Dept Q's Edinburgh location was last minute choice after 15 years in planning
Dept Q was filmed in Scotland
The hit Netflix series Dept Q was 15 years in the planning, with the Edinburgh setting a last-minute decision, the writer and director has revealed.
Scott Frank, who also created the Queen's Gambit, told an audience at crime writing festival Bloody Scotland that he had acquired the rights to the books, by Danish writer Jussi Adler-Olsen, more than 15 years ago, but the project had only come to fruition when he was contacted by London-based producer Rob Bullock, who suggested locating it in the UK - and ultimately, Scotland.
Mr Frank said: “I read the first book, the one we based the last series off and I thought it was terrific. He [Adler-Olsen] said to me, ‘If you want it, you can have all of them’, this was 15 years ago.”
“Then in 2019, I tried to get it made a number of times. We didn’t get very far, I was distracted with other things. Then I got an email from Rob Bullock, saying, ‘I’ve been trying to get the rights to these novels, but the author says I have to talk to you.”
Mr Frank, who appeared at Bloody Scotland in Stirling alongside Mr Bullock, as well as cast members Matthew Goode, Kate Dickie, Leah Byrne and Alexej Manvelov, said he had never been to Edinburgh before Mr Bullock brought him to scout for locations.
He said: “Rob flew to Berlin, where I was filming and said to me ‘Why don’t you let me handle everything, we could find a British writer you could collaborate with, we’ll set it somewhere in Britain’. Then the next conversation was, ‘What about Edinburgh?
“I said, ‘I’ve never been’. Then I went. I think I pretty much got out of the van and said, ‘This is where we’re going to shoot’. I love it here. It’s old and modern, somehow at the same time and unlike other places where you get that mixture, they look like two separate things. But there’s a real interesting blend here and psychologically, I think that’s very interesting.”
The first series, which spent six weeks on Netflix’s global top ten list, was filmed extensively across Edinburgh and the Lothians, with the city described as “the series’ other protagonist” alongside Detective Chief Inspector Carl Morck.
In response to an audience question, Mr Frank said geographical changes to the Edinburgh locations used in the series were intentional, such as when character Moira, played by Dickie, walks to the City Chambers using a route that does not make sense to locals.
“I walked the way she would have gone and thought, 'this isn’t good. No, she's not going there',” he said. “I wanted her to come out of Advocate's Close and there’s the church. It’s tricky, but yeah, I know we’re not always accurate, you’re watching, thinking ‘why is she sitting in the park down there, the cemetery, just to have to walk all the way around the corner?’ and the answer is because it’s great, Edinburgh Castle is there above her head.”
Mr Frank said the second series had also been filmed in Edinburgh, but also “a lot” outside of the city and partly in Aberdeen.
Mr Frank said he had written the script with Kate Dickie - who he described as a “national treasure” - in mind for the part of Moira.
He also revealed that actor Kelly Macdonald, who played Dr Rachel Irving, Inspector Morck’s therapist in series one, would not be returning for series two due to a diary clash.
He said: “She’s making another show, Lanterns and her show and our show couldn’t make it work. But she may come back, it depends how her career is going on the other show.”
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