I wasn’t surprised when I was finally informed a week later that Albert’s hair was going to be short. When long hair became the fashion I was able to hide my jug ears. I decided to have my ears pinned back. I’d never been anaesthetised before. When I was wheeled out from the ear operation, I came to halfway up the hall, I sat straight up and punched a male nurse in the face. To her horror, Rosa witnessed this from further up the hall. She was full of apology. The nurse was good about it and said it happened occasionally but mine was the most painful reaction he’d received. When the bandages came off, I was very happy, still am, no more ‘Volkswagen with the doors open’ gags for me.
Hanging Rock was a great experience for me. This felt authentic, this was filmmaking. We had people on that film who were to become legendary. Director Peter Weir received five Oscar nominations, Russell Boyd on camera won an Oscar, camera operator John Seale won one Oscar, four nominations.
Hanging Rock itself is extraordinary. You can feel the ancient spirit of the place; it’s the same kind of feeling I get from Uluru.
The film is cinematic poetry, with a haunting beauty. The score, the cinematography, the sound, the look, the feel, the acting. All emanating from the filmmaker, all flowing from the source, Peter Weir. He’s the best director I’ve ever worked with, and I was too young to know it. I don’t have many regrets, but one is that I’ve never had the opportunity to work with him again. He taught me subtlety. He took me aside and showed me the footage where I wink in acknowledgement of my friend putting rags on branches to show me the way. The wink was too big for a massive screen; I should have halved it. It’s in the film for me to cringe at every time I watch it. He also taught me the importance of a detailed backstory, from the day my character was born to page zero, the page before page one of the script, so that when you step onto page one, you know exactly who the character is. This is the single greatest acting tool I use. This has turned me into a competent, complete actor. To get a character right and truthful is the juice that makes me leap out of bed, champing at the bit to go to set.
At NIDA my interpretation of character was at surface level. I just based the character off the description in the script. I didn’t go beyond that. I portrayed a character not a human being. From what Peter taught me, I found depth. I felt the character and I understood the character. The thing I instinctively added to the process was, OK, I’ve given myself a history but where are the similarities between me and the character. The more of John Jarratt I can put into it, the truer the character becomes. Albert had many similarities with me. I believe I did the character justice and did my part in the success of Picnic.
The other amazing influence was Helen Morse. I was on set observing during the actual picnic scene. I wanted to learn so much that I spent my off days on set. The dedication and concentration she brought to her character were an inspiration to me. She was a Frenchwoman. Helen is one of the greatest actors ever, she’s up there with Meryl Streep in talent; why she isn’t as famous and revered as Meryl is beyond me.
The guy I worked with most was Dominic Guard. He was the upper-class Pommie and I was the lower-class Aussie and we became mates. That was true in the film and in real life. We hit it off straight away. We had a chemistry and it showed in the film.
It was sad when the film was over; it’s one of four highlights of my career.
Dom came to Sydney and spent a week with Rosa and me. With all my work coming in, we could now afford to rent a house in Bondi. We gave Dom a week of booze, drugs and rock ’n’ roll. We didn’t have to worry about girls for him: he took care of that all by himself. He was blown away by Sydney and reluctantly got on the plane back to London.
Reality check
It was September 1974, I’d worked constantly since late ’73 and rang my agent to find out what was next. ‘Nothing,’ was the reply. It remained that way for a year. Life became a bit of a drudgery. Rosa and I were short of cash. With all this work coming in I’d thrown caution to the wind and bought a brand-new 900 BMW and we’d moved three times into more and more expensive dwellings. Rosa was a few months off completing her hairdressing apprenticeship, so her wages weren’t great and I wasn’t working. I decided to get my cab licence.
Driving a cab was the worst job I’ve ever done. I only lasted three or four months. There were five highlights, two of which made me quit.
The first one was funny. My shift finished at 3 a.m. and I was ‘gassing up’ back at base in Paddington. They played the cab radio through a speaker at the base. A cabby with a thick Italian accent came on. ‘Ello base.’
