New Zealand Writers Guild questions TVNZ 'local' drama

The New Zealand Writers Guild has questioned TVNZ's definition of new drama Last Man Standing as 'local'.

"We believe it is misleading to call Last Man Standing a 'local' drama," said Guild Executive Director Dominic Sheehan. "TVNZ may very well have co-financed the show but it was produced in Melbourne with apparently overwhelming Australian creative contributions. The programme was made in conjunction with Australia's Channel 7 which is also heralding the programme as Australian 'local' content. How can the same show be 'local' in both territories?
"TVNZ need to stop the spin and admit that their upcoming schedule suffers from a dearth of homegrown drama and, indeed, comedy. It's not enough for TVNZ's general manager of programming Annemarie Duff to say that local shows are 'still in development'. This is the same excuse TVNZ have been giving us for over a year now. TVNZ's inability to move shows from development into production has decimated our local television industry. In the last twelve months there has been almost no work for local writers and once writers stop working the flow on effects impact on directors, producers, technicians and actors.
"TVNZ's Charter requires them to 'support and promote the talents and creative resources of New Zealanders and of the independent New Zealand film and television industry.' We believe the network is woefully failing to live up to this objective."

November 11, 2004 New Zealand Writers' Guild press release


You’ve got male

Travis McMahon has been having trouble sleeping, but he hasn’t been tossing and turning over the premiere of his latest TV series, Last Man Standing.
The former Good Guys Bad Guys star is directing a production of Kid Stakes at his old high school in Albury and has just gone through his first casting process.
“I’m lying awake at night going ‘argh—who do I put in the lead role?’,” he laughs. “It’s something different for (the students) to have someone come in who’s working in the industry.
“But they might get a bit of a shock once we hook into the rehearsals. I’ll want a fairly solid amount of work from them. I’m going to have to remind myself that they’re doing six or seven other subjects at the same time and not just rehearsing every day like I would be.”
And hopefully the actor won’t have to disappoint any young McMahons in the making.
The 33-year-old laughs now at the memory of the first time he was rejected for a role.
“It was back in primary school and I wasn’t very well-behaved back then,” he says.
“They gave the role to this other guy who I thought—without being arrogant—wasn’t an actor.”
McMahon, who was in third grade at the time, gave the teacher a piece of his mind.
“I went to the teacher and said, ‘I know what you’ve done. Just because I’m badly behaved, you haven’t given me the role.
“And that’s not how it should be. Look at some of the people that are acting around the world—they’re not very well-behaved’,” he laughs.
McMahon says he’s been asked a few times over the years to return to his teenage stomping ground and direct a play but it was only now that the timing was right.
The NIDA graduate has in recent years been busy with theatre productions for the likes of the Sydney Theatre Company and Company B.
Prior to that, he had his first big break playing Tourette’s syndrome sufferer Reuben Zeus in Good Guys Bad Guys in 1998, a role that won him critical acclaim.
“The response was fantastic,” he says. “People just loved that role and I guess it was a big risk too for commercial television to put someone up there with that sort of affliction. People still want to talk about it—or maybe they’ll want to talk about this new guy soon.”
The “new guy” is loveable loser Bruno Palmer, who McMahon plays in Last Man Standing opposite Rodger Corser as Adam Logan, Matt Passmore as Cameron Kennedy and New Zealander Miriama Smith as Zoe Hesketh.
Of the three blokes, Bruno is the least lucky in love but also the most comedic.
“He has foot-in-mouth (disease) and doesn’t think too deeply sometimes, but he does have a very caring side to him in regard to his mates,” McMahon says.
“This is a very honest show. People will get an insight into how guys deal with relationships and hopefully get a laugh along the way.
“We don’t fall into the trap of being too introspective and mournful when stuff goes wrong either.
“These guys, they open up in a male way, you know? They have a quick chat about it, go ‘righto’ and get another beer.”
It’s a philosophy that even the show’s main female character, Zoe (Smith), embodies.
She’s actually Cameron’s ex-wife (the pair split because of his cheating ways) but that doesn’t mean she isn’t essentially one of the guys.
Zoe is still comfortable in their company but to complicate matters, Cameron isn’t the only one with whom she has obvious chemistry.
McMahon is excited about the debut of Last Man Standing, which will run on Monday nights on Channel 7 after Desperate Housewives, but he’s also thankful he has a far more relaxed outlook on the industry than back when he scored his first TV role on Good Guys Bad Guys.
Back then, the actor had never even seen himself on camera.
“It’s really nice to have worked now for a few years and not take it all so seriously,” he says.
“Now when I see myself on TV I just go, ‘oh no—here I am—whatever’ or I might leave the room or someone will have a crack.
“But back when I got Good Guys, it was quite frightening, just in terms of having to wrap my head around Tourette’s and shoot at that pace.”
The cast has already finished filming Last Man Standing—all 21 episodes were shot in Melbourne and wrapped up four weeks ago.
“We had a blast,” says McMahon. “We got along really well and really enjoyed going out and spending time together. Hopefully that will show in the series.”
Last Man Standing airs on Mondays on Seven at 9.40pm.

