It’s a harsh juxtaposition to see Australia so beautifully represented on-screen in such a harrowing thriller like Last Seen. Based on the 2011 novel The Dispatcher by Ryan David Jahn, Apple TV has taken some creative liberties to breathe new life into the story.
Last Seen is a mystery worth sinking your teeth into. With every clue or near miss, you’ll feel an urge to scream at the screen, begging for the characters to open their eyes. “I’m very, very honoured to have been involved,” Brendan Cowell confesses.
It’s a warm welcome when The Weekly sits down with the Last Seen cast, Brendan Cowell, Chloe Jean Lourdes, and Patrick Brammall, all familiar faces after meeting them the night of the red carpet premiere in Sydney.
But despite the easy camaraderie between us, the subject of our conversation is decidedly darker.
“The darker the territory, the more bonding and more laughs to kind of survive it,” Brendan continues. “It was a real tribal feeling on set.”
From the moment we meet his character, Henry, it’s clear his piercing blue eyes are hiding a darker side. Yet the show soon challenges that assumption, exploring the uncomfortable space between being morally right and being a good person.
“The great gift in writing is that each of these characters has an extremely strong and specific objective. The things these two characters want are ostensibly, on paper, nice things. But the way they go about it is so single-minded,” Patrick explains, drawing on his portrayal as a police dispatcher, Ian.
“There’s no thought given to those around them or the consequences of their actions. Then, the result of that is this thriller with a propulsive plot, but you also think, ‘oh, the hero maybe isn’t that heroic, and the villain maybe isn’t that villainous.’”
“It operates in two ways, and I think that’s what sets it apart from other thrillers.”
For years, Patrick has been known as the comedic relief, from his role in Colin From Accounts to The Devil Wears Prada 2. But his role as Ian Ridley has brought out a side that we have never seen before.
“It’s quite a different experience, because on [Colin From Accounts], yes, I’m one of the lead actors, but I’m also the creator, showrunner, producer and writer. Whereas on [Last Seen], I have the luxury of only having the Department of Acting to worry about,” Patrick laughs. “It’s a great luxury.”
“I just got to take this emotional bath for five months. It’s a weird kind of emotional space – a weird head state – to just inhabit.”
Patrick’s character, Ian, falls apart when his daughter Maggie disappears without a trace. In turn, his marriage falls apart, and then he descends into alcoholism. Eleven years later, during a routine night shift, Ian receives a distress call from a confused teenager. Certain it is his lost daughter, Ian pursues vengeance.
At the centre of this story, and sitting between two powerhouse actors in front of me, is Chloe Jean Lordes, who plays Sarah, the young girl believed to be Maggie. Poised to be Australia’s next rising star, Chloe had the difficult task of bringing Sarah’s emotional world to life.
For Chloe, taking on such a demanding role in a new environment could have been daunting, but she was far from alone. Her mum joined her every day on set, and she formed a strong bond with co-stars Brendan and Logie Award winner Felix Cameron, who shot to fame after Netflix’s Boy Swallows Universe.
“I couldn’t have picked a better person to have by my side,” Chloe says of Felix. “He’s incredibly emotionally intelligent and talented. I asked him a million questions, and he was also very supportive in the sense that I was nervous approaching those emotional scenes because I felt like a lot was riding on them. I wanted to do it justice and he really talked me out of panicking, which was an absolute godsend.”
Despite her nerves, Chloe formed a strong bond with Brendan and Maxine Peake, who plays Sarah’s mother. That connection transcended the screen, allowing Chloe and Brendan to build the trust needed to “see what happens in the moment” when they were acting together. It’s a chemistry that comes through in the smallest details, like the moment Henry affectionately calls Sarah “possum”.
“We got to cultivate our own little language,” the Avatar actor recalls. “I wanted to create something that wasn’t a cuddly relationship but adult respect.
“Maxine, Chloe and I spent a lot of time on set, played a lot of games and had our own little musicality as a family that would allow the audience to fall into this family and forget that it might not be…”
As for what happens to this family when the truth begins to unravel, you’ll have to tune into Apple TV+ to find out.
Share this post