SBS gets Dead Lucky drama

Australian pubcaster SBS is preparing a crime thriller featuring Rachel Griffiths and from a fledgling prodco launched by showrunners Ellie Beaumont and Drew Proffitt.

Dead Lucky, which starts filming in Sydney this week, is from Subtext Pictures and uses multiple perspectives to tell the story of two feuding detectives as they hunt down a murderer.

Beaumont and Proffitt, who worked on the first four seasons of Nine Network show House Husbands, have created and written the series. It is being produced with Diane Haddon and directed by filmmaker David Caesar.

Executive producers are Sue Masters for SBS and Beaumont, Proffitt, Nina Stevenson and Greg Sitch. The four-part series is set to air on SBS in 2018.

The show is being produced with investment from funding bodies Screen Australia in association with Create NSW and stars Griffiths, who is known for Muriel’s Wedding, Six Feet Under and Hilary.

SBS is already producing Screen Australia-backed dramas Sunshine and Safe Harbour.

Marshall Heald, SBS director of television and online content, said the show “continues SBS’s run of premium, thought-provoking dramas exploring social themes that resonate deeply with Australian audiences.”

Subtext was founded by Beaumont and Proffitt last year and is focused on making original, authored drama. The duo claim 40 years combined experience in writers’ rooms, with credits including Newton’s Law, Cleverman, Lockie Leonard and The Secret Life of Us.