By Penelope Cross June 01, 2005 The Daily Telegraph


The secret life of blokes

A new Australian comedy may help to explain the compulsive and sometimes bizarre behaviour of men, writes Erica Thompson.
The funky Melbourne suburb immortalised on The Secret Life of Us—which set the benchmark for Australian relationship dramas—a show Seven’s new drama series Last Man Standing will inevitably find itself compared to.
There’s a bunch of late 20-somethings living in Victoria’s capital, who congregate at a bar to discuss their loves and losses and have their inner thoughts revealed by a ubiquitous voiceover.
But this is not the new Evan, Alex and Kelly, insists Brisbane actor and star Matt Passmore.
For a start, you’re allowed to laugh.
“Secret Life dealt with relationships on a much more realistic level,” he says.
“Last Man Standing doesn’t take itself too seriously. There is a level of tongue-in-cheek and absurdity in this show.
“Even though certain people may fall flat on their face and get hurt, we seem to bounce back very fast.”
Described as “shamelessly heterosexual” by executive producer Ewan Burnett, the show focuses on three mates, heartbroken Adam (Rodger Corser), womaniser Cameron (Passmore) and unlucky in love Bruno (Travis McMahon).
All that testosterone will make an interesting companion to the female-driven Desperate Housewives, which will precede the drama on Monday nights.
But Passmore says the blokey series should appeal to both sexes.
“A lot of the show is based on boys trying to work out girls, which I think is something women can look at and laugh at,” he says.
“It definitely tries to pinpoint the joy of boys being boys, but these characters certainly aren’t ambassadors for all mankind. (The show) is not saying this is the epitome of the Aussie male.”
Far from it. Passmore’s character in particular sets SNAGs back a decade or two.
“He is just a slave to his impulses,” the actor says of Cameron, whose flirting and cheating ended his marriage to the love of his life, Zoe (played by New Zealand actress Miriama Smith).
“He loved being married but he just couldn’t keep it in his pants. He doesn’t sleep with women for any conquest. He’s not out to hurt anyone at all, but there is this side to him that is so impulsive and sensual that just sort of takes him over.”
And that made filming 22 episodes of the series a rather intimate experience for Passmore, who conversely, has been happily married to wife Jacqui for seven years.
“I find it really difficult to have sex now without a crew in the room,” he laughs. “It’s something I’ve gotten used to and unless someone’s lighting me or directing me I don’t know what to do any more.”
Cameron’s sexual antics might horrify Passmore (and perhaps viewers who know him best from Play School), but he admits many other aspects of the show ring true.
“There was one scene where we were all supposed to be drunk, doing karaoke and falling all over each other,” he says.
“When we finished the scene, we turned to each other and said: ‘Oh, yeah. How many times have we done that (in real life)?’.”
While the show might not probe too deeply, Passmore says there are still flickers of honesty about the, er, secret life of young Aussie men.
“They go and they get into ridiculous situations and then they end up at the footy bar later on bouncing it off each other,” he says.
“It’s not boys getting together and sharing and caring, but underneath it, there’s a deep sense of mateship and vulnerability. These boys live for each other, really.”
Last Man Standing, Seven, Monday 9.40pm

