Amazon Orders Docuseries on First-Ever Esports World Cup Directed by R.J. Cutler (EXCLUSIVE)
By Jennifer Maas
May 27, 2025
Amazon’s Prime Video has ordered a five-part docuseries about the inaugural “Esports World Cup,” which is set to premiere June 6 ahead of the Saudi Arabia-based sporting event’s second annual games.
Directed by Emmy-winning filmmaker R.J. Cutler (“Billie Eilish: The World’s a Little Blurry,” “Elton John: Never Too Late and Martha”), “Esports World Cup: Level Up” follows the events of the first-ever Esports World Cup in Summer 2024, “a game-changing event in the global esports landscape, where more than $60 million in total prize money sparked a high-stakes, multinational battle to become the world’s top esports Club.”
Per the description for the series, “‘Esports World Cup: Level Up’ takes fans inside a new global sport and worldwide competition that’s redefining what it means to be a champion for the next generation of athletes and fans. R.J. Cutler and his team were there to go behind-the-scenes of the EWC, which was watched globally by over 500 million viewers last summer. The expert storytellers took in all the excitement and drama, both in and out of the arena, revealing the intense rivalries, personal sacrifices, and extraordinary talent fueling the sport’s elite.”
Cutler is already in pre-production for a second season following the upcoming 2025 Esports World Championship, which kicks off in July in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
“We are prepping Season 2 as we speak!” Cutler told Variety. “In fact, the opening ceremony for the next EWC is only 2 months away. There’s $70 million in prize money, and this year, for the first time, Clubs are returning to defend their titles. It’s all so new to us, but when you see it in person, it feels like you’re present at the birth of an evolutionary moment in sports. As we said during filming last year, just because something lacks a history, doesn’t mean it’s not historic.”
Directed by Cutler, “Level Up” is produced by Sony Pictures Television’s This Machine. John Dorsey serves as showrunner and executive produces alongside Jane Cha Cutler, Trevor Smith, Elise Pearlstein and Mark Blatty.
“A win might make the headlines — but the real story is the people behind it,” Esports World Cup Foundation CEO Ralf Reichert said. “Level Up dives into the human side of esports: the pressure, the ambition, the sacrifices. It’s about what it really takes to compete at the highest level — and why it matters. R.J. is the best at bringing those stories to life, and this one captures the heart of what we’re building.”
According to Amazon, the “Level Up” docuseries follows multiple EWC subjects, including:
● Soka (Team Falcons), hailing from the rough streets of Oakland, is the smack-talking extrovert who flips the script on the gamer-loner stereotype. He taunts his rivals, rallies his team and calls his shot, but his bravado masks the struggles overcome from his childhood.
● FAKER (T1), whose celebrity in South Korea rivals that of the most popular K-pop bands, must compete with his own legend and the isolation that comes from his own mystique. There’s greatness and then there are legends. Jordan, Tiger, Messi. In esports, it’s FAKER.
● Sanford (Team Liquid), the 19-year-old gaming prodigy from the Philippines, sees his life change after his father suffers a stroke, leaving him as the primary breadwinner for his family. Despite his young age, the stakes couldn’t be higher, making his journey in esports about more than just winning titles.
● Drazah (Atlanta FaZe), raised by his single mom with his seven brothers and sisters, heads back to his humble origins to explain how a pro gamer emerged from a rickety shed in North Pole, Alaska to the biggest stage in esports.
● Chel & Cinny (Team Vitality), sisters from a remote corner of Indonesia, are leading the most dominant women’s team in Mobile Legends: Bang Bang history. They’ve won every tournament since their team entered the scene in 2021, but their beloved grandfather dies the day they arrive in Riyadh, putting their tournament in jeopardy.
● Yevhen Zolotarov, the CEO of Ukrainian Club NAVI, is fighting for the friends and family he left behind. On the first day of Russia’s invasion, his infant son was awakened by explosions. The next day, electricity was cut off in the area. He and his team are competing to support their war-torn homeland.
● Mossad Aldossary, the 24-year-old CEO of Team Falcons, was once a kid growing up in Riyadh. Now, he’s leading the nation’s favorite Club with a chance to make sure the Cup stays at home. With the pride of a nation in the balance – not to mention so much prize money on the line – he feels the pressure to perform.
See below for Variety‘s Q&A with Cutler about the “Esports World Cup: Level Up” docuseries.
How did the project come about — who approached who for the doc?
This project was brought to us by our partners at Sony Television Non-Fiction. We immediately leapt at the opportunity to tell stories in this exciting universe, and the project quickly came together.
What was it like filming portions on the ground in Saudi Arabia vs. the U.S.?
As you can imagine, Saudi Arabia delivers on the David Lean Cinemascope vistas. So it’s a widescreen experience to be sure. But it’s also a place rich with cultural detail that you can only really observe close up. Some of those details are in opposition to one another – the ancient and the modern, the religious and the secular -particularly in Riyadh. On one corner, there’s a 500-year-old mosque, and on another, a Jon & Vinny’s and Randy’s Donuts straight outta LA. I kid you not. Riyadh itself is like an oasis of sci-fi architecture surrounded by desert. If you squint, it’s like the set of “Dune.”
As for the event itself, the scope of what’s been built there to house the EWC is astounding. Three huge purpose-built arenas. The scale of it all really brings home how ascendant gaming culture is. They say it’s bigger than the film and music industry combined. When you see what they built for the EWC, that reality starts to sink in.
How did you select which subjects to focus on in the doc?
For us, it’s all about finding the best characters with the highest stakes. There were 22 games at the EWC last year. Even a hardcore gamer isn’t going to know the x’s and o’s of every game. And so it’s character that helps us root for someone even when we don’t know the rules. A lot of people have preconceptions about what a great gamer looks like. We looked for great talents that subvert those expectations. It’s not just that they’re great at a game. It’s also about the reasons why they were driven to become great. In life, everyone is either running to something or away from something. This is a concept everyone can understand. When you see an 18-year-old gamer who’s spoon-feeding his father because his dad just had a stroke, you know that this pro-gamer kid has to be the breadwinner now. He’s not playing for a high score or bragging rights. He’s playing for something much bigger. “Esports World Cup: Level Up”
