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All-star cast including Thomas Brodie-Sangster, David Thewlis and Maia Mitchell returning for a new season of the much-loved drama with a twist.
Due to its strong performance locally and internationally, Disney+ today announced a second season of the hit Australian Original Series The Artful Dodger.
The eight-episode Season 2 has an all-star returning cast including Thomas Brodie-Sangster (The Queen’s Gambit, Wolf Hall) as Jack Dawkins aka The Artful Dodger, David Thewlis (Landscapers, Fargo) as Fagin, and Maia Mitchell (Good Trouble, Never Goin’ Back) as Lady Belle Fox. They team up with a full ensemble of Australian and New Zealand cast and several new faces in exciting cameos.
Series co-creator James McNamara (The Artful Dodger, The Outrageous True Story of Milky Moore) is leading the writing team with Kate Mulvany (Summer Love, Upright), Dan Knight (The Artful Dodger, Irreverent), and Miranda Tapsell (Top End Bub, Top End Wedding).
Ben Young (The Twelve, Clickbait) and Gracie Otto (The Artful Dodger, Ladies in Black, Heartbreak High) serve as Directors with Jeffrey Walker (The Artful Dodger, The Portable Door, Modern Family) consulting.
The Artful Dodger is the top Australian Original title for Disney+ to date^, with particular relevance in Australia, EMEA and on Hulu in the US.
To be filmed in 2025 at the historic Callan Park in Sydney, Season 2 will pick up where the heart’s desires of Dodger, Fagin and Lady Belle left off, promising more cunning thievery, snappy humour, life-and-death surgeries, and romance with a twist.
The Walt Disney Company Australia and New Zealand Senior Vice President and Managing Director, Kylie Watson-Wheeler, said: “We’re thrilled to give our global audiences what they’ve been asking for, with a second season of The Artful Dodger set to start filming in 2025. The return of our Australian born Disney+ Original scripted drama, complete with all-star cast and a brilliant crew, is a testament to the series’ high calibre of production and its local and international audience success. We’re delighted this high-stakes romantic drama of heists, comedy, and beautifully complicated life and love, will thrill and entertain again.”
The Artful Dodger is an irreverent follow-up to Charles Dickens’ “Oliver Twist” exploring his adult double life in the far-flung penal colony of Port Victory, Australia. It is a tale of reinvention, betrayal, redemption, and love with a twist. Jack Dawkins is The Artful Dodger, whose fast, pickpocketing fingers have turned into the skilled hands of a surgeon. Lady Belle, the Governor’s daughter, is a brilliant and captivating woman who captures Dodger’s heart and is determined to make history as the first female surgeon. In Season 1, Dodger is torn between the promise of an impossible love in high society, and the instinctive temptation of the criminal underworld he secretly craves. His past returns to haunt him with the arrival of Fagin, luring him back for one last heist.
Disney+ Australia’s locally produced content has included scripted series The Artful Dodger and The Clearing, docuseries Matildas: The World At Our Feet and Shipwreck Hunters Australia, and lifestyle general entertainment series Donna Hay Christmas.
The latest Australian Original scripted drama Last Days of the Space Age debuted on Disney+ in October 2024, with more to come, and a quality development pipeline. Season 2 of Shipwreck Hunters Australia is currently filming in Perth, Australia.
The Artful Dodger Season 2 is a co-production with Sony Pictures Television’s Curio Pictures. Curio Pictures’ Jo Porter and Rachel Gardner are Executive Producer/Producers, with James McNamara as Executive Producer and Cameron Welsh (Foundation, Krypton) as Series Producer. The series was co-created by James McNamara, David Maher and David Taylor.
NSW State Government is supporting Season 2 through Screen NSW's Made in NSW Fund. Post, digital and visual effects also supported by Screen NSW.
^based on premiere episode views after 12 weeks