By Erica Thompson June 02, 2005 The Courier Mail


Delivering the male

It’s 9.25AM on a Wednesday and the sounds of sex are coming from Studio 4 in the Central City Studios. Just outside, on a grey December day, the traffic is flowing steadily between the Bolte Bridge and North Melbourne. But inside these soundproofed studios amid the construction zone of New Quay, there’s no truck noise, just the sound of actress Miriama Smith swooning through two minutes of bedded bliss for her character, Zoe. And she’s doing it without assistance from her unseen partner in the scene.
“I couldn’t be an actor,” remarks second assistant director Kara Masters, shaking her head as sound recordist Andrew Ramage announces that Smith’s first take of pleasure moans only amounted to one minute and 45 seconds, and that he really needs two minutes. He helpfully suggests she might pad it out with a bit of giggling before the purring.
In the scene, from episode nine of Seven’s new 22-part drama series, Last Man Standing, the central group of friends has rented a beachhouse. Zoe is in one bedroom, having an audibly fine time with a new beau.
In the bunk beds of a neighbouring room, her ex-husband, Cameron (Matt Passmore), and his pal Adam (Rodger Corser) are trying to block out the sound of Zoe’s enjoyment.
Smith, a statuesque 28-year-old who played a nurse in the New Zealand hospital drama Mercy Peak, is all business, despite the ribbing from the crew. She delivers a second take to rival Meg Ryan’s famous diner scene in When Harry Met Sally… it meets the two-minute requirement, and Ramage cheekily inquires about what she’s doing over Christmas.
Smith brushes aside the wisecracks with the good humour of someone who’s heard it all before, and heads off to board a flight to Sydney for a fashion magazine shoot.
It isn’t always easy being the only regular female cast member in this blokey environment, as the Green Room attests. The box-like actors’ retreat looks as if it has been set-dressed to resemble a male recreation zone: the magazine selection runs to sports, cars and busty women, there’s a nude pin-up on the wall, and a cricket bat and well-battered cricket balls resting beside the sagging couch.
No surprise that Smith spends her down time on set in the make-up van, chatting or flipping through more girl-friendly publications.
Gender issues, the subtleties, lunacies and complexities of male-female relationships, are central to Last Man Standing. This Australia-New Zealand co-production is about love, longing, loss, friendship, pain and the whole damn thing. Zoe, who works for an airline, is the gal pal/love interest. The others are Adam, a food photographer, Cameron, a landscape gardener, and Bruno (Travis McMahon), a nurse.
Originally inspired by the pilot script for a British sitcom, it has grown into a drama-comedy about the foursome and the life-shaping decisions that they face as they move towards their 30s.
Executive producer Ewan Burnett was alerted to the pilot by a couple of English producer pals when he attended a TV market in Cannes in 2002.
He read the script by Geoff Deane (Love is a Many Splintered Thing) and acquired the rights for his company, Burberry Productions (Bootleg, The Farm, Fergus McPhail), attracted by its qualities and its potential.
“It was unashamedly heterosexual and it had a very strong male voice,” he recalls. “But it worked really well for a female audience in that it was a group of men trying to work out what women think.
“It was very perceptive about men and what drives us, the primal forces versus what men are becoming. It looked at what it is to be a single straight male in today’s society and the expectations women have of us. It looked at how our roles have changed, and how we’re expected to be sensitive new-age guys but also to be able to do the caveman thing. I think a lot of men have difficulty understanding what a male is these days. The identity of men is changing and this looks at it honestly.”
Although it sounds as if it started out as something like a big brother to Men Behaving Badly, as it has developed the series’ reference points might be closer to Coupling or Cold Feet.
Around the production, there are also whispers of the “S” words: Sex and the City for men, The Secret Life of Blokes.
Burnett and scriptwriter Marieke Hardy can understand the easy-reference shorthand to popular productions from the past, but they’re loath to have their baby inappropriately pigeonholed.
Hardy, who shaped the series with Burnett and wrote 19 of the 22 episodes, mentions High Fidelity, with its confused, music-obsessed main character, as a point of reference for Adam, the series’ occasional narrator.
Burnett says that the concerns of Coupling, if not its half-hour format and quick-gag approach, are in similar relationship-scrutinising territory.
