‘Heavily judged and discriminated against – but never shown on TV’: Stan’s Critical Incident shows the real Australia
A police officer pursues a teenage suspect and, during the chase, an innocent bystander is critically injured. Things get even worse for the constable when he discovers the young female he was chasing wasn’t even the perpetrator.
This is the premise behind the latest Stan Original Series, Critical Incident – a psychological crime thriller filmed and set in Western Sydney, written and created by Sarah Bassiuoni (The Secrets She Keeps), and produced by Matchbox Pictures.
The Matchbox Pictures production stars Zoë Boe (The Tree) as Dalia, the aforementioned suspect, and Akshay Khanna (Polite Society) as Senior Constable Zil Ahmed, as well as Roxie Mohebbi, Hunter Page-Lochard, Jai Waetford, Jackson Heywood, Zindzi Okenyo, Simone Kessell, and Erik Thomson.
It was filmed across Blacktown, Granville, Parramatta and Greenacre, and delves into the murky world of police corruption and the targeting of vulnerable communities. As Zil becomes consumed with guilt over the bystander’s injuries, and faces public and internal pressure, he becomes obsessed with pining a crime — any crime — on Dalia, in order to ease his burden.
It’s a nuanced take on what could have been a heavy-handed morality tale — as executive producer Shelia Jayadev explains to Mumbrella, “there is no black-and-white, good-and-evil, finger-pointing in the series”.
Both Jayadev and writer/creator Sarah Bassiuoni are former lawyers, which drove the series.
“I used to be a lawyer that worked in police misconduct matters,” explains Bassiuoni. “And mainly they involved young people from Western Sydney. I got an insight into that world on a daily basis, which was pretty affecting and stays with you.”
When Bassiuoni changed careers, she pledged to make “entertaining shows that had something to say about the world”, and that mirrored the world around her.
“Growing up in Australia and seeing a lot of friends, and being part of a community, that was pretty heavily judged and discriminated against, but never shown on TV – I wanted to do shows that reflected real life and maybe shows we didn’t get to see that much of previously. And so, Critical Incident was born.”
Aside from her executive producer role on Critical Incident, Jayadev has also worked on House of Gods, Ali’s Wedding, and Stateless, and tends to gravitate towards stories that highlight diverse communities. She says “the stories of the underrepresented Australia” speak to her as “a child of migrants” — although she quickly points out these communities actually make up around half of the Australian population.
“I’ve got an Indian background,” she explains. “It’s just I have an emotional connection to those stories and a desire and motivation to tell these stories.”
Like Bassiuoni, Jayadev has a background as a criminal lawyer, which further shaped her desire to help tell this story. Bassiuoni’s script “immediately appealed to me for so many reasons,” she explains.
“I’ve defended young people who were facing criminal charges. There was just such an immediate connection to the story material. It spoke to so much of the areas that we both had worked on, but also in Western Sydney with diverse communities.”
Both credit Stan with allowing the project to bloom without interference.
“They just had so much trust in the process and the development process,” Jayadev recalls. “They wouldn’t micromanage the development and the storytelling. They allowed exploration. They allowed us to go from draft to draft and explore different ideas and came in with feedback.”
Rather than offering the dreaded network notes, “when they had feedback, it was really astute, big-picture feedback that showed that they knew their audience and helped us to make something that would appeal to the widest possible Stan audience and beyond,” Jayadev explains.
Bassiuoni says that Stan basically bought the show in the room following “a long, lengthy pitch” that morphed into “a really great, engaging conversation”. From the start, Stan told Bassiuoni, “we bought your vision, so you do what you need to do to make that come true – and we’re here when you need us.”
By greenlighting such a show, Stan is also giving work to many talented creatives who often go without such opportunities.
“Both in front of, and behind, the camera, this show gives a lot of people an opportunity to shine who haven’t had that chance before. Our writing team is relatively new. The cast, there’s some real exceptional people who haven’t had the chance to take on roles like this before, plus a lot of newcomers.
“But, also in the crew, there were lots of people who were stepping up into this kind of big drama series. And the energy was just amazing. So, I hope that translates to the ride of watching the show.”
Considering that corrupt police conduct makes up a large part of the show, it’s surprising to hear they haven’t had any blowback from the boys and girls in blue. “They knew we were making it,” Jayadev explains, “and they had the synopsis and absolutely no issues – ‘go forth, tell the story.'”
“I know a lot of police,” Bassiuoni adds. “I think there’s an assumption that I’m probably going to be quite anti-police because of my work, but that’s not true. I think the police have a really hard job and often aren’t supported that well to execute it. But at the same time, I think they have a really vital job that has an immense amount of power, and so they have to be held to account at all times.
“We had some people who’d recently retired from the police force, involved as consultants, plus a lot of off the record conversations with people I know. But I also lived and breathed pretty close to that world for four-and-a-half years.”
Bassiuoni says one of the things she’s most proud of with the series is that it rings true to the police.
“All of the cops who’ve seen bits of the show or read parts of the scripts were like, ‘Wow, you really got the personalities and relationships right.'”
Jayadev feels it’s a “fair portrayal” of police. “Yes, there are cops that definitely do some very bad things, but there are also some cops who demonstrate a real moral integrity as well.”
When Mumbrella spoke to Bassiuoni and Jayadev, Critical Incident was less than a week from premiering, and had benefitted from a slew of advertising during Nine’s Olympic coverage, as well as the perfect lead-in program.
“It’s amazing!” Jayadev enthuses. “When we found out that we would be essentially Stan’s first drama off the back of the Olympics, to get that sort of publicity and eyeballs, that’s a dream for a show like ours, you know, set in Western Sydney, with this amazing diverse cast lineup, some relatively unknown cast members in lead roles. It’s wonderful to be platforming their incredible work, at this particular time, it’s a great launch for us.”
Bassiuoni has spent the past week fielding excited messages from friends and family who have seen the ad playing during the Olympics.
“It’s phenomenal, because I think Australian drama doesn’t get supported,” she said. “You know, it doesn’t have the marketing budget to compete to some of the levels of international productions – except for Stan, who plastered it everywhere, and during the Olympics as well. It’s just unreal.
“You know, we can’t ask for a better platform to give the show a chance.”
Critical Incident is out on Stan now.
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Nathan Jolly is the Features Editor at Mumbrella. He joined the team in July, 2023.
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