Rich period drama ‘Copper’ the ‘anti-CSI,’ says executive producer

From the outside, it looks like what it once was — an old auto parts factory in an industrial corner of Toronto. Step inside, and step back in time to Manhattan, circa 1864.

This is the world of “Copper,” a big budget, international co-production premiering Sunday night at 9 p.m. on Showcase.

Produced by Cineflix in association with BBC America, the historical cop drama launched Stateside last week as the U.S. cable network’s highest-rated series premiere ever. A 10-episode first season was shot earlier this year.

The enormous and richly detailed set recreates the notorious “Five Points” region of central lower Manhattan, circa 1864, as well as a few blocks of well-to-do Fifth Avenue.

The crowded Five Points area was a jammed, crime-ridden slum that was largely populated by Irish immigrants and African Americans who’d been displaced after the just-ended Civil War. Policing them in “Copper” is Det. Kevin Corcoran (Tom Weston-Jones), a former Union Army Civil War soldier who finds the war never stops on the mean streets of New York.

While it is already being described as “Deadwood” meets “Gangs of New York,” executive producer Tom Fontana (“Homicide: Life on the Street,” “Oz”) says “it was especially important for all of us to make a show nobody’s seen before.”

An international, generally unknown cast was part of that plan.

Weston-Jones is from the U.K. as is Anastasia Griffith (who plays caring socialite Elizabeth Haverford). Irish actor Kevin Ryan plays Corcoran’s trusted police pal, detective Francis Maguire. German actress Franka Potente plays shrewd brothel owner Eva Heissen. Mississauga, Ont.-native Kyle Schmid is Manhattan aristocrat Robert Morehouse. Ato Essandoh (African-American doctor Matthew Freeman) and Tessa Thompson (the doctor’s wife, Sara) are American.

Raised in Britain to Irish and American parents, Griffith was born in Paris. Having lived in the U.S. for a while now (she was featured on “Damages” and “Trauma”), she’s so used to disguising her natural British accent she actually had to hire a dialect coach to help restore her English lilt for this part.

Like Corcoran, she says the period costumes and sets (recreated by production designer John Blackie) make it easy to play these mid-19th century characters. Inside the former car factory, tenement shacks can be found on the cobblestone roads, with the police station, Eva’s Paradise tavern and bordello, a bank, a mission and Corcoran’s house among the larger standing sets.

The size of the sets and all the detail took the “imagining” side of the acting out of it, says Ryan.

“You really felt like you were in that world.”

What’s especially unusual about these sets is that you can walk up the steps of one of the tenement apartments, or inside the bordello, and find a fully furnished sitting room inside. Usually interior rooms are in a whole other sound stage.

“It’s quite impressive to see,” says Barry Levinson, who’s been on his share of sets.

The Oscar-winning director, who partnered with Fontana previously on “Homicide,” liked how the interconnecting sets gave the same claustrophobic vibe one probably felt back in the crowded slums of Five Points.

“It’s quite an achievement in terms of its production design.”

In all, there are five blocks of brownstone apartments, outdoor markets, jails and other buildings inside the makeshift sound stage. Live horses are stabled nearby and brought in for street scenes. Some exteriors are shot at nearby Black Creek Pioneer Village in Toronto’s northwest end, as well as Casa Loma and the Elgin Theatre.

Fontana says there was no advantage to recreating old Manhattan in new Manhattan and so Toronto — with its tax incentives and seasoned crews — was chosen as a base of operation.

As impressive as the sets are, viewers want story. “Copper” is co-created by Will Rokos, screenwriter of “Monster’s Ball.” He brings edge to the main story about Corcoran’s struggles to walk a straight line policing such a crooked neighbourhood.

Corcoran isn’t afraid to bend or even break the law to achieve his ends. Fontana sees a bit of John Wayne in Weston-Jones’ performance, “a sense that there is this undercurrent in him. He clearly is a man who believes in justice.”

As for the limitations of police work back in the 1860s, Fontana sees “Copper” as the anti-“CSI.”

“There’s no DNA, there’s no machines,” he says. “It’s all about the detectives having to use their minds and really kind of assess the situation.”

There wasn’t even a morgue in Manhattan at this point, says Fontana.

“I mean, personally, I just love the fact that we’re writing a series and doing a series where there’s no cellphones.”

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Bill Brioux is a freelance TV columnist based in Brampton, Ont.