Nearly 20 years after taking the stage together for a Melbourne Theatre Company production of Edmond Rostand’s Cyrano de Bergerac, Asher Keddie and David Wenham will star opposite each other for the first time on screen in Fake, a new drama from Paramount+ that has begun filming in Melbourne.
Based on Stephanie Wood’s book of the same name, the eight-part series follows Birdie Bell (Keddie), a beautiful, smart, and brilliant magazine features writer who thinks she has found the one when she meets successful grazier Joe Burt (Wenham) on a dating app.
Convinced by her well-meaning friends and family that this could be her very own happily ever after, Birdie begins to believe that it is finally her chance to live the fairy-tale. As cracks start to form in Joe’s stories, Birdie soon discovers her boyfriend isn’t all he has led her to believe.
Created for television by Anya Beyersdorf and directed by Emma Freeman, Fake is produced by Kindling Pictures’ Imogen Banks and Emelyne Palmer, with Keddie on board as co-producer.
Banks said Beyersdorf had written “dynamite roles” for Wenham and Keddie.
“Inspired by Stephanie Wood’s book of the same name, Fake throws us inside the confusing and deluding experience of a relationship built on lies. Kindling Pictures is thrilled to be working with Paramount+ Australia to bring it all to life,” she said.
The Kindling Pictures production will have major production investment from Paramount ANZ and Screen Australia, in association with VicScreen. Entertainment One (eOne) will handle international sales.
Paramount ANZ executive producer for drama and comedy Sophia Mogford, expected the series to be addictive viewing for audiences.
“The concept of ‘it would never happen to me’ is a familiar one to us all,” she said.
“And Fake, which centres around this, is a nuanced and fascinating story, and there really is no one better than Imogen Banks to bring all this to life.”
Fake will premiere on Paramount+ in 2024.