[image]
[title]You may know actor Josh Lawson from TV (House of Lies, Hoges: The Paul Hogan Story) or movies (Bombshell, Anchorman 2, Any Questions for Ben?) but he is also a writer and director (The Little Death) who scripted the 2016 short ‘The Eleven O’Clock’, which was nominated for an Academy Award. His latest feature film is Long Story Short, in which Sydney workaholic Teddy (UK actor Rafe Spall) wakes up after his wedding to Leanne (Zahra Newman) to find he’s time jumping a year every few minutes.
Time Out spoke to Lawson, who’s currently based on the Gold Coast, to find out the following things you only truly know if you’ve made a high-concept romantic comedy.
Photograph: Brook Rushton
Making good romcoms is hard. Really hard.
“Because we've seen so many! We're desensitised to the tropes. It's a tough one to get right now.”
The inspiration for comedy can be darkness.
“Before writing the script I had lost an ex-girlfriend to cancer at a really young age. And that really shocked me because I couldn't believe that someone so young and vibrant and vital could disappear. Long Story Short was inspired by just the most human feeling really, that life was running out, that life was short. And I was so afraid that I wasn't making the most of the limited time that I had.
"The stakes in romcoms should be high. It should feel like life and death, because love sometimes can: ‘I’ve got to stop her getting on that plane!’, you know – ‘my whole life depends on this point!’”
When it comes to comedies involving time, everyone thinks of Groundhog Day.
“It was like, do we mention Groundhog Day in the movie or do we not? And I think it is the smart move [to acknowledge it]. It's funny that ‘time loop’ has become a genre this year – you know, Palm Springs. And even though Groundhog Day is the most obvious [example], because it's the most popular, actually, Long Story Short is closer to It's a Wonderful Life, Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, or Scrooged, which was more of an influence on me growing up. Where you're like: ‘I saw my whole life, and I realised I'm wasting it, give me a second chance, I'll make it better. I promise.’”
If you get the casting right, the rest falls into place.
“With a romcom, is there anything more important than making sure you believe the chemistry of the two leads and want them to get together and believe that they're in love? It's that X factor. Zahra [Newman] was the third tape I saw, and I must have seen 50 to 60 tapes, maybe more. Zahra was exactly how I saw Leanne. Ronny Chieng I didn't really audition, I just felt like he was a fit. Noni [Hazlehurst] has a cheekiness, there's a bit of a mischief to her, and when she smiles there's a sparkle in her eyes. But [lead character] Teddy [Rafe Spall] was the last person we cast, if you can believe that.
The stakes in romcoms should be high. It should feel like life and death
“It was tough, because Teddy’s in every scene, he's got to be perfect. And my US agents gave me a list of people to talk to and Rafe was on that list. I gave him a call and we had a big, long chat. And by the end of that call, I knew he was right. Just his energy, the way he talked to me. It's a certain mania. I don't know if you could go with a Ryan Gosling, you know what I mean? Rafe kind of Tasmanian devils his way through this thing.”
Photograph: Brook Rushton
Hollywood is not always the best place for a filmmaker to be.
“I came back from LA in October, packed everything up and brought my dog back and settled on the Gold Coast. And it's been wonderful. It just didn't make any sense to be in Los Angeles right now, and a lot of Hollywood films are shooting in Australia now, because we have a pretty good grasp on how to handle shooting in a pandemic, and we have excellent crew and cast and locations. I just hope we can keep this going after the world starts opening up again.”
Even if your movie flops, it can still be a success.
“My film The Little Death (2014) has been remade in about six different countries. The one in Spanish was a big hit in Spain. But the Lithuanian one, I got a real kick out of that, because they remade it shot for shot. I mean, they copied everything! That was so funny to me because there were things that happened on the day that were mistakes, they definitely didn't have to replicate them, but they went for it! And also Long Story Short – a bunch of countries are negotiating for the remake rights.
“That's one of my favourite parts of both of these experiences, that other countries can go, ‘Yeah, we're a country that has people who have relationships and who have sex, this movie speaks to us.’ And, ‘Yeah, we are a country full of humans who want to live and make the most of the time they have.’ So it's sort of telling me that I'm making human stories, which is great. I want to keep doing that. I'm so happy that Australia can be the birthplace of these stories, and it's always so exciting to see how other countries interpret stuff.”
Long Story Short is in Australian cinemas from February 11.
Find a movie to go see tonight in Sydney.
