Another spiky and difficult female detective? That’s just the way Anna Samson likes it

The line of female detectives on screen is long and distinguished: Helen Mirren’s DCI Jane Tennison in Prime Suspect, Brenda Blethyn’s DCI Vera Stanhope in Vera, Gillian Anderson’s DSU Stella Gibson in The Fall and Mariska Hargitay’s Captain Olivia Benson in Law & Order SVU.

They were women who were built tough and didn’t take any nonsense, even if that meant staring down sexism and harassment on the job. They also paved the way in how female detectives – and no-nonsense female characters in general – could be seen on screen.

Stepping into that detective line-up is no easy task, but it’s one Anna Samson has relished ever since she took on the role of Detective Inspector Mackenzie Clarke in Return to Paradise.

“Everything I do, whether or not it’s deliberate, some is, some isn’t, is going to be informed by the female detectives we’ve seen on screen,” says Samson. “And the audiences will bring the female detectives that they know to the screen as well.

“What I like is that there’s flaws that I’m allowed to bring to her that I perhaps wouldn’t have been allowed if I was portraying a female detective in another era. She’s allowed to be more difficult. She’s allowed to be spiky. She doesn’t have to be smiley. She doesn’t have to be a people-pleaser. She doesn’t have to talk herself down.”

Samson is talking during her lunch break, while shooting season three of the popular cosy crime series, the Australian spin-off of the long-running Brit series Death in Paradise (fondly referred to by cast and fans alike as the Para-verse). Today, filming is taking place in Stanwell Park, a small coastal village just north of Wollongong on the NSW south coast, where a blue weatherboard building is used as the exterior of the Dolphin Cove police station (the interiors are shot in a nondescript office block in Sydney).

Samson has spent the morning questioning a suspect – the scene I watched was a classic cosy crime trap, where the suspect denies all knowledge of the murder, before inevitably tripping themselves up – and after three years in the part, she’s still enjoying finding what makes Mackenzie tick.

“She’s quite proud, and I really like that,” says Samson. “I like playing someone who knows how good at her job she is. There’s this thing about being a female character and having to be likeable. I’ve always pushed against [it] because I don’t understand it. Because we love her, but we don’t always have to like her. I don’t think you always have to like a protagonist to want to watch a show.

“And I don’t think we put the same thing on men. Men can be all kinds of flawed, and we are fascinated by them as a central character, and I think the same is true for women. There’s just this [expectation] they have to be likeable and lovable and good all the time. I don’t think that’s true. I want to see flawed characters. I think it’s great to watch shows and read books because they’re full of flawed protagonists, not just flawed villains.”

After season two’s cliffhanger – where Mackenzie’s former fiance Glenn (Tai Hara) drove off after being dumped by his new fiancee Daisy (Andrea Demetriades) – Mackenzie is now grappling with what her future looks like.

“It’s not so much whether she’s going to stay any more in Dolphin Cove,” says Samson. “It’s about whether she can change, and does she need to, and what does change even mean. Maybe you don’t need to change who you are, but you do need to be able to have people in your life.”

One of those people in Mackenzie’s life this season, is her mother Jillian, played by Kerry Armstrong. “The character is a force and a firecracker,” says Samson. “And Kerry is a real force of talent.”

Having Armstrong join an already strong group of women on the show – which includes Catherine McClements as Mack’s boss Senior Sergeant Philomena Strong and Celia Ireland as police volunteer Reggie – has been a boost for Samson.

“They understand what my job is, and that they want to support it,” she says. “And that’s from everything. Celia will be make sure I’ve had enough to eat that day. They understand what it takes to open your heart up in one scene, and then you’re shooting different episodes 10 minutes later, so you have to close that [emotion] up and do something completely different. They know what it’s like to carry an emotional arc of a whole three series. They understand what that takes, so when they’re here, it’s really lovely for me. I’m very grateful to the women on this show.”

Return to Paradise airs at 7.30pm on Saturdays on the ABC and streams on ABC iview.

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