Actor Shamita Sivabalan’s role in a new American TV series breaks the mould of how, in her words: ‘brown women’ are usually cast.
Good Cop/Bad Cop is an American produced ‘dramedy’ by Stan Original. It’s about brother and sister detectives in the fictional small town of Eden Vale contending with quirky locals, lack of resources and complicated dynamics with each other and their police chief father.
Another challenge for the siblings is being surrounded by rookies, including Shamita’s character Sarika Ray, a gung ho police officer.
Shamita plays rookie cop Sarika Ray, alongside fellow new recruit Sam Szczepkowksi played by William McKenna
Small town setting
The show is set in a small town in rural Washington, America.
‘It’s Schitt’s Creek meets Brooklyn Nine-Nine’, says Shamita.
Like Brooklyn Nine-Nine, the show has a diverse cast which suits Shamita. As a queer Malaysian Indian Australian, she is an outspoken activist, committed to amplifying representation and diversity.
Shamita Sivabalan is outspoken about the need for diversity on our screens: PHOTO: Jonas Wong
‘I want to encourage people to stop boxing themselves in, particularly other brown women. We come in more than one type that the industry likes to categorise us as, which is doctor, nurse or safe, restrained type of characters.’
Shamita’s Good Cop/Bad Cop character, police officer Sarika Ray, is a stern yet well-meaning rookie cop with a mysterious past in the Marines.
Shamita (far right) with fellow cast members in Good Cop, Bad Cop.
‘She’s very by the book,’ Shamita says. ‘Good Cop,/Bad Cop is a comedy and the irony is the androgynous brown woman plays the straight man trope.’
Starring Gossip Girl’s Leighton Meester and Australian actor Luke Cook as brother and sister detectives, Good Cop/Bad Cop was shot on the Gold Coast and Mount Tamborine in Autumn last year.
Subtle humour
A short run series of eight episodes, the show delivers subtle humour (the main family’s surname is ‘Hickman’) and laugh out loud moments. My lol moment was an exchange between two male cops with the first saying: ‘You be Batman, I’ll be Robin’.
‘Batman’ replies witheringly: ‘Obviously’.
Shamita’s character gets funny moments too, such as the way she treats the local Girl Scouts like Marines, drilling them with lines like ‘You WILL succeed on your mission’ to which they shout in reply: ‘Ma’am! Yes Ma’am!’
Shamita says it can be hard, as a Malaysian Indian Australian, to get similar roles in Australia.
‘There are plenty of diverse actors, but there aren’t many Malaysian actors who get to be platformed on mainstream TV. I struggle to think of anyone with a similar vibe, apart from Sophie Wilde.
‘On American TV there is a broader range of representation.’
Report says many communities invisible on Oz screens
Screen Australia’s latest diversity report found while there have been improvements in representation of actors from First Nations, disability, queer and non-European backgrounds, they’ve been incremental.
Screen industry representation of First Nations people has gone from 4.8 per cent to 7.2, of disabled people from 3.6 per cent to 6.6, of LGBTIQ+ people from 4.5 per cent to 7.4 and of non-European people from 6.9 per cent to 16 per cent.
‘… many of Australia’s communities remain under-represented on-screen compared to population benchmarks and in particular disability representation remains critically low,’ says the 2024 report.
Shamita says she’s seen change since she started in the industry ten years ago, but there’s room for improvement.
‘I do see the difference but there is still this tunnel vision about what inclusivity can look like.
‘Milk tea’ casting
‘Colourism means there can be inclusion of diverse actors who are “milk tea” with a little bit of melanin. They might be 16 per cent ethnic and white everything else.’
There have been times Shamita was cut from the cattle call stage of Australian auditions ‘when everyone left in the room was white’.
Undeterred, Shamita auditioned for Good Cop/Bad Cop on Zoom and was shocked when she got the gig.
‘I got a call back from the show runner saying we want to offer you the role. I had a million auditions that week.
‘When a role this massive comes along you drop everything.
‘My partner just gone through major surgery and I had to leave him in that state. My sister looked after him.’
‘I also had to pull out of a Burlesque show.’
Shamita says the three month shoot for Good Cop/Bad Cop was fun and fast paced.
Gold Coast locations turned into hick town, America
‘The art department turned places in the Gold Coast where we were shooting into small town America,’ says Shamita.
‘Most of the cast and crew were Australian and we teased (American) Leighton Meester about her Australian accent and gave her some tips and phrases. She got good by the end. She gave us the American pronunciation of words and we gave her the Australian.’
Shamita says the shoot had good ‘supportive family energy’ though she did have to perform the odd stunt in one take, in her police uniform, ‘with a heavy gun belt and a good face’ at the end of a day’s shooting.
‘There are 60 plus people waiting on you to do one scene so they can go home. I work well under pressure because you’re buzzed with adrenalin and you don’t have to think.
‘It was nerve-racking but I like doing my own stunts and I like a challenge.’
Like to play a ‘badass’
Shamita has a vision for roles she’d like to play in future.
‘I love action. I’m a very physical performer. I’d like to see more brown women in strong badass roles. I’d love to work on a horror or Sci-Fi film or play a villain.’
Shamita wants to break the mould of how ‘brown women’ are cast in the screen industry
Critical reception
Good Cop/Bad Cop has attracted good reviews and there’s a possibility of a second season.
In the meantime, Shamita’s made a short film, Twin Flame, touring festivals now and she recently became artistic director of a new production company Shadow Goose.
Season One of Good Cop/Bad Cop premiered in February and is streaming now on Stan, CW, and Roku.
Good Cop/Bad Cop poster SUPPLIED
IMAGE of Shamita Sivabalan as rookie cop Sarika Ray at top of story SUPPLIED
