Family justice
Creator John Quaintance, star Luke Cook and executive producer Jeff Wachtel unpack crime comedy-drama Good Cop/Bad Cop, from its sibling-centred story to indie-style financing – and why Quaintance hopes it becomes someone’s favourite show.
A crime comedy-drama with a sibling twist, Good Cop/Bad Cop stars Leighton Meester and Luke Cook as a sibling detective team working in a small Pacific Northwest town’s police force.
Here, Lou (Meester) and Henry (Cook) must contend with colourful residents, a serious lack of resources and their very complicated dynamic with each other – and their police chief, Big Hank (Clancy Brown), who also happens to be their father.
The cast also features Devon Terrell as Detective Shane Carson, Blazey Best as Nadia Drozdova, Scott Lee as Officer Joe Bradley, William McKenna as Officer Sam Szczepkowski, Shamita Siva as Officer Sarika Ray, Philippa Northeast as Dr Marci Laine and Grace Chow as Lily Lim.
Commissioned by Australian streamer Stan and US pair The CW and Roku, the series is written by creator John Quaintance (Will & Grace, Workaholics), with lead director Trent O’Donnell, Jeff Wachtel and Chloe Rickard executive producing for Future Shack Entertainment and Jungle Entertainment. Phil Lloyd is a co-executive producer, while ITV Studios is handling global distribution.
Speaking at the Monte-Carlo TV Festival, where Good Cop/Bad Cop was in competition and won the special jury prize for cast performance, Quaintance and Cook offered insight into the making of the series, the sibling relationship at its heart and financing television in the same way as independent films.
Quaintance first wrote a script for Good Cop/Bad Cop 15 years ago, but had to find a personal connection to the story before pitching it to Future Shack CEO Jeff Wachtel.
Quaintance: Jeff was running the network [USA Network] and I developed it with one of his development executives, and I was like, ‘I want to do the show and I want to do it about this family.’ But she said, ‘For Jeff, you really need to say why this is really personal to you, why this is a show you’ve always needed to make. I was like, ‘How am I going to say this show about a family of cops is personal to me?’
The truth is I remembered that, as part of this process of coming up with the character of Henry, I had a cousin who was obsessed with detectives. He was like eight years old and he had a trench coat and the Sherlock Holmes hat. He had a little fake badge that his dad bought him and he would go look for clues.
I lost touch with him, so I always thought, ‘Did he get to be a detective?’ So when I came in to pitch to Jeff [this time around, before the US writers strike in 2023], I had this picture of my little cousin in his trench coat with his giant coke-bottle glasses and his magnifying glass. That’s probably why I sold the show [this time].
It’s a long way of saying that all fiction is autobiographical. The thing that’s been amazing about this experience is to put myself into the show and to write it, to film it and to edit it. Anybody that knows me, even though this is a show about murder and crime, people see it and they go, ‘Oh, it’s so you. You’re Henry.’
Cook: Well, one day I was going to work on the show and Kara, my wife, said, ‘Have fun at work being yourself.’ So I’m a little bit Henry too.
But there’s no formula to creating or pitching a series to ensure it gets a green light.
Wachtel: Anybody who’s trying to create something to a formula is doomed to failure. Even with the times I’ve had the most success at USA Network, people would say, ‘Well what’s your formula?’ My response is that it was not a formula, it was a recipe. It’s like a chef who puts the ingredients in the oven and prays. There are elements of success, but like a great chef or like a great writer, they better have talent. It can’t just be passion. If it doesn’t start with something they truly love, you’re gonna have to make so many compromises along the way. John did make this one so personal and made a show about family.
As well as financing from The CW, Roku, Stan, ITV Studios, Future Shack Entertainment and Jungle Entertainment, Good Cop/Bad Cop was also made with support from the Queensland Government through Screen Queensland’s Production Attraction Strategy and PDV (Post, Digital and VFX Incentive), and the City of Gold Coast. It’s an example of how television series must now piece financing together from numerous sources, in the same model as independent feature films.
Quaintance: It’s interesting that when you watch all the best movies, the ones that get all the awards have five minutes before the movie where it says, ‘With the participation of the French Film Council,’ and, ‘With the generous donation of the Belgian Film Council.’ That’s kind of what we have and what quality television outside of the behemoths like Netflix, Apple and Amazon is moving towards.
It’s a little bit more like making independent films. You really have to cobble together all these different resources, but you can. There’s people who want to make television, and you might not get one person to say, ‘Here’s $100m,’ but you can get 10 people to give you $1m or $2m. You can go to Australia where they give you tax breaks. But there’s always a hunger for quality television, and I’m really proud that we made it outside of that algorithm-driven system. We made a show that was idiosyncratic and without a lot of creative. You can still do it – you just need to have seven minutes of credits beforehand with all the executive producers.
