Since its launch in January 2015, TV3's Irish soap Red Rock has gone from strength to strength, particularly in recent months when it was sold to Amazon Prime in the US and was also acquired by the BBC for its summer daytime schedule - and has proven a hit on both.
Now the folk behind Red Rock have decided to jazz things up a bit for viewers, and as of September, it will change from two half-hour slots on a Wednesday and a Thursday to a prime time one hour slot on a day of the week yet to be revealed.
Executive producer John Yorke told Beaut.ie; "It's the big primetime slot of the week, we're making it a bigger event. Forty five minutes instead of 22. You're getting all your money's worth on screen with one hit."
Yorke also pointed out though that the one-hour later time slot won't alienate any previous fans of the show; "It's a balance. We don't want to lose the existing audience, but being an hour means you can go into things a bit deeper. You can be a bit sexier, you can be a bit more violent, you can go into areas that probably you wouldn't do in 30 minutes, but it's still Red Rock, with a few steroids added."
Yorke, for those that may not know of him, is a prominent BBC television producer who has worked on some of British soaps most memorable storylines, as well as serving as executive producer on the likes of The Missing and Skins.
Part of the revamp, also involves a change to the credits, which we got a glimpse of in a screening of the first episode of the season. (Yes we know who killed Brian, and no, we're not telling you.) The theme tune is still pretty much the same, although a little less harmonica, thankfully, and there's a notably darker tone to it.
"We've had the same credits for two years", said Yorke, "so you always want to keep it fresh and exciting."
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Overall, Red Rock is starting to feel less and less like a soap, and very much like a drama. Yorke agreed, saying; "When we first started talking about it, it was as a soap, but as it's evolved we've found we're using all the same standards as drama.
"It's a long running drama serial and that's how we position it now but we really don't mind as long as people watch it. It shouldn't alienate an old-fashioned soap audience but I think what TV3 have seen is that this is actually quite grown up and it's quite sophisticated television - let's put it on a bit later and grab that audience as well, because there's always a few people who are a bit sniffy about soap."
Yorke also didn't seem too fazed by competition coming in the form of EastEnders Irish spin-off called 'Redwater'... a name with some obvious similarities.
"It's a very different kind of show, I know the guys who are making it, I did say 'You do know our show is called Red Rock', but bizarrely they had come across that title entirely independently for completely different reasons so I don't think there's anything sinister about it, but as I said to them," he joked, "we were here first".
He added; "They're different beasts, and they are very different kinds of shows, so we're not too worried about it."
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Red Rock will be back in September on TV3, and plan on kicking things off with a bang with a flashback episode that will reveal Brian's killer... still not telling you.
