★★★★★ 0/5

ABC considers Crownies spin-off

Exclusive: ABC1 Channel Controller Brendan Dahill confirms Crownies will not return in its current form -but a spin-off is in the works.

70
Leave a comment

EXCLUSIVE: Ambitious legal drama Crownies will have its final episode on ABC1 next week, but the drama may have life in the form of another spin-off.

“Crownies won’t be coming back as Crownies,” ABC1 Channel Controller Brendan Dahill tells TV Tonight.

“But we are talking to (producers) Screentime about a spin-off. There are lots of things I love about Crownies and lots of things that were done brilliantly, and I’m really proud of Crownies.

“I’m genuinely surprised it didn’t engage a bigger audience than it did. Genuinely surprised. But I don’t want to throw the baby out with the bathwater. There are plenty of brilliant things in it and we’re talking to Screentime at the moment.

“That’s why we haven’t made the announcement yet about no Season Two. It’s not a Season Two of Crownies, it’s a spin-off from Crownies that takes Crownies and the characters in a slightly different direction.”

The 22 part drama was ABC’s most ambitious and expensive drama in years, but launched to modest ratings and mixed reviews.

“The criticism comes in the more soapie elements and fair enough. But there were plenty of really on-the-pulse moments. The Dominique Strauss-Kahn case, babies dying of dehydration in the car because people leave them there. There were so many cases when you open your paper they’re right there and the production team were right on the pulse of what Australian courts are inundated with,” Dahill explains.

The show was not announced as returning during ABC’s 2012 Programming Launch this week because Dahill says he was still considering his options in recent weeks.

“I’ll be completely honest, I was undecided. There’s bits of Crownies that have really worked and I didn’t want to throw them away because of (poor) ratings,” he says.

“So what Screentime have come up with is a really great compromise that allows us to keep the best bits, and learn and move on.”

He also cites Hamish Michael and Marta Dusseldorp as two of his favourite performers in the show.

“Hopefully they will get recognised when Awards season comes around, but they’re up against some stiff competition.”

A spin-off is rare in Australian drama but it isn’t unprecedented. As far back as 1976 Solo One was a spin-off from Crawford Productions’ Matlock Police. E Street also had a major makeover while The Flying Doctors became RFDS. Pacific Drive was changed from a late night M rated show to a PG daytime show when it got axed. A Country Practice and Neighbours also switched networks while Chances bore no resemblance to its original premise.

Dahill emphasises it is still early days on the development of the spin-off.

“Nothing is signed. We’re still talking through creatively how it’s going to look.

Screentime is positive, creative and energised all the time and we’d love to keep that going.

“I’m hoping it might be late 2012, but it might end up in early 2013, purely because we’ve got such a rich drama slate in 2012 and I will be hard-pressed to get it in the schedule.

“We’ve learned from the experience and Screentime have learned.

“Hopefully next time round we’ll get it better.”
 

70 Responses

  2. So ABC’s programmer who was part of the team who greenlit Crownies and knew exactly what kind of show it was is now considering a spin-off. Mate the show was a failure both in terms of audience and creatively. Its reviews were tepid. Some of the writing was atrocious. It ploughed no new ground. You don’t make spin-offs of failures. Count your losses, strike the sets and move on. Get at least two 13 parters into development asap and this time think about who the ABC1 audience is. Surely the ABC’s head of television should step in and put a stop to this. I thought Bed of Roses was a new low in ABC drama but Crownies really took the cake.

  3. I wanted to like Crownies but gave up watching it halfway through episode 3. I found the characters to be too smug and extremely unlikeable. Maybe it was too close to art imitating life. Writers need to realise that most characters should be like friends you invite over to your home for a BBQ. Of course irritating characters are necessary but they should be in the minority. IMO this is where Crownies failed.

  4. Crownies was pretty good but somewhere along the way it lost me a bit. I was intrigued by Janet; thought the drunk bloke was one dimensional (but good storyline about why he see drinks); Richard was excellent but became a characature; the bird with the perky breasts annoyed me. But it was good enough to record so i have about 15 episodes sitting on TiVo for the off-season.

    If the producers are wondering why it didn’t go so well, it almost lost me with the sexed up billboards and bus posters promoting the series. Let the writers loose with some meaty topics that don’t need the pretty desert to prop them up.

  7. “I’m genuinely surprised it didn’t engage a bigger audience than it did. Genuinely surprised…Hopefully next time round we’ll get it better.” Oh deary me. Don’t you worry, Mr Dahill. You carry on with your tinkering and take all the time and taxpayer dollars you need, mate.

  8. This is fantastic news. Hope they keep Janet and Richard on. I don’t think the “soap elements” were badly handled at all, that’s the stuff that made me care about the characters.

  10. I liked it the way it is but this is better than cutting it. I hope you give it another shot. The characters were fantastic and I have enjoyed watching and laughing with them. I thought the stories managed a dark and light side very well so I hope you stick with it, keep the loyal audience you have and attract a new one as well.

  12. Kudos to the ABC for trying to make this work. Crownies had many, many elements that worked very well, but the combination of the soapie element with the hard hitting legal stuff didn’t sit well together, so I’d be very interested to see what could come of tweaking the concept.

  13. Sounds like a decent spinoff might work, the series definitely improved as it went along. Crown solicitors with their tits hanging out all over the place didn’t ring true, a bit of a cover-up is probably in order there. And a name change would probably help.

  14. Crownies works. It engages intelligent viewers of all ages. ABC made the mistake of adding the gratuitous soapie element to appeal to a different audience.

    A spinoff is a great idea to get back to what the show is best poised to do: bring to life legal cases which have interested australians over the last 20years.

  15. If Screentime couldn’t get Crownies right in the course of 26 episodes, then they’re unlikely to get it right with a spin-off.

    The problem, as with so many Aussie TV series, is the writers don’t have a clue about creating characters that are both believable and intriguing, and any story not based on legal cases (or police files, as in Underbelly) is hopelessly inept. What they did to Hamish Michael’s character, Richard, through the series was unspeakable. Most of it wasn’t remotely believable (pretending to be gay, sleeping under his desk, throwing away great wads of cash) and the result is a spineless, dim-witted, unlikeable character.

  19. Screentime are already producing 2 drama series for Nine next year. The ABC should give another company the commission. There is almost a Screentime house style in Crownies and that may have been part of the problem. The ABC needs to commission bespoke drama – individualistic gems like The Slap, not assembly line soap dressed up as “issue of the week”, “ripped from the front page”. It’s just spin.

  20. I hope the show comes back in some form next year – it’s really improved in quality in recent weeks. And yes, Hamish Michael as Richard Sterling is outstanding.

  21. I agree that it had some brilliant drama and was only spoilt by the soapie elements. It had the potential to be a long running workplace drama like All Saints but it was more soapie than All Saints ever was.

  25. I loved Crownies. It was clever and thoroughly entertaining. Not surprised they won’t renew it though, but I hope to see the characters again – even if it’s in a different form.

Leave a Reply