‘Yes, Twenty-Three.’
‘I gotta problem, baaase.’
‘What’s your problem, Twenty-Three?’
‘I gotta these passengers, baase, an they gotta na money, but they have a bagga grass they wanna pay me with, what I gonna do, baase?’
Suddenly all these other calls came in.
‘Take it, Twenty-Three, could be good shit.’
‘Check it for heads.’
‘Gimme your address, I got the papers.’
‘I’ll leave it to your discretion, Twenty-Three.’
For the one and only time, I used the Asian card. My great-great-grandfather was Chinese. I’m at the airport cab rank, there’s a cab in front of me. A middle-aged country woman got in the front cab and got straight out again. She came to my cab and got in.
I said, ‘You’ve got to go with the cab in front.’
‘I’m not goin’ in that cab, there’s a bloody Asian in there.’
‘Well, my great-great-grandfather’s Chinese, so get the fuck outta my cab, you fat-arsed bitch.’
I normally don’t talk that harshly about people’s looks, but she deserved it.
I picked a woman up from Town Hall in the city. She looked pale and distressed. She jumped into the cab, gave me her address in Surry Hills and said, ‘I’ve left my pills at home, I’m having a heart attack.’
‘Shouldn’t I take you to hospital?’
‘No, I’ve got to get my pills.’
‘Okay, okay.’
I raced towards her flat. She was making snorting noises, jerking and holding her chest. I hit the horn and tried to get through traffic. Cabbies noticed and base contacted me.
‘Are you in trouble, One Twenty-Five, do you need help?’
I quickly explained the situation and the cabs on Elizabeth Street combined to stop traffic and allow me through. It was amazing. I got to the flat, dragged the woman out of the cab, took her up a flight of stairs and into her flat. She dropped two pills and it was like a miracle. In no time at all, the pills kicked in and she was okay. She was very grateful and handed me some cash. For some reason I didn’t take it; I was in shock. I told her not to worry about it and left.
I was travelling up Bondi Road, I was sitting in traffic outside a dumpy terrace with Harleys around it and bits of bikes and shit on the front verandah. Six burly bikies came out and squashed themselves into the cab. ‘I can only take five passengers maximum.
‘Don’t fuckin’ worry about it. You know where the Capitol Theatre is?’
‘Yup.’
‘Take us there.’
I didn’t argue. They lit up cigarettes and one of them lit a joint. We were in the top end of Riley Street when they said, ‘Pull over here.’
‘But you said the Capitol…’
‘Just fuckin’ pull over.’
It was a dark part of the street. I smelt a rat. At the other end of the street was the well-lit Greyhound bus depot. I put my foot down and made small talk about taking them to the Capitol. They got more and more enraged. I think they were about to attack me when I pulled in to the depot; luckily there were a lot of passengers getting on a bus.
They said, ‘Fuck ya, we’re not payin’.’
Fine…
I was on Campbell Parade at the north end of Bondi Beach heading south. A surfie guy was running down the middle of the road, and about 200 metres further down, another much heavier guy was run
ning. The surfie waved me down and jumped into the cab and gave me $5.00.
‘Take me to that cunt running up ahead’.
I did so. The surfie jumped out, caught the fat guy and started punching him in the back of the head. The fat guy was unsuccessfully trying to stab the surfy with a pocketknife. I drove to the south end of Bondi Beach, parked the cab and walked to the cliff overlooking the ocean. I’d recently seen Dirty Harry on the TV. I pulled my cab licence out and threw it into the sea, as Harry had thrown his police badge into the river.
Rosa’s parents were going back to Italy for a two-month holiday in September–October 1975. They said they’d shout us the plane fares, so all we had to do is find money for food, travel and accommodation. It was early 1975 and we had nothing. We’d moved yet again to Surry Hills. We had a three-bedroom house, so we got Herb’s friend Monroe to move in to save on rent money. I’d known Monroe for a couple of years by now. He’d migrated from Sri Lanka in his teens and went on to work with Herbie at the fruit-juice factory. He was an aspiring actor and I helped him get into NIDA. He was in the same year as Mel Gibson, Steve Bisley and Judy Davis, but more about that later.
