Timely comic opportunity for Collette

Timely comic opportunity for Collette

Australians seem largely oblivious to the international esteem in which Collette is held. Yet she remains one of the most employable actresses, a 40-year-old who comfortably plays identifiable women, mostly complex mothers. Whenever one door closes, such as her long-running lead role in the US television series United States of Tara, another opens. "Yeah, there's been a lot of really good opportunities come my way," she says, smiling. She has just moved to New York to begin work on the Jerry Bruckheimer-produced network series Hostages, which neatly fills the gap left by United States of Tara and was one of the few programs Australian programmers spoke positively about after the US network screenings of new shows in May. That follows a pivotal role she recently played in the coming Foxtel miniseries The Devil's Playground. Digital Pass $1 for first 28 Days And as the memory of her delicious turn in the American comedy Little Miss Sunshine fades, Collette reappears in an equally delicious indie comedy, The Way Way Back. The film is being compared with Little Miss Sunshine because it was another comedy sold for a high price on an air of optimism at the Sundance Film Festival. Collette says the comparison is crazy. "There are three things that are similar: me, Steve (Carell) and the high you're on at the end," she says. "That's it." There's also the shared notion of family and trying to cobble together one when all is not normal. Collette plays Pam, who goes to her boyfriend Trent's (Carell) summer beach house with her 14-year-old son Duncan (Liam James) in tow. It's not entirely a summer of fun, as Pam learns of Trent's foibles and Duncan is befriended by Owen (a delightful Sam Rockwell), the man-child manager of the local water park. It's a coming-of-age story that begins awfully. Trent asks Owen how he'd rate himself as a person on a scale of one to 10. The kid says six; his stepfather-elect says three is closer to the mark. "That scene is pretty much ripped from the headlines of my own life," says one of the film's two co-writers and directors, Jim Rash. "That's a conversation I had with my stepfather when I was 14 in a station wagon on the way to our summer vacation. So we're not afraid to pull stuff from the world we know." Rash and Nat Faxon's world has changed dramatically after they won the original screenplay Oscar for writing The Descendants, which starred George Clooney. The duo, members of the Los Angeles comedy troupe the Groundlings, are actors with long lists of screen credits. But as comic performers, they're willing and able to write their own material. They wrote the screenplay for The Way Way Back many years ago, before The Descendants. In fact, the screenplay helped them secure the job of writing The Descendants. Collette read the script years ago but thought in the interim the film had been made or dropped. Her agent told her otherwise and she had lunch with the duo, who turned out to be "so approachable and so lovely". "It's pretty much autobiographical for Jim, so they knew what they were talking about," she says. "They're incredibly talented men." The Oscar gave the duo the confidence and power to not only direct their first feature but attract a powerful cast including Allison Janney, Maya Rudolph and Amanda Peet. Faxon and Rash also feature in amusing minor roles, Faxon as a boyish water park assistant, Roddy, and Rash as the moaning towel attendant Lewis. "I hope that an idealised version of me would not be anywhere remotely close to Lewis," Rash says. "I won't say that I'm not a bit of a germophobe, sure, we can pull that from me, but I don't sport a moustache and I think I have a little bit more spirit than him." Faxon, however, admits: "I am exactly like Roddy." Although they are first-time directors, Collette did not see them as a risk. "Everyone's got to start somewhere," she says. "I love working with first-time directors. They're not set in their ways. And rarely have I worked with one who's just a mess and didn't know what they were doing." She says they're always prepared because "they don't want to stuff up". "I've worked with a couple of directors who shouldn't even call themselves directors," Collette adds. She is too diplomatic to name them. "But these guys knew what they were doing. "It's not rocket science. They were very smart, knew their story, cast it really well, and tonally it's like my ideal movie because it's incredibly funny but also moving and very real," she says. It's also an amusing film when there aren't many around. "I think when somebody claims to be a comedian they want to shove the humour down your throat, they don't let the audience find it," Collette says. "And the comedy doesn't come out of real situations, it's these extreme, broad situations." James, Carell and Collette are the dramatic focus of the film while Rockwell, Janney, Faxon and Rash provide most of the laughs. Rockwell, perhaps better known as a dark, broody type because of films such as Moon and Matchstick Men, is a revelation. "He was born to play this part," Collette says. "I have always admired Sam and he is an absolute star in this. He says he was channelling Bill Murray in Meatballs. He's as laidback as his character but the way he riffs and the amount of improvising he did was incredible." The 1979 comedy Meatballs is not a film referenced by too many directors, though Faxon feels no embarrassment. "Sam very much embodies that confident spirit," Faxon says. "We've certainly talked a lot about this movie wanting to have a timeless feel and a sense of nostalgia. (Like) movies that we grew up on such as Meatballs and certainly John Hughes films where they had younger kids at the centre of their films and they were spoken to like adults as opposed to kids. "They were certainly strong influences on us growing up." And The Way Way Back has certainly influenced Collette positively. "I can't imagine anyone disliking this movie," she says. "There's nothing to dislike." In the context of Collette's golden run, the film came to her at an opportune time. "Generally in life I just don't push any more, things happen when they're meant to," she says. "It's kind of beyond anyone's control, so if it's meant to be, it will. But over the last 18 months I've had such positive experiences on every job that I've had. I love working; I don't aim to work all the time but they've kind of worked in succession and I think: 'Oh, the last one was amazing and this one won't be', but they keep being amazing and personally satisfying." The Way Way Back opens nationally tomorrow.




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