Face value

July 21, 2005
The many faces of Chris Lilley.

The many faces of Chris Lilley.

The versatile Chris Lilley puts his best face forward in a new local comedy, writes Nicole Brady.

Daniel Sims, 17, nominee for Australian of the Year, is explaining some of the upsides of the transplant operation through which he will donate an ear drum to his deaf twin, Nathan."

You know the Starlight Foundation?" he asks. "I actually inquired on the internet about it 'cos kids and shit who are like dying and that, they want to see if they can grant their wishes, and I was going to ask for, like, some chicks and that for the weekend - which wouldn't actually be that expensive because they do like trips to Disneyland."

As an interviewer, how do you follow up a statement like that?

As I grapple for the next question for a teen colloquially deemed a hero, from afar we hear the cry of "Cut", and it is time to regroup and prepare for the next scene in the shooting of We Can Be Heroes: Finding the Australian of the Year.

My bit part in the comedy and the discomfort and hilarity generated by the experience are typical of the series.

There was no script; the brief was to improvise. To travel out to the dusty farm the twins call home and, as journalists do, interview a nominee for one of the nation's biggest honours. And so on a stinking hot February day, Daniel and I stroll a desolate paddock as he embarks on a series of bizarre responses to my questions.

It is impossible to anticipate what he is going to say, hard to keep a straight face at the ridiculous things he comes out with and a delight to watch such a sharp talent at work.

Viewing the scene months later, the key elements are still at work: it is at once fresh, funny and cringeinducing, much as the series is as a whole.

Daniel and Nathan are both played by Chris Lilley: he devised, wrote and plays the five Australian of the Year nominees the six-part series is built around. Lilley, 30, is best known for the hilarious drama teacher Mr G, a character who stood out in the Channel Seven sketch comedy shows Hamish and Andy and Big Bite.

Here he is allowed a much bigger stage and, with the backing of experienced industry hands, the opportunity to show off his gift for social mimicry. "He has a bottomless pit of curiosity about people - about how people behave, everything from the bigger character traits to just tiny things about how somebody might pronounce something or the way they move their body," says producer Laura Waters."

He also has a laserbeam ability to nail things in popular culture, things that are going on in pop culture and also in politics and society."

We Can Be Heroes focuses on five "ordinary" Australians who have been nominated for Australian of the Year. The series follows their journeys to the awards ceremony at which one will be named the winner. Styled as a documentary, it is narrated by journalist Jennifer Byrne, the idea being to present the stories as genuine, with the humour derived from Lilley pushing the characters to the extreme.

One, Pat Mullins, is a suburban housewife who has been nominated for her sporting achievements.

She is a champion roller being filmed as she prepares to lie down and roll the road from Perth to Uluru. Teenage girl Ja'mie King is a stunning 16-year old private schoolgirl who does the 40-Hour Famine each week to raise money for the 85 Sudanese children she sponsors.

While Lilley plays each of his characters for laughs, the brief of everyone else working on the show was to keep it realistic. "We auditioned over 200 people for the supporting cast and because it was meant to be a documentary none of them could be actors that people recognised," Waters says."

The casting department went mental and, Chris in particular but all of us, really, kept an eye on people who could improvise. If you saw anybody acting they would not get in."

While there were scripts, the actors were encouraged to respond to Lilley's ad lib with their own.

Director Matt Saville, who first worked with Lilley on Big Bite, says while the show will probably be described as a mockumentary, the intention was otherwise. "We always wanted it to be a documentary rather than a mockumentary and go beyond, 'Eww look, see it's just like a documentary.' We actually wanted to make a documentary and so two job functions grew into existence during the course of shoot: Chris's was the creation of the universe and the characters and mine was the documenting of that. I was directing a documentary crew and he was creating a world."

For each of his characters Lilley devised extraordinarily detailed back stories. Though much of that doesn't make it to the screen, it was this detail that enabled him to improvise so effortlessly when the cameras rolled. During my interview with Daniel, he seamlessly segues from being a distant relative of Bob Hawke to his intricate knowledge of hip hop."

Chris has got such a wealth of material that he's sponged up over the years, he will have a character and he will know the popular characters that character will be obsessed with and will himself have gone and researched that fairly extensively. I don't think he's into hip hop or anything, but because Daniel and Nathan were, for example, he knew a lot about it," says Saville.

