Colin Farrell Teases ‘Sugar’s Shocking Twist: ‘I Didn’t See It Coming’ (VIDEO)
Inspired by the golden era of film noir, this stylish contemporary drama stars Colin Farrell as private detective John Sugar, who has a secret so unexpected, the revelation will make you spit-take your bourbon.
“Sugar is a fascinating collision of impulses. He can be chivalrous and kind and emotionally open but also violent and intense and impenetrable,” says Sugar executive producer Simon Kinberg. “There’s a naive way he looks at the darkest corners of our world, and that perspective is linked to the show’s big question of who Sugar is and what he’s hiding.”
Farrell says he was initially drawn to the role because Sugar wasn’t bitter like most film noir gumshoes. “John Sugar has this optimism, this belief that human beings are fundamentally good, which a very questionable belief when we see the world that we live in,” the actor says. “Every case he works on has personal meaning. He bites off a little bit more than he can chew.”
The complex story debuts with two of eight episodes as Sugar investigates the disappearance of the beloved granddaughter (Sydney Chandler) of a legendary Hollywood producer (James Cromwell). Sugar winds around a gritty and glamorous LA landscape in his slick sports car interviewing sources and unearthing a trove of family secrets.
A key source is Olivia’s former stepmother, an ex-singer, Melanie (Amy Ryan), who the series could have painted as a classic femme fatale. Farrell acknowledges there was discussion of romance between the two but “we thought it’d be truer and more interesting if there were just two characters so alone in their lives. There’s a loneliness they shared. The love that grows between them is built around friendship, support, and belief. No femme fatale, but something a little bit deeper and certainly less nefarious.”
But there’s plenty of evil around, and Sugar’s colleague Ruby (Kirby, formerly Kirby Howell-Baptiste) doesn’t want him to take the case. “Ruby is to John Sugar, what ‘M’ is to James Bond, a friend, but they have this professional relationship. She’s also sort of the brains behind the operation,” Kirby says.
Film buffs will love how the series updates the distinct visuals of the hard-boiled detective genre. “The tone and look combine classic Hollywood sheen with a darker aesthetic,” Kinberg says. “We studied everything from Humphrey Bogart as [Philip] Marlowe and Sam Spade to Jack Nicholson in Chinatown. But we added a new twist.”
Farrell says he didn’t channel any specific classic film noir detectives in his performance, but he did dig into the genre to prepare. “I watched a load of some films that I’d seen before, The Big Sleep, The Maltese Falcon and The Long Goodbye, and then other films that I had never seen, like Murder My Sweet and Farewell My Lovely,” Farrell says. “It was great fun to swim in those waters of those old noir films, which are so extraordinary and so filled with mood and loneliness and longing and corruption.”
You’ll get all of that in this drama, along with a mystery to unravel and that shocking reveal. (Find out more about that in the video above.) Says Kirby, “People and things aren’t always as they seem. And I think that is true for every single character in Sugar.”
Sugar, Fridays, Apple TV+