Hardy is keen for Last Man Standing not to be regarded as “that show about sex and swearing”.
“People said that Secret Life was about drinking and swearing and sex, and it wasn’t,” she explains.
“You hope that people can see to the core of it and see that it’s about relationships. It’s a character-driven show. I think it’s quite gentle, an affectionate look at men.”
Burnett rejects the “Sex and the City for men” label: “This is an hour program, it’s not a sitcom, it’s not gag-driven. The sexuality in the show is a function of the relationships. Yes, there are boobs and bums involved, and there is some nudity, but it’s not gratuitous.”
Rodger Corser, who did a stint on McLeod’s Daughters, observes, “Sometimes when they portray Australian blokey males, they’re very two-dimensional.”
Of this trio, who have been friends since high school, he says, “They have a good time. They’re great mates and they can communicate with each other. They’re blokey blokes, but there’s a difference between blokes and yobs. You can be a mate of someone, you can be a bloke, doesn’t mean you’re an idiot or a dickhead. You care about your friends, you can give them an absolute ribbing, but when it comes down to it, you’re there for them.”
While Burnett found the bare bones of what he was looking for in the pilot, he believed that changes were needed to make the production work for an Australian audience, which is where Hardy came in. The producer had known the writer since she was a child actor on the second series of The Henderson Kids II (1987).
There’s clearly a relationship of trust and admiration between them and, on Last Man, Hardy is taking a writer-producer role that would be the envy of many screenwriters. She has some say about what happens to her words and her characters.
Rightly noting that Hardy looks about 13, but is actually 28, Burnett explains, “The thing about Marieke is that she’s immensely fond of men. She’s also incredibly analytical, critical but perceptive, about what drives men. Because the male voice was so strong, and was about men, I was very concerned about having a bunch of men writing it. I wanted a show that was truthful, that was perceptive about men and male behaviour, but wasn’t condemning of us.”
To help achieve that aim, Hardy worked with a script department and plotting team that included Kirsty Fisher, Jonathan Correll and David Hannam.
“If we have a house theme at Burberry, it’s about people trying to make sense of the world,” says Burnett.
“The thing I love about comedy is having characters go off, with the greatest sincerity, and stuff up spectacularly. If anything, the motto of the company should be ‘Heroic Misadventure’,” he says, adding with a laugh that “it probably defines my business style as well”.
Burnett, Hardy and the Seven Network are keenly aware that Last Man Standing will be the first new local prime-time drama to debut this year, and it arrives at a time of trepidation in the TV industry.
Last year there were only two new prime-time series, the ABC’s Fireflies and Ten’s The Cooks, and both died.
Seven is approaching this year with a renewed commitment to Australian drama, which includes Headland, a series created by network script executive Bevan Lee. There’s hope that the fledgling productions will bring some vibrant new blood to a stable reliant on the trusty Blue Heelers, All Saints and Home & Away.
Burnett is cognisant of the state of the business: “I believe very strongly that you shouldn’t be looking over your shoulder. You shouldn’t be letting other things freak you out because if you, as an experienced program-maker, have a project with great characters and compelling stories, and you can bring to that great scripts, a terrific cast and a great team to make it, you can make a terrific series.
“Obviously you go through a process of assessment all the way through, but if you’re running scared and second-guessing on the basis of what’s gone wrong with other shows, that’s when you can trip up and create a blancmange, that’s where you compromise on story elements and character elements. With the support of the network, we have really kept a strong focus on the characters and on the story.”
Network confidence is critical, as the sad case of The Cooks illustrated. Without that support, it can be a short and unhappy run: with The Cooks, it was basically one week to perform, or you’re toast.
“If a network supports a program and keeps it running, then it has a chance to grow,” says Burnett.
“I think that’s the reality with Last Man Standing: they believe that it’s a good program and that there’s a lot of potential. I mean, it’s three men trying to work out women: we could go for 300 episodes for God’s sake!”