I got two cleaning jobs and Rosa got a night job as an usherette at the Regent Theatre. Our lives became work, save, work, save and save some more. I didn’t get any acting work. My agent said it would turn around when the two films I’d made were released.
The Great McCarthy was the first to be released in about June 1975. The film was quite a good comedy romp but the marketing for it was pathetic, so nobody knew it was on. They did their best with the money they had. The night after the premiere, the movie PR team organised a dinner with journalists. It was a pleasant enough dinner with about ten of us. One of the journos was very camp and I played up to him and had a few laughs with him. He was an all-right guy, but he’d had far too much to drink. I was coming out of the men’s toilet and met him at the door. He threw his arms around me and thrust his tongue down my throat. I pushed him away and right-crossed him, knocking him out cold in the hallway. I stepped over him, went back to the table, excused myself and left.
Europe
We’d managed to save quite a decent pool of money and flew to Europe with Alitalia on a DC-10 aircraft. Rosa and I were so excited. The furthest I’d been off the mainland of Australia was Magnetic Island. To be going to another country, another culture, bloody Rome for Christ’s sake. My trip to Europe with Rosa is a highlight of my life.
We arrived in Rome late afternoon jetlagged out of our heads, and we were driven to an outer suburban hotel. I was already fascinated: even the apartment blocks looked ten times older than anything in Australia. The next day we went our separate ways. Rosa’s parents went to Sicily and we went to a backpacker hostel in the city. We settled in and went sightseeing. We visited the ruins and the Coliseum.
It’s always staggering to witness these achievements. It’s amazing what you can do with brilliant architects, mathematicians, thousands of slaves and lots of antiquated tools. There you have it, a Coliseum.
On our way back to the hostel, we crossed a bridge and on the other side was a fruit stall. The fruiterer was asleep in his car beside it. He was in his mid-thirties, his hair was matted, he had rotten teeth and he looked hungover. He didn’t seem too happy to serve us. Rosa asked for some bananas, and he slid two rotten ones into the bottom of the bag. Rosa protested she didn’t want the black bananas and this started an argument. I thought Rosa was getting into the swing of bartering until she said ‘fanculo’. The fruiterer spat on her and I started punching him.
I was winning until the fruiterer’s mate turned up and threw me into some empty boxes. He then held onto the fruiterer, who looked like he wanted to kill me. I grabbed a hysterical Rosa and got out of there. We walked down the street and Rosa was sobbing. I sat her on a bench and tried to calm her. She looked wide-eyed over her shoulder and yelled, ‘Look out!’
I spun around to see the crazed fruiterer running towards me like a madman. He ran into me and grabbed me, then he sank his rotten teeth into my chin. I managed to get him in a headlock and dropped onto the footpath. I was now very angry. I started rubbing his face up and down on the concrete.
Rosa was yelling, ‘Let him go, let’s get out of here.’
I was not going to let him go. He was a fruiterer: he probably had a knife. Finally two big Italian soldiers turned up and pulled us apart. I went back to the hostel and tried to get drunk on Italian beer, but it’s not possible.
The next day we went looking for a second-hand car. This was my idea. It would have cost over a thousand bucks to tour by train and it was very limiting. We found a 1964 Fiat, a bit rough but mechanically good, just what I wanted. It cost $300 and I sold it two months later to a wrecking yard near the Rome airport for $50.
It was going to take four days to get the car paperwork done.
We decided to take the train to Venice and back. It was a beautiful trip up and back, travelling through the middle of Italy by train. The train travelled on a long bridge across the bay to Venice. We arrived in the early evening and walked out of the station to be suddenly cloaked in this ancient floating city. We took a narrow pathway past quaint shops and bars until we came to a historic boutique hotel. We were given a room and made our way upstairs to it. We opened the door to our little room and it was…Italian, beautifully Italian – I can’t think of a better description, so romantic. We pulled the velvet curtains to reveal the canal. At that very moment about ten gondolas tied together floated past. On those gondolas was a crowd including a number of tenors from the Milan Opera singing their hearts out. Then we went to bed. Welcome to Venice.
