Tamara Lawrance Thrills in the 'Get Millie Black' Trailer
The U.K.'s most popular export in recent years seems to have become police procedural shows. From your bog-standard Father Brown to high-concept series like Magpie Murders, stories of those drawing order from a chaotic universe are all the rage, whether they are "cozy crime" series like Grantchester, social commentary like Unforgotten, or propulsive thrillers like D.I. Ray. Being tapped to lead your own crime series is a bit of an honor, Sharon D Clarke (Doctor Who), who currently stars in Inspector Ellis, said as much in her interview with us. But she's not the only Black woman who leads a new series this fall; over on HBO and Max, Tamara Lawrance (The Long Song) is also leading a new series as the titular detective in Get Millie Black.
The show hails from Marlon James, a Jamaican author known for such novels as A Brief History of Seven Killings (for which he won the Man Booker Prize). Get Millie Black is not adapted from any of his novels but an idea inspired by his family's own history. “My mother was one of the first policewomen in Jamaica to make detective,” James said when the series was initially greenlit. “Storytelling has always struck me first and foremost as a mystery to be solved—which I’m sure I got from her. Millie, from the second she appeared in my imagination, was a brilliant, mercurial, hilarious, unpredictable force of nature; someone who was always there, just waiting for her story to be told. I didn’t create her; I found her.”
The new series is currently listed as "limited," but everyone knows HBO converts limited series into seasonal ones if they're a hit. If the full-length trailer is anything to go by, we should be preparing for HBO to announce a Season 2 sooner rather than later.