Three guys and a girl*#8230;
Adam (Rodger Corser): “Adam’s girlfriend leaves him at the start of the series, so he suddenly finds himself single again,” executive producer Ewan Burnett explains.
“He’s trying to feel good about being single but he’s also feeling quite shattered.” Writer Marieke Hardy describes Adam as “the most everyman of the group”.
Cameron (Matt Passmore): “Cameron is the attractive sexual predator,” Burnett says.
“His marriage fell apart because he was rooting around and he’s grappling with what it means to have something more meaningful. Cameron isn’t unredeemable. Like a lot of men, he allows his penis to make decisions and his willy frequently doesn’t make the right decision.”
Bruno (Travis McMahon): “He’s a nurse and he’s surrounded by women who fancy him,” Burnett says.
“He doesn’t buy into the niceties and the flirtatious aspects of relationships. He’ll say what everyone else is skirting around: it can be gauche but it can also be incredibly honest. Some people find it attractive; others find it offensive.”
Hardy says that one of the challenges with Bruno was not to turn him into Nudge from Hey Dad, i.e. the loopy guy who could be relied upon to bumble in and say something stupid.
Zoe (Miriama Smith): “She’s pretty strong-willed and independent,” Hardy says.
“Since her marriage break-up, she’s built this veneer of self-protection around herself. She’s reserved to a degree, she’s got a real wild streak and she’s comfortable with the boys. We didn’t want her to be the all-purpose woman: ‘I like football and beer and I’m also really sexy!’ We didn’t want to make her some goddess, so she’s flawed as well.”
Burnett says Zoe needed to be the kind of woman men want and women like.
Last Man Standing premieres on Monday at 9.40pm on Channel Seven.

By Debi Enker June 02, 2005 The Age


Last Man Standing

What do men want? We’re used to movies and television shows depicting women who are interested in finding a man to call their own.
Last Man Standing takes a look at the lovelorn single from the male point of view.
It tells the story of three Aussie blokes stumbling about in the long paddock that lies between adolescence and adulthood, looking for love and self-understanding, but willing to settle for a beer or three if these are not forthcoming.
When the series opens Adam (Rodger Corser), its protagonist and narrator, is hung over, having recently broken up with his girlfriend of five years, the curiously prim and humourless Lou.
He and Lou are giving a reading at a wedding and he arrives just in time.
There we become better acquainted with Adam’s best mates, Cameron (Matt Passmore) and Bruno (Travis McMahon)—also single and checking out the talent—and Cameron’s ex-wife, Zoe (Miriama Smith), who has flown in from New Zealand for the occasion and who has decided to return to Melbourne.
They all occupy an inner-Melbourne milieu that has become recognisable television territory, and the action occasionally stops so that Adam can reflect on events in what has become, from other programs, a familiar narrative device.
But Last Man Standing does have the potential to break new ground if it allows itself to meander away from the soapie set-up of episode one.
The characters are likeable but it would be a shame if the questions of whether Zoe and Cameron get back together, say, or whether Adam has a chance with her, are the only ones it explores.
It might be interesting to know, for example, why these men are dodging the responsibilities of manhood, or even what they imagine being a grown-up entails.
It is not unusual to come across a bunch of boys who drink too much but how often do we have the chance to find out what it is, exactly, they think they are doing?