Meeting Lilley months after the shoot is a tad unnerving. The gently-spoken man in a black cap, T-shirt and jeans looks just like the five on-screen characters, but whereas they are riotous he is reserved. His gestures are restrained and in conversation he does not throw in the sort of oneliners typical of professional comics. Rather, at times he stumbles to articulate his thoughts about a series he hopes will not be misinterpreted as political commentary but appreciated as one big joke. He insists he did not set out to make a comment on the annual Australia Day awards."

They are pretty meaningless, pretty silly, I guess, but I really don't have strong views on them," Lilley says. "I'm not completely opposed to them or anything. I hope people don't interpret the show as that, as though I'm making some big statement about John Howard's Australia. I'm not at all. It was definitely just a device."

Lilley, who graduated from Macquarie University with a bachelor of arts in music and a primary teaching degree, flirted with standup as Mr G before getting a gig at Channel Seven.

Together with Waters he spent months refining and writing the five lead characters of We Can Be Heroes. He then interviewed groups of people representative of the different characters - such as private schoolgirls for Ja'mie - to help perfect their mannerisms, watching videotapes of the meetings again and again.

While the finished product is unique, it is hard to resist comparing it to British mockumentary-style comedies as People Like Us and The Office. Yet it has an Australian voice in the manner in which it satirises our love of stereotyped national heroes.

Asked which television comics he admires, Lilley flounders."

I love The Office - but everyone does. I like that sort of bizarre British television stuff. I'm pretty hard to impress, I don't laugh much at comedians. It's easier to tell you what I don't like," he says."

I'm not a big stand-up comedy fan, even though I used to do it.

I'm not a big American sitcom fan.

I just love those really obscure shows that the BBC does and I hope this show is more similar to that."

He names Nighty Night and more particularly Animals Like Us, both from British production house Madcow and recently screened on the ABC, as shows he has enjoyed this year. He is hoping that, like those programs, this will catch on by word of mouth and hopefully be repeated later in the year.

On set it was clear how strong Lilley's vision was for this series - he even wrote the corny theme song Gidday, Gidday. He worked closely with director Saville during filming and spent the lunch break talking with other production figures. He also worked intensively with costume designer Kitty Stuckey, production designer Carrie Kennedy and art director Ben Morieson."

I just had the really clear idea that I didn't want it tipped too far toward comedy and I was lucky they all got it as well as they did," he says.

For that reason he was delighted Jennifer Byrne agreed to do the narration (Lilley says husband Andrew Denton knew of his work and recommended him to her) and followed the instruction to play it straight.

The extent to which the show is played so straight makes for some of the most exquisitely excruciating moments. In the third episode teen prodigy Ja'mie visits a detention centre in which one of her sponsored Sudanese children is being held as an illegal immigrant.

Ja'mie and her school friend use the opportunity as a photo shoot to showcase Ja'mie's looks, their interest in the detained girl is pretty much limited to the multitude of thin plaits her hair is woven into."

If you let them out would you like have a full-on Afro?" Ja'mie asks."

It was a little bit awkward," Lilley says, recalling filming the scene with the Sudanese actor who, aged 16, had only been in Australia for 12 months. "But I knew it would be quite a powerful scene so I was happy to go with it and we delicately cut stuff out of it that was pushing the boundaries too much."

While Ja'mai is an atrocious, narcissistic character, Lilley emphasises he did not create her, or indeed any of the other nominees, as a vehicle to push political or social comments."

I'm not opposed to any of them, I just think they're funny. It's just meant to be funny."

We Can Be Heroes: Finding the Australian of the Year premieres at 9pm Wednesday on the ABC .

Union rules required Nicole Brady to be paid for her appearance. She donated the fee to the Mirabel Foundation.

Who's been nominated to beAustralian of the Year
Ricky Wong, 23. Received international acclaim for a breakthrough in physics. His love is Chinese musical theatre.

Ja'mie King, 16. Holds the national record for sponsoring 85 Sudanese children. Aspires to be either a UN ambassador or a supermodel.
Quote: "Two days a week without food keeps me looking hot."

Daniel Sims, 17. Is donating an ear drum to his deaf twin in a world-first medical procedure.
Quote: "Chicks are more attracted to blokes with spastic qualities."

Pat Mullins, 47. Pioneered the sport of rolling and is chasing a world record by rolling from Perth to Uluru.
Quote: "Yes I'm disabled - but I can roll."

Phil Olivetti, 37. Risked death when he saved nine children who, in a freak accident,were blown in an unsecured jumping castle into overhead powerlines.
Quote: "I laughed at the suggestion when I nominated myself."
