Sunday July 19, 2009
Australians in action
By MUMTAJ BEGUM
Be charmed by the wave of Australian talent sweeping US television. They are waltzing to Tinseltown and into our living rooms.
THE British Invasion in La La Land is obviously still raging, with the Brits having practically taken over the lead roles in both television and film with their perfectly-nasal American accent.
Ironically, English heroes are being tackled by non-English actors: American star Robert Downey Jr is Sherlock Holmes while Aussie heavyweight Russell Crowe is Robin Hood!
Now, keeping both the English and the Americans on their toes are the Australians.
For the past years the American entertainment sphere has been impacted by amazing talent from the land Down Under. Crowe and his compatriots Mel Gibson, Cate Blanchett, Naomi Watts, the late Heath Ledger, Hugh Jackman, Eric Bana, Hugo Weaving, Geoffrey Rush, Nicole Kidman and Isla Fisher have added a huge boost of style, ruggedness and glamour to Hollywood.
In the TV-scape, too, the Australians are proving to be an asset. Here, we take a look at 14 hardworking Australians (in no particular order) who are (or have been) regulars in our living rooms.
1. Julian McMahon(Nip/Tuck) – Started his career in the long-running Australian soap Home and Away in 1990. The middle child of a former Australian Prime Minister – the late William McMahon, who held office in the early 1970s – first caught the Americans’ eyes in a daytime soap opera, Another World, back in 1993. In the next seven years he worked diligently on movie and TV gigs including the drama series Profiler. However, the womenfolk were smitten by this rugged-looking actor when he played Cole Turner (better known in the evil circle as Balthazar) in Charmed. Turner was a demon who tried to be good for the sake of his one love, Phoebe Halliwell (Alyssa Milano). From Charmed he went on to portray Dr Christian Troy, a plastic surgeon with myriad issues – mostly daddy-related – on yet another hit show, Nip/Tuck. The 41-year-old was nominated for a Golden Globe for best drama actor in a TV series in 2005.
2. Rachel Griffiths (Brothers & Sisters) – Melbourne-born Griffiths, 41, got her big break when she was cast, alongside Toni Collette, in the 1994 film Muriel’s Wedding. She followed this up with yet another winning performance in Jude. In 1997, she was embroiled in controversy after crashing the opening of a casino, topless, but the same year also saw her appearing in a tiny role opposite Julia Roberts in My Best Friend’s Wedding. The talented actress received an Academy Award nomination for best supporting actress for her role in Hilary and Jackie. Finally, Griffiths arrived on the small screen as one of the leads in Six Feet Under, a role that earned her a Golden Globe award as well as two Emmy nominations. And the awards kept coming. As Sarah Walker Whedon in Brothers & Sisters, Griffiths has garnered two Emmys.
3. Toni Collette (in the series executive-produced by Steven Spielberg, United States of Tara) – After Muriel’s Wedding, there is no stopping this 36-year-old actress. Working both in Australia and America, Collette has built an impressive movie portfolio that lists Emma, The Sixth Sense, Changing Lanes, About a Boy, In Her Shoes, Connie and Carla, and Little Miss Sunshine among others. The versatile star has also participated in theatre, and is the lead singer of the band Toni Collette & The Finish. In United States of Tara, Collette plays a wife and mother suffering from multiple personalities, a testing role that basically means playing four roles in one show! For her superb performance in the dramedy, she is nominated for best actress (comedy) in the 61st Annual Primetime Emmy Awards in September.
4. Simon Baker (The Mentalist) – This Tasmanian devil has a killer smile that comes in handy when he plays the title character named Patrick Jane in The Mentalist. The blond actor – a Home and Away alumnus – got his big break in the United States when he took a minor but memorable role as a budding actor in L.A. Confidential. He went on to appear in the movies Red Planet (2000) and The Affair of the Necklace (2001) before landing the lead role in the TV series, The Guardian. His three-year stint on the show got him a Golden Globe nomination. Following that were gigs in The Ring Two (with fellow Aussie and pal, Naomi Watts), George A. Romero’s Land of the Dead, and The Devil Wears Prada. Baker, 40, a former bricklayer and a keen water sportsman, was attached to the short-lived series Smith, which featured Ray Liotta and Jonny Lee Miller. His part in Mentalist has tremendously raised his profile; he’s got two films lined up: Fair Game (with Watts in the lead again) and The Killer Inside Me (starring Jessica Alba and Kate Hudson). At the just-announced 61st Emmy nominee list, Baker is up for a best drama actor award.
5. Rose Byrne (Damages) – The fact that this Sydney-born actress, who turns 30 next week, is able to perform well alongside the formidable Glenn Close in the series is impressive in itself. So well, in fact, that they have not only become friends but are nominees in the upcoming Emmys for their master-and-protegee roles in the legal drama. Byrne, of Irish-Scottish descent, started acting when she was 12. In Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones, Byrne played Padme Amidala’s handmaiden Dorme (Byrne said all she had to do was stand near Natalie Portman and look serious). Byrne has also appeared in major films including Troy, Sunshine, 28 Weeks Later and Knowing. Unlike some of her peers, Byrne failed to make the cut for Home and Away, something she isn’t bitter about but is instead thankful for!