Quaintance grew up in Minnesota, where the Coen Brothers are from, and he was naturally inspired by their numerous feature films.
Quaintance: I grew up watching Blood Simple, Fargo, Raising Arizona. I love those movies and I enjoyed reading mysteries when I was a kid, but one of the things I really love about Luke’s character is that, when we were filming it and he was discovering the character, this is a person who’s wanted to be a detective his whole life. So some of what he thinks is being a detective is from the things he has seen on TV. And he [Cook] brought a lot to that.
Cook: Later in the season, you’ll see I’ve become David Caruso. He takes off his glasses whenever he has a big moment [in CSI: Miami], and we squeeze that in.
While Cook jokes that Henry runs like a cyborg from The Terminator, he stresses that he was keen not to be overly influenced by other characters.
Cook: The run, 100% I watched the Terminator run before doing that scene. But as for other influences, I didn’t want to watch anything that was anything like Henry because I’m a natural impersonator. I didn’t want to think about anybody as I was doing the role. After it came out, a few people [compared him to] Sheldon [from The Big Bang Theory], a few people said a few different things, and I was like, ‘I’m glad I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
In fact, Quaintance was having a “really hard time” casting the role of Henry until Cook turned up.
Quaintance: Luke just showed up fully formed. I had spoken to other people who couldn’t quite get it and I always said I wanted Henry to be like he stepped out of a 1940s noir, like Sterling Hayden [The Long Goodbye] or Jack Webb [Dragnet]. I was looking for a 6’5”, lantern-jawed, handsome guy who’s really funny and really weird, and everybody said good luck. Also, he has to be Australian and do a perfect American accent. I found that didn’t exist – and then Luke’s audition came in and I was like, ‘See.’
Despite returning home to Australia to shoot the series in Queensland, Cook didn’t have any issues with his American accent.
Cook: Well, I’ve lived in LA for a long time now, so my accent I feel is pretty good. Most American actors when they meet me don’t know I’m Australian. They’ve seen my audition, and they’re like, ‘Oh, you’re Australian. I had no idea.’ That’s always a great compliment. But auditioning Australian actors for American roles [in Good Cop/Bad Cop], maybe 70% weren’t able to be cast because they just didn’t have the accent.
Quaintance: For the most part, people who were over 14 and under 60 were very good. But there are definitely people who got the part because they were the only ones who did the accent properly.
Cook: But it’s funny going back to Australia because I naturally get my twang back when I’m around Aussies, and then I’ve got to slip into American. But for me, I’ve been working on it for so long that it’s natural. I feel Aussies are generally pretty good [at American accents].
After working with Leighton Meester on the set of Good Cop/Bad Cop, Cook now feels like the Gossip Girl star really is his sister.
Cook: When you work together like that and you’re together 12 hours a day, you get to know each other. You go through the hard times when everybody’s tired or feeling a bit sick or run down, and then the joys of making great TV. So I feel like she’s my sister now, but that was very immediate. We met and, immediately upon rehearsing, we never had to try. I said to her right when I met her, ‘This whole show I feel hinges on our ability to pull off this relationship,’ and then we never spoke about it again. It was just very natural. Now I feel the same way about Clancy. I feel like he’s very much my father. You become real family in some way.
Wachtel: She’s great on every level. First, she’s a very talented actress, and as number one on the call sheet, one and two [Cook] inform the attitude [on set]. And to have gracious actors at the top is just a great experience. Leighton has been known since Gossip Girl, but she’s having a moment right now.
Quaintance wants Good Cop/Bad Cop to be someone’s favourite show.
Quaintance: If you’re going to make a television show, you should always make it with the goal that it will be somebody’s favourite show, not just a show that you’ll have on. There’s a terrible phrase right now in television development called ‘secondary screens,’ where they want you to develop content that people will half-watch while they’re on their phone.
Sometimes executives will say, ‘If there’s an important piece of plot, make sure you say it several times because we don’t expect our audience to be paying attention.’ To me, you can love a show so much in a way that you can’t in any other form of entertainment. If you’re not making a show that could conceivably be somebody’s favourite show, you’re not making a good show.
Like Good Cop/Bad Cop? Watch this! Suggested by AI, selected by DQ
The Good Cop: This police procedural comedy-drama features a father-son detective duo with contrasting styles.
Longmire: Set in Wyoming, this show combines crime and mystery as a county sheriff returns to work after his wife’s death.
The Night Agent: A fast-paced FBI thriller involving conspiracies and political intrigue, with strong procedural elements and suspense.
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tagged in: Clancy Brown, Future Shack Entertainment, Good Cop/Bad Cop, ITV Studios, Jeff Wachtel, John Quaintance, Jungle Entertainment, Leighton Meester, Luke Cook, Roku, Stan, The CW