The Australian screen industry is going through an incredibly exciting time, according to local star Luke Arnold.
Speaking to Variety Australia to promote the new season of Stan’s crime drama. “Scrublands,” the Adelaide-born actor who shot to stardom after his award-winning performance as late INXS legend Michael Hutchence, said streaming services have been crucial to the backing and promotion of local projects and its actors.
“Streaming has been so fantastic, that when you make an Australian show, you’re not hoping that some Italian network is gonna take out one of their own shows and put you on prime time,” he said.
“These streamers around the world can pick up our shows. And we’ve seen very clearly how Australian productions meet that world standard… we do just have the best crews in the world. We have some of the best actors in the world that now don’t have to go to the other side of the world to work in stuff that gets seen by everyone.
“It probably was a thing that when we were only exporting a small amount of stuff, there was probably more pressure to do things that had that particular kind of Australian brand – a particular look of Australia, a particular kind of show – and what’s great now is we get to do everything.”
“Scrublands” season two is a good example of that. While the first season of the show, a murder mystery centred around award-winning investigative journalist Martin Scarsden (Arnold), was set in a rural town and showcased the Aussie outback, season two is set in a coastal town.
Per Stan, “Scrublands” follows Scarsden who has “returned to his coastal hometown, Port Silver, to set up a new life with partner Mandy Bond (Bella Heathcote). When he arrives to find his childhood friend Jasper brutally murdered and Mandy the prime suspect, Martin struggles with doubts – about Mandy and about his own ability to recognise the truth. As he pushes forward to find the real murderer and absolve Mandy, Martin confronts secrets about Port Silver and his long-buried past.”
“It’s like a version of Australia that hasn’t really been seen on screen before,” Arnold said of the new season.
“It’s a coastal town but it ain’t Summer Bay! It’s this kind of misty, moody, southwestern corner of Australia with humpback whales and a very different look.
“I didn’t really maybe even know what it was about ‘Scrublands’ until seeing it for the first time It just has an engine that not a lot of mystery shows have, where these four episodes just rocket through. We get a lot of story done.
“While there is a lot of character there, and there’s a lot of theme and mood, it just has a different kind of engine than most shows you’ll find out there, I think.”
Scrublands season two is available to watch on Stan now.