Death in Paradise meets The City of Light in Détectives, the quirky French detective drama that premieres in the US next month.
The Best Drama Series winner of the 2014 Festival de la Fiction TV de La Rochelle, Détectives is a dramedy mystery series that centers on the goings-on at the Paris-based, family-run Roche and Son detective agency.
Founded by the now-retired Maxime Roche (Jean-Luc Bideau, The Red Violin), the agency has been run by his son Philippe (Philippe Lefebvre, Tell No One). It’s just that, with his thrill-seeking, skirt-chasing, I-don’t-give-un–sou-about-money attitude, Philippe has been running it into the ground, and the company is about to go under.
To save his namesake business from ruin, Maxime sets up a partnership with the firm of Nora Abadie (Sara Martins, Death in Paradise), a former intelligence officer for DGSE, France’s national intelligence agency. Maxime wants the no-nonsense Nora to bring some much-needed professionalism and discipline to Roche and Son, but working with the rascally, albeit charming, Philippe, often proves to be as challenging as the cases.
To wit: On their first case together, Philippe and Nora find themselves on opposing sides, owing to clients that have conflicting interests. The parents of a young worker who fell to his death at a Mickelsen nuclear site don’t believe his fall was an accident, and hire Philippe’s agency to investigate. The thing is, Mickelsen is one of Nora’s clients.
Tensions beyond professional ones (ahem) also arise between the two incompatibles as they investigate cases that include kidnapping, fraud, corporate espionage, and murder.
But Philippe and Nora aren’t the only ones in on the detective action. Philippe’s seemingly rebellious daughter Xenia (Daphné Chollet) and Nora’s hapless but sincere assistant Santo (Vincent Escure) do, too, as does the retired yet still active Maxime.
Détectives costars Vanessa David as Philippe’s psychologist sister Isabelle Duchene, Sébastien Libessart as her ex-cop husband Marc Duchene, Natasha Cashman as Maxime’s wife Alison Roche, and Romann Berrux as Philippe’s budding-detective son Hugo Roche.
MHz Worldview premieres the first season of Détectives on Wednesday, 5 November 2014 at 9 PM ET. All eight hour-long episodes will be shown in French with English subtitles.
The second season of Détectives completed its run on France 2 in September 2014, so fingers crossed that its eight episodes will screen in the US in 2015.
__________________
Add your comments on our Facebook and Twitter pages.
Share this post/page.