Pine Gap

In recent decades American Aircraft carriers have been named after former US presidents. In this series the American carrier is named the USS Josiah Bartlet. Josiah Bartlet is the US President in the TV series The West Wing (1999) played by Martin Sheen.

Mark Leonard Winter plays an American on the show (Moses Dreyfus) but the actor is actually Australian. Similarly, Steve Toussaint, who plays American Ethan James, is British. The only American in the regular cast is Parker Sawyers, who plays protagonist Gus Thompson.

The lead cast and major players in this television mini-series are intended to be both American and Australian actors and actresses. Supporting characters in this production will feature the Alice Springs community of the Northern Territory. Greg Haddrick, creator and co-writer, show-runner and exec producer, said: "A compelling work of fiction inspired by modern geo political tensions, we are delighted to be working with Netflix and the ABC to produce an original concept for a worldwide audience". Greg Haddrick said in an article published in TV Tonight: "Since the '80s I have been fascinated by the world of Pine Gap and what it meant to be living with a little bit of America in the middle of Australia, and the relations between Americans & Australians on that base. So it evolved out of wanting to tell a story of those who work in intelligence, and how an environment of secrecy and increasing geo-political pressures impacts on those relationships". Moreover, he added: "We don't get direct access to the formal world of Pine Gap, but we did get considerable help from David Rosenberg who wrote the book Inside Pine Gap. He helped us with the unclassified information about the base. And we had help from a couple of other people who had visited the base but are not part of the Department of Defence, directly. We could glean enough to be able to set a credible drama series in that world. But having said that the series is not about trying to reveal precisely what Pine Gap does, because we will never know. It's more about the relationships inside the base. We wanted to contextualise it by making it as authentic as we could." Further, Haddrick said: "Netflix wanted to make sure that it was clear to an American audience what this place was, and what it did. Most people in America, and indeed (many) in Australia, have no idea that it exists at all. So it feels like an Australian story for Australians and an American story for Americans".

The Pine Gap facility was portrayed by the old Holdens car factory at Elizabeth in South Australia, once opened by Queen Elizabeth II, and which had just recently closed down.

The large technological communications room was a constructed set built at the Adelaide Studios of the South Australian Film Corporation.