Jason Priestley returns to TV with B.C.-shot Private Eyes West Coast

Jason Priestley and Cindy Sampson star as private investigators Matt Shade And Angie Everett in the Global TV series Private Eyes West Coast. Shot on Vancouver Island, the show is a spinoff of the series Private Eyes that went off the air in 2021. Photo by Global /Global

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Five years after the TV series Private Eyes ended, fans will finally get to see what happened between lead characters Matt Shade (Jason Priestley) and Angie Everett (Cindy Sampson) when the new crime-comedy/drama spinoff Private Eyes West Coast debuts.

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In the new Vancouver Island-shot series, premiering on Sept. 30 on Global and StackTV, Matt and Angie are now married and have a small child. They have left Toronto and their private investigator lives behind for a more chilled existence in Victoria.

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“It just felt like an opportunity for us to put a closure on the original series, that I felt like we never really got a chance to explore what was going to happen to Shade and Angie after the kiss in Episode 60,” said North Vancouver native Priestley, who moved with his family to Nashville a handful of years ago.

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Vancouver Island plays itself in the new Global TV series Private Eyes West Coast, starring Jason Priestley and Cindy Sampson. Priestley said he was thrilled to get to work on the Island, a place he spent a lot of time visiting when he was a kid growing up in North Vancouver. Photo by Darko Sikman, Global /Global

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Sampson said the “will-they-or-won’t-they?” vibe served them well in the first series that ran from 2016 to 2021, but it wasn’t sustainable moving into a new series.

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“It’s so much better,” said Sampson. “There’s so many grand opportunities we have now that Shade and Angie are married and navigating parenthood. It’s like Angie and Matt 2.0. The better version of them. A more grown-up version, more polished version of them.”

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The new series opens with Shade and Angie living what looks like a regular (the gorgeous oceanfront home aside) West Coast life that all goes out with the tide when a date-night dinner is interrupted by a murder just feet away from them.

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Angie, it turns out, knows the woman who is caught holding the murder weapon and wants to jump right back into her PI ways.

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Shade not so much.

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“This is what we used to do. We’re parents now,” Shade tells Angie while the body is still warm.

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“So, we’re a little rusty,” Angie offers up.

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While their onscreen characters may feel a bit rusty about their return to their former roles, the actors both agree there was no trepidation when it came to returning to the characters.

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“It took no time for us to fall back into the same patterns,” said Sampson, a native of Halifax who lives in Toronto. “By the end of Day 1, we were like, ‘We’re good. We got this. We’re good, bring on Season 2.’ ”

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With a whole new personal world order happening, Priestley isn’t worried that fans of the previous series will be put off by the major changes.

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“I’ve seen the episodes, and they’re all fantastic. They’re all really good, and the show feels familiar enough that fans of the original show will immediately gravitate towards it, but it’s also fresh and new,” said Priestley.

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Sampson agrees but adds the new series, which received a Season 2 order almost a year ago, comes with more laughs.

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“I feel like we up the ante with the humour,” said Sampson. “I feel it was a little more ridiculous in the best way possible, and we really leaned into it, and it was fun. It was even more fun than the original.”

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The new series Private Eyes West Coast sees North Vancouver native Jason Priestley and Cindy Sampson bring their Private Eyes characters Matt Shade and Angie Everett back to life for the new series that debuts on Sept. 30 on Global and StackTV. Photo by Global /Global

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Sampson also sees the couple’s choice to return to work while navigating parenthood as a situation that will ring true with viewers of the show.

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“The new season is very relatable because they are spouses working together, juggling having a young child,” said Sampson, who herself had a young child in tow while shooting the new season. “(You’re) working long hours and trying to be present with your family. So, there’s a lot of things that are relatable in the series for us as humans, and we try to make it fun.”

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Shot mostly in and around Victoria last summer, the new series is a great tourism ad for the area. And it was a great experience for Priestley, who has close ties to the Island.

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“I grew up on Vancouver Island. My grandparents lived in Victoria, so for me, going back to Victoria was an absolute joy,” said Priestley.