The ABC has ordered a fifth season of Luke McGregor and Celia Pacquola’s comedy Rosehaven, with production to kick off in Tassie next month.
The fifth instalment sees McCallum Real Estate’s Daniel (McGregor) and Emma (Pacquola) content for things to go back to normal, having defeated the first agent who tried to encroach on their territory. But Barbara (Kris McQuade) isn’t, and she forces them to take on more responsibility for the business,
The eight-part A What Horse?/Guesswork Television series will shoot over seven weeks. In a boon for the Tasmanian industry, it will employ 37 local full-time crew, 16 local casuals, 25 local actors and more than 50 extras. Six departments are completely staffed by locals, and ten departments have Tasmanian HODs.
The fifth season also sees 17 ‘Rosehaven graduates’ in the crew – that is, staff who had their first professional engagement or started as a trainee or attachment on the show promoted to a full-time role.
Screen Tasmania has invested $500,000 in the production, which has also received support via Film Victoria.
Director and associate producer Jonathan Brough returns, with Andrew Walker, McGregor and Pacquola producing. Fiona McConaghy co-produces, and EPs include Guesswork’s Kevin Whyte and the ABC’s Todd Abbott and Brett Sleigh.
Creators, writers and stars Pacquola and McGregor said: “This is really exciting for us, and it hasn’t quite sunk in yet. In 2015 we knew we wanted to make a TV show, but we had no idea what to write about, and we were extremely worried no one would want to watch whatever we came up with. Now we’re getting to make a fifth season, we will allow our very self-deprecating comedian brains to feel a tiny amount of pride that we’ve made a good thing. But having written that, we already feel arrogant, so we take it back and apologise for getting a big head there for a second. Thank you to everyone who helped us get here, and a huge thank you to Tasmania for being such an awesome state to film in.”