service, NRK.TV."

The political thriller/war drama co-written by Mette Marit Bøstad and Stephen Uhlander is the latest high end drama directed by Sørensen. The director’s previous drama The Heavy Water War had a stronger opening with 1.2 million viewers, but then the historical drama was launched at a busier TV viewing period early January 2015.

Commenting on the premiere, Sørensen told nrk.no he had bet on 750,000 viewers on linear TV so he is very pleased with the numbers. “The Heavy Water War was a national happening that gathered Norwegians from 10 to 100 years-old. Nobel has somewhat older viewers; it is a contemporary piece and political comment, plus it has a 15 age limit. Therefore, being able to create and send such a show on prime time TV and gather nearly 800,000 viewers the first weekend is extremely good”, he said.

Nobel was produced by Monster Scripted in co-production with Sirena Film, in collaboration with DR, SVT, RUV, with support from the Norwegian Film Institute and Nordisk Film & TV Fond.  The drama starring Aksel Hennie, Tuva Novotny and Anders Danielsen Lie is sold worldwide by DRG. The series is competing for a Prix Italia.