There are various ways to measure the extraordinary success of The Dynasty (A Dinasztia), Direkt36’s investigation into Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s inner circle’s financial empire and available for free in Hungarian with English subtitles on YouTube.
There’s the industry recognition the documentary received, including the Free Media Award, whose judges praised Direkt36 for their “valiant investigative journalism under exceedingly difficult circumstances”, as well as its reception at international festivals. There’s the 40% surge in subscribers Direkt36 attracted after the documentary’s release, a significant boost to an outlet which survives in part through its membership model. There’s the astonishing 4.1 million views The Dynasty has received on YouTube, a record for any journalistic work in Hungary, a country of 9.6 million people. All this points to a substantial public appetite for hard-hitting factual journalism delivered in a captivating way.
Another indicator of the documentary’s success, ironically, is the reaction of those the film exposed and their supporters, who couldn’t successfully discredit the documentary’s evidence, so tried to besmirch its producers’ reputations.
We were the targets of a pretty crazy, intense smear campaign
“We were the targets of a pretty crazy, intense smear campaign,” says András Pethő, who co-founded the independent Hungarian media outlet in 2014. “It started even before the film came out. It wasn’t pleasant to hear all those crazy accusations which had no basis in fact, such as that we were part of a Ukrainian intelligence operation. But in hindsight it actually helped the film because it generated so much interest. It was free promotion… It was such a blatant lie that it was clear for a lot of people that it was a lame pre-emptive strike from the government.”
Breaking out of the bubble
The Dynasty was released in February 2025, and documents how Orbán’s family and associates amassed immense wealth since the 1990s through public contracts, government-linked loans, and other means of political influence. The documentary was released in a year before critical elections when a serious challenger emerged to the ruling Fidesz party, and they were no longer able to control the public narrative as before.
“We had no idea it was going to be such a huge success,” says Pethő.
It was Direkt36’s second major foray into long-form documentary, following their earlier film on the Hungarian state’s failures to tackle the rising threat of hospital infections during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Pethő, like most of his colleagues, has a background in written journalism, but realised that Direkt36 needed to use different tools, such as films, podcasts and hosting live events outside Budapest, to break out of their bubble and reach new audiences.
Watch András Pethő discuss the impact and value of long-form journalism, and why he thinks it is currently undergoing a renaissance.
This whole new line of work was the result of a lot of thinking inside the organisation
“This whole new line of work was the result of a lot of thinking inside the organisation,” he says. “Four or five years ago, we started talking about what direction we should try to grow in. We could go horizontally or vertically.
In our case, horizontally would have meant publishing more frequently, maybe shorter pieces, perhaps setting up bureaus or having journalists in other geographic areas. Vertical growth is when you go even deeper, sticking to this long form storytelling, but in different ways.” This was the path that Direkt36 chose. Making documentaries entailed teaming up with independent filmmakers.
“We have to make sure that whatever we produce as a documentary or podcast meets the quality standard that we set for ourselves. But on the other hand, we’re not filmmakers and we don’t really speak the visual language filmmakers do. So it’s a genuine collaboration.”
Whatever the medium, Direkt36’s guiding principle remains the same. “We dig deep into a subject and tell stories nobody else does,” says Pethő.
This article is part of Civitates Annual Report 2025, which will be published in May 2026. To discover more stories like this one, stay in touch by signing up for our newsletter using the link below or follow us on LinkedIn.
