We see her tenacious spirit and her canny ability with problem-solving, which she's been doing in the background with Lucien for years."Īs the bodies begin to pile up, she also proves, like her husband, to be an inveterate sticky beak and a self-styled sleuth. Her look is very different: it's not so much about aprons and practical shoes. "We're seeing a woman literally come from the kitchen into the working world. "She's courageous, but she's damaged," says Garner.
The telemovie finds Jean understandably changed: privately grieving her missing husband and trying to negotiate a new life as the first woman elected to the town council. Another is that the producers initially cast an actor of the calibre of Garner, who's widely regarded with admiration and affection, and is strong enough to rebuild around.
One is that, after five simmering seasons of URST (unresolved sexual tension) between Lucien and Jean, they married in the ABC finale, enabling the continuing use of the Blake name in the title. There are a few serendipitous positives amid the upheavals for the drama. "Jean's always been the font of knowledge of everything local," notes Adams. But it does feel like a different show."Īdams says of the reboot: "We've taken a male-dominated police procedural and turned it into a female-dominated murder mystery series, a Miss Marple or Murder, She Wrote kind of thing." It's now built around Ballarat native Jean and her knowledge of the town and its history, as well as the skills she learned assisting Lucien. And eight months after Lucien went to Sydney to investigate a case he has disappeared without a trace.Īdams admits that McLachlan's absence has been "tricky" for plot development and Garner says that she had "a few wobbly moments before we started", adding: "We've been so busy trying to get this done in 13 days that I've really had to concentrate on getting through the call sheet. Its production base is still the Port Melbourne complex that houses the substantial, lovingly detailed set for the Blake home.īut, says Wright, "It feels like a totally new show" as it takes up the story late in 1963, three years after the ABC telemovie, in the dawning era of television and after the assassination of the American president. Writer Paul Jenner has previously worked on the show, as has director Ian Barry and members of the crew. Many elements of the production remain unchanged. He points to Seven's success with Downton Abbey as a positive sign.
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With the move to commercial TV comes the chance to introduce a new audience to the world of Blake, along with the hope that those previously devoted to what Wright calls a "comfort drama" will again engage with it. While shooting the telemovie in a lightning-fast 13 days mid-year, the producers put a positive spin on a problematic situation. It's an outing that will test the waters and gauge the significant variables: will fans follow Blake to a commercial network and suffer the ads? Can the community built around the good doctor – which again features policeman chief superintendent Matthew Lawson (Joel Tobeck) and newly promoted police surgeon Alice Harvey (Belinda McClory) – exist convincingly without him? And can Garner's Jean carry the show?
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Now Adams and Wright have refashioned the crime series around the redoubtable Jean, retitled it and boiled it down to a single telemovie. (McLachlan denies the allegations and has taken defamation action against Fairfax Media, publishers of this article). And Blake will discover that the key to solving this unsolvable puzzle may lie somewhere in the past, and the tortured relationship he shared with his own father.Allegations of sexual misconduct against McLachlan in January put an end to that plan. Along the way he and Jean will have to navigate through three murders, two weddings and a funeral. The further Blake digs, the more complicated these cases will prove to be. It soon becomes clear that his case and the murder at the wedding are actually intertwined. Instead he’s tasked by an estranged relative to investigate a seemingly innocuous missing persons case in Melbourne. And Blake, of course, is still forbidden from working the case, as he’s no longer the Police Surgeon. But then the next morning a prominent member of the bridal party is found dead at the Reception venue. The night quickly turns ugly, and Blake and Jean make a hasty retreat, glad to have put all that nastiness behind them. A few weeks ahead of their own nuptials they’ve been invited to what promises to be Ballarat’s society wedding of the season. It’s 1961, and wedding bells are in the air.
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