Australia has reinvented the BBC’s biggest crime hit. Does it work?

A classically Australian scene: a surf carnival. Sun, sea, smiles all round. On golden sands the lifesavers pull at their ropes and sprint across the beach. All is wholesome and serene. Until…goodness gracious, there’s a body in the water! Alas, death has come to Dolphin Cove.

And so begins Return to Paradise, the latest entry in what is now known as the “Paraverse”, the world that began with the BBC’s megahit murder mystery series Death in Paradise. That series, following a string of British detectives (beginning with Ben Miller, moving through Kris Marshall, Ardal O’Hanlon, Ralf Little and Don Gilet) solving fiendishly complex murders on the beautiful Caribbean island of Saint Marie.

Anna Samson in Return to Paradise.Credit: ABC

It’s been running since 2011 and is still going strong, feeding the British – and Australian – audience’s insatiable appetite for tricky whodunits. After Beyond Paradise, Return to Paradise is the second spin-off, and the first Australian entry, as well as the first Paraverse entry to feature a female detective.

The officer is Detective Inspector Mackenzie Clarke, played by Anna Samson (Home and Away, Jack Irish, Wake in Fright).

Samson is cognisant of the pressure that comes with taking the lead in the spin-off of such a beloved franchise.

“Yes, absolutely,” she says. “I’d be silly to say otherwise. There’s a pressure and an excitement and a fear. It’s like taking up that mantle from those maverick detectives. Along with the fear, there’s a lot of pride. I’m really proud to be the first female detective. I’m really proud that it’s Australia and it’s the ABC that’s made the move in the Paraverse to put a female in that lead role.”

It’s a well-worn genre, the genial, good-natured murder mystery. From myriad Agatha Christie adaptations to Midsomer Murders, Death in Paradise itself and countless others, the small-town setting where death stalks around every corner but luckily an uncommon genius is around to crack each case is familiar to all.

Which poses a particular challenge for Samson, as Mackenzie must fit into this long tradition while still making a mark as a distinctive character. She embraced the idiosyncrasies of the genre, where the darkness of the crime sits beside a quirky lightness.

“There’s an acknowledgment of genre in this show. We know what show we’re in, and we can play with that quite technically. You can be cheekier with the camera in a show like this. I’m always looking for the joke, where the funny is, even in the biggest of tragedies. But with this, you can bring it to the surface.”

The nature of Mackenzie, who in the first episode of Return comes back reluctantly to her home town of Dolphin Cove and finds herself unable to resist jumping into an ongoing murder investigation, was especially attractive to Samson. A prickly, somewhat irascible character, perhaps a little too forthright with her opinions, Mackenzie is infused with just a little of the woman who plays her, according to the actor.

“Anna’s own oddness is in Mackenzie maybe just turned up to 10,” she confirms. “The main thing is that she’s not overly preoccupied with being liked, which is a real relief to play. She can be abrupt and she can be rude and she’s a detective like that and making her my own was really embraced by everyone. It’s a happy marriage of those brilliant scripts and my own oddness.”

Those brilliant scripts are the product of a writing team led by the show’s creator, Peter Mattessi, a veteran Australian screenwriter who had been working in the UK for years on shows such as Eastenders when he was approached by a friend who worked at Red Planet, the company behind Death in Paradise.

“She approached me to say, ‘can you just help us understand how the Australian television industry works?’ And I was like, of course I can do that. In my mind I was thinking, ‘God, if they’re looking for someone for an Australian version of Death in Paradise, that’s a perfect job for me’. I basically said, ‘here’s all the information that you asked about how the Australian TV industry works … but also, could you give me a paragraph to pitch myself in for this?’”

Talking to Mattessi, it’s easy to see why his pitch was successful. The writer has a knowledge and love of the whodunit genre that would be hard to top.

“What is appealing about this show,” he enthuses, “is in the first five minutes, it’ll be a dead body. Forty-five minutes later, someone will be in handcuffs. Put the kettle on. I know there’s the gritty crime where there’s a body 10 minutes into episode one, and eight hours later you’ll find out who did it. But also eight hours later, you will understand that society is crumbling because of that. In Return of Paradise, it’s not the type of show where murder reveals a crumbling society.”

Catherine McClements and Anna Samson.Credit: ABC

The greatest attraction for Mattessi in writing the show is the puzzle being presented to the viewer. “The appeal is you can sit down and try to beat Mackenzie into figuring it out. When we get to the big denouement scene, Mackenzie’s going to tell you who did it, why they did it, how they did it. Are you good enough to get there with her?

“The audience for these shows is so engaged with it, and they’re merciless: if you make a clue too easy, they’ll be on you. If you make it too hard, it’s not fair. They’re playing, they’re involved, and I love that about it. It’s a very demanding audience to work for. Ninety per cent of our work is on the machine, on the mechanics of the puzzle.”

Whatever the percentage, Mattessi has at least got it right in the eyes of his leading lady.

“I think I love Peter Mattessi,” Samson exclaims. “We adore him. He is the kindest, gentlest, most collaborative creator of a show I’ve ever worked with. He would allow me to argue for things that I loved. He would allow me to question things I didn’t understand. I was gifted a lot of freedom to make it my own.”

Return to Paradise screens on ABC from Sunday, September 8 at 7.30pm

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