Nordic noir: Jo Nesbo on going down the Detective Hole for his new Netflix series
Jo Nesbo was hands-on in the studio for the filming of Detective Hole.
As one of the world’s most successful crime writers, Jo Nesbo is well used to having his writing adapted for the big and small screen. But — his new collaboration with Netflix — is a different project entirely.
The series based on one of his most-loved characters — troubled homicide detective and anti-hero Harry Hole — sees him immersed in the filming and production process from beginning to end for the first time. As well as writing the screenplays for the highly anticipated nine-episode series, he is show runner and executive producer.
It adds an extra layer of intrigue to the characterisation of one of the most popular characters in crime fiction, but it felt like the right time, he says, to become more involved in an adaptation of his work.
“This was the first time that I went all in and I wrote a script,” says Nesbo. “I was a show runner, which means I was there for pre-production. During shooting, the directors took over most of the job. In post-production and editing, I was there every step of the way.”
In many ways, he feels, the experience was similar to writing a novel. “I always write long synopses for my story. They say that doing a movie or a TV series is like writing the novel three times, first the script, then the shooting and then the editing. And that is definitely true.”
Like many successful writers, Nesbo has traditionally been content to let his novels stand by themselves. Previous adaptations, he says, have been other people’s ideas and ambitions. He would have hated if somebody interfered with his vision or idea for the story.
“I’ve always seen it the same way: I've written a novel. The novel is there. I don't want, or need, the movie or the TV series to be like a version of my vision. It has to be somebody else's.
“This time it was different, because when we started speaking about the TV series, I was asked if I was interested in writing. I also had experience writing for the screen, and I had collaborated with Oystein Karlsen, the main director of the TV series.”
sees Tobias Santelmann play Harry in the whodunnit serial killer mystery, with Joel Kinnaman playing his long-time adversary and corrupt detective Tom Waaler. This series is an adaptation of his book Told in Norwegian with subtitles and set in Oslo, the series sees Harry attempt to track down the killer and stay ahead of the corrupt Waaler, while wrestling with his own challenges.
“He is fighting his demons, as he always is, alcoholism. The reason why he, at the start of this series, is fighting that especially is that he is in a fresh relationship with Rachel, who has a little boy. Harry is also chasing a murder in a cold case where he never caught the killer, a bank robber that shot and killed one of the employees in the bank. In many ways, this murder case, which seems to be a serial killer, saves him, because his only reason for being is working, and now he can start working again.”
Nesbo is a cultural and international publishing phenomenon, with 13 Harry Hole novels written and another on the way. He has sold 60 million books across more than 180 territories, with translations into 50 languages. This series sees him working with Working Title Films, whose many hits include and as he continues to redefine the crime genre.
His storytelling has put him on many creative radars, including that of famed Australian artists Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, whose scores have included and “We put them on top of our list, but not really believing that they would be interested in writing a score for a Norwegian TV show,” says Nesbo, a big fan of the duo’s work.
“But then they accepted, just straight away, and we were so thrilled. We went over to their studio in London when they were doing the score, and it was being star struck for five minutes and then working on the score. They were accommodating, being curious about we wanted for the series, but still being Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, of course.”
Of this show, Nesbo has said: “Storytelling isn't about serving people what they think they want, but what they didn't know they wanted.”
What does he mean by that? “I think that, as a storyteller, the only thing you can do, or at least that I can do, is to invite people to my house and serve them the food I like, the drinks I like, play the music I like, have the conversations about topics that I'm interested in, and if people are interested in that, then good. I don't work as a storyteller if I need to be accommodating. I have to please myself, and so when I say that I'll give people something they didn't know that they wanted, that is more like a hope, not a fact.”
In the 1900s, Nesbo enjoyed considerable success as part of Norwegian pop-rock band Di Derre, and it was an approach by a publisher to write a memoir of his musical experiences that prompted him to start storytelling in a most unexpected way.
“I was asked to write a book about my band, but I told them that I'm not interested in that. But since you asked, I'm going to Australia now traveling, and I will bring my laptop and I'll write something so you will get something else. That was the first novel in the Harry Hole series taking place, of course, in Australia.”
As a young man, he played football for Norwegian team Molde FK before an injury put paid to sporting ambitions. He had harboured ambitions to play for English club Tottenham Hotspur. He smiles while recalling he was on his way to becoming an Arsenal fan at the age of 10, when his big brother caught him looking at a football magazine of some Arsenal players.
“He said: ‘No, no, you're a Tottenham fan. Don't even think of going there’. He's five years older than me, so both me and my younger brother, we were forced into being Tottenham fans. You would think that now we are regretting not being Arsenal fans, but that's not right. We feel that we're in the right place. We are Tottenham supporters in our family.”
Tottenham’s loss was crime fiction’s win, and as his career seems only set to grow, Nesbo continues to tread the path he has always set out to achieve in his storytelling. “The ambition to make something that's good, I think it's always there. You may have commercial or mainstream success, which is nice — I like that. But my main goal is to make something that is really appreciated by people. Whether that's a lot of people or a few people, it's not that important — make something that contributes in some way.”
- is now on Netflix
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