6. Portia de Rossi (Better Off Ted) – It is unfortunate that her acting skills have been unjustly overshadowed by her marriage to the successful American comedienne and talk show host Ellen DeGeneres. A quick glance at her resume will tell you that the 36-year-old star from Victoria has a knack for quirky TV roles such as those on the series Ally McBeal, Arrested Development and currently, on the office comedy Better Off Ted. At 15, she changed her name – Amanda Lee Rogers – to Portia de Rossi as she struggled to find her identity and come to terms with her sexuality. She was 20 when she auditioned for her first role, in Sirens, a low-budget comedy starring Hugh Grant and Elle McPherson.
7. Yvonne Strahovski (Chuck) – It may seem like this extremely tall actress was plucked out of nowhere to join a cast of really tall people in Chuck. Truth is, the Sydney native studied drama for three years at a local institution where she learned to pick up a flawless American accent. Strahovski sent in her audition tape for Chuck from Australia while filming a guest-starring spot on the Australian TV series Sea Patrol. Two days after she landed in Los Angeles, the 26-year-old secured the role of Sarah Walker opposite Zachary Levi’s geeky Chuck. According to imdb.com, Strahovski, who is of Polish descent, has three projects in post-production and one in the making. Another rising star from Down Under.
8. Jesse Spencer (House M.D.) – Unlike his fellow Aussies, Spencer is one “lucky” bloke who gets to keep his Australian accent on an American show although his speech pattern is often a source of mirth for the protagonist Dr Gregory House (played by Englishman Hugh Laurie). When Spencer auditioned for the role of Dr Robert Chase, he went in with an English accent which absolutely shocked Laurie, who thought Spencer’s Brit accent might be distracting. The guy from Melbourne ended up with his own (original) accent. We bet the 30-year-old is not complaining! Incidentally, Spencer hails from a family of doctors, though for the blond actor, he’d got his heart set on acting since he was 15. His last series back home was in the soap Neighbours. He subsequently moved to London, sharing a room with James McAvoy, the Scot who found fame in Hollywood with films such as Atonement and Wanted.
9. Alex O’Loughlin (Moonlight) – Canberra-born O’Loughlin deserves a mention (although his vampire series Moonlight was sucked out after just one season) simply because of his guest spot on Criminal Minds. Never mind that it was for just one episode, but it was so creepy it was good! When Moonlight wasn’t renewed for a second season, a fan-based charity campaigned for its return by holding blood donation drives. He began his career in film in 2004. The next year, he auditioned for the role of James Bond – with no luck. O’Loughlin, 33, got an all-access pass to American TV when he was cast as Detective Kevin Hiatt for seven episodes in the sixth season of crime drama The Shield. His fans can rejoice now that he’s working on a new series, Three Rivers, which focuses on an organ transplant team. O’Loughlin’s character is inspired by a real-life surgeon.
10. Anna Torv (Fringe) – In Fringe, Torv plays stolid and no-nonsense FBI agent Olivia Dunham as she struggles to make sense of the bizarre happenings she witnesses. While Torv’s breathy speech needs getting used to, it’s to her credit that she’s able to make a stereotypical character intriguing. Born in Melbourne, the 31-year-old grew up in Gold Coast, Queensland, and is a graduate of the National Institute of Dramatic Art in Sydney. Before the Americans discovered her, she had starred in three Australian series – Young Lions, McLeod’s Daughters and The Secret Life of Us – as well as a BBC mini-series, Mistresses. Late last year, Torv married her Fringe co-star, Mark Valley.
11. Ryan Kwanten (True Blood) – It’s hard to believe, isn’t it, that behind the Southern accent is an Australian? The 32-year-old who plays Jason Stackhouse in the vampire series is from Sydney. Another Home and Away alumnus, he acted as a lifeguard in the drama. Kwanten left the series in 2002 and headed for the United States where he was cast in Summerland and films like Flicka and Dead Silence. He has not looked back since and is said to be in an animated feature directed by Zack Snyder.
12. Dichen Lachman (Dollhouse) – Her unique features are attributed to a Tibetan mother and an Australian father. Born in Kathmandu, Nepal – her home for the first seven years of her life – Lachman, 27, moved to Adelaide with her parents. While in her early 20s, the gal relocated to Sydney to pursue an acting career, then to Melbourne for 14 months where Neighbours was filmed. Finally, she ventured to California, and snagged the juicy role of a doll named Sierra in Joss Whedon’s Dollhouse.
13. Emilie de Ravin (Lost) – It would not be right if Australia was not represented in a series that had characters of virtually every nationality! Before embarking on Lost, the 27-year-old has been chalking up an impressive resume that includes Roswell, NCIS and CSI: Miami. After Lost, she secured a tiny role in the current gangster movie Public Enemies and a considerably bigger part opposite Robert Pattinson in Remember Me.
14. Stephanie Jacobsen (Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles) – Jacobsen, 29, seems to have a soft spot for science-fiction serials. Except for Home and Away, Jacobsen, who boasts an exotic heritage of a Portuguese mum and Chinese-Norwegian-English dad, has acted in Farscape, Battlestar Galactica: Razor and Sarah Connor Chronicles, in which she plays Jesse Flores, a resistance fighter from the future. The Hong Kong-born Jacobsen and her family moved to Australia when she was 12.
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