australian television information archive

Family Portrait

Telemovie (109min)
Sunday, November 12, 2017
891,000 viewers (3rd)
Written by Paul Jenner
Directed by Ian Barry

It's 1961, and wedding bells are in the air… but not for Blake and Jean. Not yet anyway. A few weeks ahead of their own nuptials they've been invited to what promises to be Ballarat's society wedding of the season. The night quickly turns ugly, and Blake and Jean make a hasty retreat, glad to have put all that nastiness behind them.

But then the next morning a prominent member of the bridal party is found dead at the Reception venue. And Blake, of course, is still forbidden from working the case, as he's no longer the Police Surgeon. Instead he's tasked by an estranged relative to investigate a seemingly innocuous missing persons case in Melbourne.

It soon becomes clear that his case and the murder at the wedding are actually intertwined. The further Blake digs, the more complicated these cases will prove to be. Along the way he and Jean will have to navigate through three murders, two weddings and a funeral. And Blake will discover that the key to solving this unsolvable puzzle may lie somewhere in the past, and the tortured relationship he shared with his own father…

Cast:

• Craig McLachlan as Doctor Lucien Blake
• Nadine Garner as Jean Beazley
• Joel Tobeck as Chief Superintendant Matthew Lawson
• Rick Donald as Sergeant Danny Parks
• Charlie Cousins as Senior Sergeant Charlie Davis
• Anna McGahan as Rose Anderson
• Belinda McClory as Alice Harvey
•  
• John Wood as Patrick Tyneman
• Lee Beckhurst as Edward Tyneman
• Jenny Seedsman as Susan Tyneman
• David Whiteley as Bill Hobart
• Ian Rooney as Cec Drury
• Veronica Thomas as Harriet Dunne
• Michael Cormick as Milton Dunne
• Donnie Baxter as Brian Underwood
•  
• Senie Priti as Peggy Allen
• Sean Scully as Lloyd Welleman
• James Beck as Dr Jack Wallace
• Suzy Cato-Gashler as Dorothy Lucas
• Maggie McKenna as Roslyn Kerr
• Lawrence Price as Thomas Blake
• Freddy Curry as Young Lucien Blake
• Catherine Ward as Dress Shop Girl
• Phillip McInnes as Dr Allan Sattler