We finally acquired the car after six days of bureaucratic bullshit. We headed north out of Rome and up the west-coast motorway. I checked the map and found Pisa. It was only a three-hour drive, nothing for an Aussie. We got to Pisa around lunchtime and followed the signs to the Leaning Tower. Luckily we found a car park in the street close by. We had a good look at this fabulous round building on a ridiculous lean. Rosa is fearful of heights, and the Leaning Tower made her feel woozy.
I pulled out onto the street, but I still wasn’t used to left-hand drive and looked the wrong way. A car scraped itself along my front mudguard. The driver pulled up and got out of his car. I did a U-turn and took off.
Rosa started yelling. ‘What are you doing? Stop, you’ve just had an accident!’
‘If I go back our holiday will be over. I was in the wrong, we could be in Pisa for days and lose the car.’
‘No, stop, they’ll follow us, the police will get us, stop!’
‘No they won’t, let’s go to France.’
Four hours later we were on the French border. Luckily Rosa was wrong, and the police weren’t there to meet us.
We went to Monaco. Rosa suggested we slow down or we’d do the entire tour of southern Europe in four days.
We stayed in a camping ground on the outskirts of Monte Carlo. We scrambled through our clothes and found the best we had. All togged up and nothing in our pockets, we wandered through the famous Monte Carlo Casino trying to look rich. Monte Carlo is a beautiful place on the Mediterranean. We found a quaint restaurant with pleasant views of the harbour. We were in trouble now because we didn’t speak French. We were young and unworldly. I looked down the menu and sound something that looked like steak: steak tartare. I received a blob of raw mince with a raw egg in half an eggshell on top. I asked the waiter to cook it. She went to the chef, whom we could see from our table. He looked at me, snarled, put the mince on the hotplate for two seconds, turned it, cooked it for another two seconds and put it back onto my plate. I couldn’t eat it.
We wandered on in the Fiat through Cannes and Nice. We were on the Spanish border; it was late afternoon. We sat down to a meal at a large restaurant attached to a service station. I got through the main meal and ordered what I thought was fruit salad. They brought out this basket full of fruit with a large plate and a knife. I looked at it in as
tonishment and said to Rosa, ‘I’ve done it again. I’ll eat everything except the watermelon.’
The waiter came out and was shocked by how much fruit I’d eaten. I was only supposed to take two or three pieces of my choice. It cost us a lot to feel bloated that night.
We did the Paris thing: the Seine, the shops, the Eiffel Tower. The one that knocked my socks off was the Palace of Versailles. The palace was incredible enough, but the grounds! You looked down the centre avenue of the gardens and it shots off to the horizon. That’s not a garden, it’s a country.
I wanted to speak English again. We boarded the ferry at Calais and travelled across the famous English Channel to those brilliantly white White Cliffs of Dover. Driving into London, bloody hell, what a nightmare, it made Sydney traffic look good. We somehow found our way to Earls Court. We did the touristy stuff and then found Dom Guard from Picnic at Hanging Rock. He was determined to show us as good a time as we’d given him in Sydney. He, his mates and girlfriends took Rosa and me on a pub crawl. It was fabulous. It was 1975, the music was great. ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’ was number one. There were great bands in the pubs Dom took us to. We went on until the wee small hours. About halfway through, they had me drinking pints of Guinness while they sang, ‘Drink it down, down, down.’ They didn’t scull any and they all ended up legless. I had to drive them all home.
Dom had never been to Westminster Abbey and he was keen to come with us the next day. I swung round to pick him up. Too hungover, weak as piss. Love ya, Dom, if you’re reading this, be great to catch up with you again one day before we die.
The Bastard from the Bush: An Australian Life Page 16