Barracuda (ABC 2016, Elias Anton, Matt Nable)

Barracuda, which is set in the mid 1990s and based on the novel by Christos Tsiolkas, focuses on young Danny Kelly. Highly talented as a swimmer and with ambitions to win gold at the Sydney Olympics in 2000 Kelly, who is half Greek and half Scottish is having trouble fitting in at the Melbourne private school that he attends thanks to a scholorship.

Trained by the talented Frank Torma Kellt also strikes up a friendly rivalry with teammate Martin Taylor who is also determined to become an Olympic champion.

Barracuda plays strongly with it’s themes of class, ethnicity and the pressure we put on our kids to perform, reviewing the first episode in The Australian Graeme Blundell said “what I like… is the way it maintains an aura of honest, unforced mystery: will this young man make it and what will happen to the people around him along the way? Will his anger ­destroy his life? And, in the end, what is success and what is failure?”

Speaking to the Sydney Morning Herald co-adapter Blake Ayshford talk about author Tsiolkas’s thematic vision “Christos is telling a classic Aussie golden boy story but he’s inserting in that a not-golden-boy, an outsider. This is a sports story, but it has Christos’ take on it, his particular views on ethnicity and class.”

production details
Australia / ABC – Matchbox / 4xc60 minute episodes / Broadcast from 10 July 2016

Writers: Blake Ayshford, Belinda Chayko / Novel: Christos Tsiolkas / Producers: Tony Ayres, Amanda Higgs / Director: Robert Connolly

cast
Elias Anton as Danny Kelly
Ben Kindon as Martin Taylor
Matt Nable as Frank Torma
Rachel Griffiths as Samantha Taylor
Jeremy Lindsay Taylor as Neal Kelly
Victoria Haralabidou as Stephanie Kelly
Tilda Cobham-Hervey as Emma Taylor
Andrew Creer as Wilco
Jacob Collins-Levy as Clyde
Joel Lok
Rhys Mitchell as Scooter
Imran Adams as Theo Kelly
Luca Sardelis Regan Kelly