Pasquale Barbaro, the Sydney crime figure at the centre of Australian Gangster, bears many different titles. And most of them ain’t flattering. The press for this upcoming TV saga describes the character as a “drug dealer, gangster, gym-junkie, Lamborghini driver, husband, father,” and perhaps most strikingly, “dickhead.”
We can’t wait to hear the full sordid story behind those names when Australian Gangster is released sometime in 2021. While we don’t have an official air date for the four-hour miniseries yet, just thank your lucky stars we’re getting the show this year at all, considering the fictionalised show’s collision with litigious real-world events.
Intended to air way back in 2018, Australian Gangster has since been held up by the ongoing legal cases of some of its depicted characters. After two years of no information, we’re thankfully a bit closer to seeing what Pas (Alexander Bertrand) is all about, kicking off the trailer below with an inspirational quote: “You want something, you gotta take it: it’s what’s called positive finking.”
Director and executive producer Gregor Jordan is perhaps best known for the 90s crime classic Two Hands, starring Heath Ledger as a wannabe crook who gets in way over his head. That film is itself on track for revival as a TV series, but before then, Jordan is occupied with Channel 7’s true crime drama, speaking on the contemporary relevance of his mob setting. “They are all about flaunting their wealth and their physical appearance to try and create an image of themselves that they can project to the world”, he explains. “They represent a modern and interesting twist on the gangster genre.”
As with the swaggering mobsters of Two Hands, Jordan seems to be encouraging his audience to laugh along and shake their heads at these Sydney moguls, making comedy out of Pas’s Instagram narcissism, his Lambo fixation, his womanising.
But that doesn’t mean things can’t turn nasty at a moment’s notice, with gunshots punctuating the teaser trailer. “You’ve got nine separate people tryna kill ya—that’s not normal!” crows one of our hero’s confidantes. It’s likely that Australian Gangster will air on Channel 7’s TV channel before making each episode available online via 7+: keep your eyes peeled for a release date in the next few months.
