Brendon Daniels plays a seasoned policeman Detective Forty Bell in international co-production White Lies. Picture: Riaan West
A new murder mystery series, White Lies, which hits screens this week, is set in Bishopscourt and unravels the secrets and lies in the lives of its characters..
The eight-part drama series - an international co-production for M-Net from Quizzical Pictures and Fremantle - stars Game of Thrones British actress Natalie Dormer as investigative journalist Edie Hansen and local movie and TV star Brendon Daniels, of Eerste River, as detective Forty Bell.
“Investigative journalist Edie Hansen is stunned by the murder of her estranged brother, Andrew McKenzie, in his Bishopscourt mansion. She is pulled into the nightmarish aftermath when she’s reunited with her teenage niece and nephew in the most awkward of circumstances, and sets out to find the killer, working with – and when necessary, against – the local police,” reads a synopsis for the show.
The series is created by Sean Steinberg and written by Darrel Bristow-Bovey.
Bristow-Bovey says he wanted to explore the inner psychology of wealth and the psychology of people who build walls around their own lives that separates them from their neighbours, communities and a society who might otherwise love them.
Daniels says the story could take place anywhere: a story about family and what you are willing to do to protect that family.
“If you work in the policing sector within this country you certainly do have your challenges. I think Forty Bell has that inner conflict as to what his original ideology was for himself and where he finds himself now. He is also weighing that up with his responsibility as a family man, a father and husband, and keeping the integrity and wholesomeness of that intact within this world he sees out there on a daily basis be it the affluent area of Constantia or be it on the Cape Flats.”
Playing the rookie officer Constable Peri Zondo supporting Forty Bell in unravelling the case is Athenkosi Mfamela, of Nyanga East.
“Constable Zondo is a man of doing things the right way. He is a cultural, family man, who aspires to be like Detective Forty one day. That's how he sees his future, but there is a lot of growth in a couple of episodes where we see he begins to question Forty about his actions,” says Mfamela.
Lee Roodt, of Factreton, will, with Jill Levenberg, play a criminal mother-and-son duo whose illegal activities intertwine with the lives of the wealthy.
Roodt says this whodunnit will have audiences guessing until the end.
“With the introduction of each character, you organically start assuming things without any one suspect being forced down your throat as a suspect,” he says.
Bristow-Bovey adds: “Cape Town is a little like Instagram: it is very pretty, but inside there is something that is not quite right. I am very proud of the writing that I did on this show, and I hope people will watch all the way through to the end of the series because it is in the second half the show really reveals itself, that it becomes itself, and I think that is the point of the show when the walls start coming down.”
White Lies will air on DStv Channel 101, tonight, Thursday March 7, at 8pm.