THE VERTIVAL
The Vertival is a French competition entirely dedicated to vertical fiction: series built for smartphones, more direct, more immersive, more addictive. Whether you're a director, screenwriter, content creator, student, professional or passionate amateur, it invites you to imagine the next great French vertical series, shot with a phone or a professional camera: only the strength of the story matters.
The concept
The platform opened for entries on September 15, 2026, until October 15, 2026, at vertival.fr. The competition is free and open to the whole French-speaking world.
Each project must include three pilot episodes in 9:16 format, 2 minutes maximum each, along with a synopsis of the full season. Episodes must be in French or subtitled in French.
All projects meeting the rules will be published on the Vertival platform: the public will be able to discover them, share them and vote for their favourite, while a jury of professionals will award its own prize.
The prizes
The competition awards a Jury Prize and an Audience Prize. Beyond the reward itself, both winning projects will benefit from full support: a financial grant, artistic and professional mentoring, and help developing a first season of 30 episodes of 2 minutes.
Partners
The Vertival has two first partners on board: médiaClub, a network of more than 9,000 audiovisual professionals, which will help promote the call for entries, the competition's key moments and the winning series; and EICAR, which will put its expertise and technical and human resources at the winners' disposal to help develop and produce their series.
Contact: contact@vertival.fr
Website: vertival.fr
Instagram: @vertival.fr
2026 calendar
- September 15Submissions open
- October 15Submissions close
- October – NovemberPublic vote
- NovemberJury deliberations
- November 27Vertival ceremony (venue to be announced)
About
The Vertival was founded by Isabelle Guénézan, producer and screenwriter, and Lisa Azuelos, director, screenwriter and producer, president of the jury for this first edition, with the ambition of bridging film, television and new digital creative formats.
The jury of the first edition
Thomas Dubois
Head of Original Content at Amazon
Lisa Azuelos
Director, screenwriter and producer, Vertival co-founder and jury president
Stéphane Foenkinos
Casting director and filmmaker
Sandra Ouaiss
Producer at Éléphant
Serge Hayat
Producer, film financing specialist
Alexandra Schamis
Agent at AS Talents
Jérémie Imbert
Creator of the CinéComédies Festival
Guillaume Sanjorge
Vertical series creator
Isabelle Guénézan
Producer, screenwriter and Vertival co-founder
A well-known figure from the film industry will also join the jury and will be revealed in November.