Local Drama - Sea Patrol the TV show Australia desperately needs!
June 14th 2007 12:55
I felt so bad about dissing Lisa McCune in her musical theatre incarnation in Sydney Theatre Company's production of 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee that I decided to give a well deserved plug to her upcoming TV drama on Channel Nine.
Discerning Australian TV viewers will tell you that home grown television drama has not exactly been flourishing of late. Indeed after Lisa McCune left Blue Healers and Georgie Parker left All Saints both shows careened out of control into overly "soapie" territory leaving audiences everywhere rushing for the remote control!
McCleod's Daughters has remained something of a stalwart, like our very own version of Desperate Housewives... only country style, they have collected awards and ratings like nobody's business, but it's still not what you'd call "quality" drama.
When Home and Away takes out the Best Drama logie and Kate Ritchie nabs the Gold Logie (got nothing against her, but seriously if she were that good she wouldn't be on Home and Away) then you know something is seriously wrong with the state of affairs.
Enter Nine's latest BIG drama hopeful with a cast, a premise and a perspective series of plots that looks set to do more than simply please. It's called Sea Patrol and it's set on an aged Fremantle class patrol boat on its last tour of duty in the Coral Sea patrolling Australia's coastward borders.
The ship, the HMAS Hammersley, has a crew of just twenty-four, and the principle cast of Sea Patrol will feature the interactions of ten of them. Lisa McCune heads the cast as the Executive Officer (XO) of the ship, Lieutenant Kate McGregor, an efficient Australian Defense Force Academy graduate who has already served on the big ships.
This is her big promotion and she can now look forward to a prosperous and successful future in the Navy.
Her one slip, a brief affair years ago during her training with another officer, Mike Flynn... did I mention that he is the Commanding Officer of the Hammersley?
These two former lovers and tough as nails by-the-bookers are thrown together and they're damned well going to do their duty regardless of how awkward it should be - and that's only the beginning of the social drama.
The crew members have all sorts of perils lurking beneath the decks from a gossiping cook (Thank God Your Here's Josh Lawson) to the chemistry between the crews only woman aside from the XO and the unfufilled chemistry she shares with the Electronics Technician and the unco-operative communications officer.
While the human social drama sounds fair enough I am happy to say it is the least of this shows storyline. The Hammersley is twenty-four years old, due for retirement and yet still required to patrol vast areas of Ocean in searing heat and violent storms.
Moreover her crew has to deal on a daily basis with people-smugglers, pirates, illegal whaling and fishing and any and all forms of suspicious or criminal activity that takes place in its patrol zone.
All this has to be done in very confined quarters and for very extended periods in which home and family are a very very long way away - and as for love on board? Look but do not touch! Any relationship is an infraction of Naval regulations.
There is action - a hell of a lot of action! There is human drama and conflict - believable human drama and conflict! There is humour - non-cheesy or tacky humour! And frankly with the almost guaranteed overwhelming success of this thirteen-part drama there is at last hope for Australian TV drama once again.
The show is billed as "Coming Soon" by Channel Nine just at present, but the website has some killer video's in the meantime so go along and take a gander. It may sound like Blue Heelers at sea, but frankly if you remember the prosperous early years of Blue Heelers that is by no means a bad thing! This is something new and something different and I am already looking forward to seeing it.
Sea Patrol... BRING IT ON!!!!!!!!!!!
Discerning Australian TV viewers will tell you that home grown television drama has not exactly been flourishing of late. Indeed after Lisa McCune left Blue Healers and Georgie Parker left All Saints both shows careened out of control into overly "soapie" territory leaving audiences everywhere rushing for the remote control!
McCleod's Daughters has remained something of a stalwart, like our very own version of Desperate Housewives... only country style, they have collected awards and ratings like nobody's business, but it's still not what you'd call "quality" drama.
Lisa McCune in Nine's upcoming drama Sea Patrol as XO Lieutenant Kate McGregor
Enter Nine's latest BIG drama hopeful with a cast, a premise and a perspective series of plots that looks set to do more than simply please. It's called Sea Patrol and it's set on an aged Fremantle class patrol boat on its last tour of duty in the Coral Sea patrolling Australia's coastward borders.
This is her big promotion and she can now look forward to a prosperous and successful future in the Navy.
Ian Stenlake as McCune forbidden love interest and ships Commander Mike Flynn
Her one slip, a brief affair years ago during her training with another officer, Mike Flynn... did I mention that he is the Commanding Officer of the Hammersley?
These two former lovers and tough as nails by-the-bookers are thrown together and they're damned well going to do their duty regardless of how awkward it should be - and that's only the beginning of the social drama.
The crew members have all sorts of perils lurking beneath the decks from a gossiping cook (Thank God Your Here's Josh Lawson) to the chemistry between the crews only woman aside from the XO and the unfufilled chemistry she shares with the Electronics Technician and the unco-operative communications officer.
While the human social drama sounds fair enough I am happy to say it is the least of this shows storyline. The Hammersley is twenty-four years old, due for retirement and yet still required to patrol vast areas of Ocean in searing heat and violent storms.
Moreover her crew has to deal on a daily basis with people-smugglers, pirates, illegal whaling and fishing and any and all forms of suspicious or criminal activity that takes place in its patrol zone.
Saskia Burmeister as the only other woman aboard, Navigation Officer Lieutenant Nicki Caetano
All this has to be done in very confined quarters and for very extended periods in which home and family are a very very long way away - and as for love on board? Look but do not touch! Any relationship is an infraction of Naval regulations.
There is action - a hell of a lot of action! There is human drama and conflict - believable human drama and conflict! There is humour - non-cheesy or tacky humour! And frankly with the almost guaranteed overwhelming success of this thirteen-part drama there is at last hope for Australian TV drama once again.
The show is billed as "Coming Soon" by Channel Nine just at present, but the website has some killer video's in the meantime so go along and take a gander. It may sound like Blue Heelers at sea, but frankly if you remember the prosperous early years of Blue Heelers that is by no means a bad thing! This is something new and something different and I am already looking forward to seeing it.
Sea Patrol... BRING IT ON!!!!!!!!!!!
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