Horror has found a new home in Greystanes, with a Maltese-Australian horror drama series set to be filmed in the area.
A 15-part scripted series – entitled ‘Greystanes’ – will put the western Sydney suburb in the spotlight when it’s released later this year, exclusively on social media giant TikTok.
‘Greystanes’ is created by AACTA-nominated writer and director Ryan Cauchi and co-written and co-produced with Matt Ferro. Under the scares, the series intends to explore generational relationships, with Maltese-Australian culture and the migrant Australian experience at the heart of it.
Cauchi said the plot of ‘Greystanes’ came about after researching into Maltese culture and folklore and discovering its “untapped horror film potential”.
“Both my parents are Maltese immigrants, they migrated to Australia in the 60’s, and there’s not been a lot of Maltese representation on the screen,” he told Parra News.
“I was encouraged by my family to actually do something Maltese, to actually dig deeper into our culture and see if there was anything that actually interested me and maybe adapt that.”
Excited to be filming in Greystanes where his own father grew up, Cauchi said the series is also loosely based on his own childhood, which happens to include a curse in his mother’s family.
“It is inspired by my own upbringing in the 1990’s and my own Maltese ancestry, so it kind of has this really rich, dense mismatch that we’ve not seen on screen before,” Cauchi said.
“Greystanes is big on mystery, thrills and chills, while also giving voice to the Maltese-Australian community, which has gone largely unrepresented in Australian scripted content.”
Set in Australia in the 1990s, ‘Greystanes’ tells the story of 11-year-old Samantha and her older brother Marius. While visiting their Maltese grandmother during school holidays, the siblings discover a dark family secret and encounter Il-Haddiela, a sinister creature from Maltese folklore.
Currently in pre-production and filming later this month in Greystanes, the series features a largely western Sydney based cast and crew, something that the western Sydney raised Cauchi is extremely proud of.
“I always love shining a light on the western Sydney acting community… we’re filming it in western Sydney and relying on a lot of local businesses to make the series,” he said.
“I’m very proud of western Sydney and especially the western Sydney filmmaking communities, so anything I can do to really showcase their creative output, talent and their ingenuity I will do it.”
The series is a recipient of the Every Voice 2022 funding program, a joint initiative between Screen Australia, NZ On Air and TikTok. It aims to support a new generation of Australian and New Zealand storytellers to develop scripted or factual content exclusively for TikTok.
‘Greystanes’ will be released via three weekly episodes over five weeks on TikTok, starting on October 31.
Ellie Busby is a news reporter for Western Sydney Publishing Group. A graduate of the University of Hertfordshire and Western Sydney University, she is a journalism Major. Ellie has worked with Universal Media, The Cova Project and for a range of other organisations. In 2024, Ellie was named Young Writer of the Year at the Mumbrella Publish Awards.