Death in Paradise
Season 6 BBC Brit (*120) 20:00 Action
It isn’t just murder mysteries taking centre stage in action series Death In Paradise (2011-current). Personal issues will pop up for the police team on the Caribbean island of Saint Marie, leading to an important character saying goodbye mid-season. “Things are shaken up this season,” admits executive producer Tim Key, “but we still have intriguing murders and crimes driving the show as well.”
Bumbling detective Humphrey Goodman (Kris Marshall, Nick Harper in the first five seasons of comedy My Family 2000-2011) has led the series from day 1, which makes it all the more sad that it’s him swapping island life for London in episode 6 (18 September). “We’ve seen a lot of Humphrey solving crimes, we’ve seen a lot of Humphrey and his indecision,” laughs Kris. “What we haven’t seen is Humphrey in any relationship scenario until now.” Humphrey follows love-interest Martha (Sally Bretton) to the UK in the two-part episode (starting on 11 September) for an investigation and Kris adds that “we’ll find he’s actually quite dashing and a bit of an old romantic at heart”. In real life, Kris wasn’t happy with being away from his family for the six months a year it takes to film Death In Paradise, so he quit the show – he was also heavily linked to take over as the new Doctor in cult sci-fi series Doctor Who (2005-current).
Stepping in to fill Humphrey’s shoes is detective Jack Mooney (Ardal O’Hanlon from Brit comedy show Father Ted, 1995-1998). “Mooney is quite friendly, quite genial,” says Ardal, “and I think he will bring quirkiness to the island.” But he too doesn’t come without baggage – he’s recently widowed and has a 20year-old daughter. “So that’s a whole different dynamic,” laughs Ardal.