Welcome to Global Breakouts, Deadline’s fortnightly strand in which we shine a spotlight on the TV shows and films killing it in their local territories. Breakout hits are emerging in pockets of the world all the time and it can be hard to keep track, so we’re doing the hard work for you.

Empathy (Empathie) is the latest from Quebec-born actor and screenwriter Florence Longpré, who has emerged as a singular voice with series including Can You Hear Me? (M’entends-tu?) and the award-winning Audrey’s Back (Audrey est Revenue). Her latest is Empathy, in which she plays Suzanne, a criminologist-turned-psychiatrist who works at a psychiatric institute in Montreal, where she meets an intriguing security guard and a variety of patients.

Empathy (Empathie), the Series Mania-winning drama out of Quebec, Canada, explores mental illness with a deft blend of drama and humor.

Series creator Florence Longpré stars as Suzanne, a criminologist-turned-psychiatrist at a Montreal maximum-security psychiatric institute where she befriends security officer, Mortimer, played by French actor Thomas Ngijol. It quickly caught the attention of viewers in Canada, where it plays on streamer Crave, and France on Canal+. The series, however, was not meant to happen, Longpré tells Deadline.

“It was a big mistake,” she says. “I began writing a true-crime show and the first episode was about a psychopath, but I spoke with a lot of psychiatrists and I realized that was very boring. I like to speak about emotion and the experience of life, and a psychopath doesn’t have that empathy.”

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