By Katherine Kizilos June 02, 2005 Sydney Morning Herald


Men behaving sadly

Well, whoopy-doo! It seems that young, archetypal, Aussie, alpha males on the loose like to drink a little, pump up their testosteron and then, after a few growls and beatings of chests, get a performance rating from their old girlfriends. Surprising really, isn’t it?
Probably not if you’ve already suffered a dinky-di blokes-behaving-badly lifetime experience. And certainly not if you’re among those now blessed with Aussie, male, beta-to-omega bodies as the result of too many years of flexing biceps over beers or one of those beautiful, Australian women who had the sense to stay well clear.
There’s very much a sense of deja vu about Last Man Standing. You get the feeling that what you’re seeing is what was happening up the road a couple of years ago when most were watching The Secret Life of Us. And, while you can’t quite remember it, you know you’ve been through this episode.
Writer Marieke Hardy’s generally affectionate journey into the world of twenty-something male relationships introduces us to three reasonably likeable single blokes. They’re certainly less smarmy than the chaps from Coupling. And far less dorky than the males in Friends or Sex and the City.
There’s our storyteller, Adam (Rodger Corser), who reminds you a little of Secret Life’s Samuel Johnson. Dumped by his girlfriend, he initially appears to be finding it difficult to adjust to being single again. Then there’s marriage casualty Cameron (Matt Passmore), who can’t keep his zip shut, and, finally, hapless Bruno (Travis McMahon), open, honest and at times romantically naive. The woman they look like staying closest to is feisty New Zealander Zoe (Miriama Smith), who seems wise beyond her years.
We get to know them at the wedding of a couple of friends. The bride appears to have known them all well in the biblical sense; the groom appears happily oblivious to her past.
And so, as we look around for a Julia Roberts or Toni Collette to emerge, there are some excruciating readings at the service from Adam and his chilly long-time girlfriend, Pru, before Bruno and the bride’s father deliver far too much information in their wedding speeches.
But Last Man Standing is mainly about the game of relationships. Those three pals survey the room for the talent; Zoe, once married to Cameron, predicts what they’ll all do next. And at the end of the night, she, at least, is a winner.

By Brian Courtis June 06, 2005 The Age


Last Man stands up

CHANNEL 7's new drama series, Last Man Standing, has raised some perplexing questions about Australian drama.
LMS has failed to grab the attention of viewers in its first two weeks despite being a quality product and running after Seven's hit, Desperate Housewives.
It was ranked a dismal No. 27 out of all the shows screened on Monday night, and could only reach No. 11 in the younger 16-39 demographic.
The strange thing is that we reckon LMS is a funny series, with good acting and an irreverent humour that should appeal to 20 and 30-somethings.
A weak first episode wouldn't have helped matters, but we hear the series only gets better and better through the season.
Perhaps a string of so-called duds, like Ten's Cooks and CrashBurn, have made young people cynical.
Ever since The Secret Life of Us went awry in its third season, local hit drama series tend to appeal to a wider audience, a la Blue Heelers, McLeod's Daughters and All Saints.
Let's hope LMS can get the numbers before it too hits the cutting room floor.
We reckon it's really worth a go.

June 15, 2005 The Hearld Sun


Stand up for more

CHANNEL 7’s Last Man Standing may not have hit its straps yet, but star Rodger Corser is hopeful of making a second series.
Corser, who is rehearsing for the stage musical Leader of the Pack, said he wasn’t too worried about the lacklustre ratings figures for the show’s first two episodes.
“We’re just finding our audience,” the rising star said.
“Even though we’ve done publicity, it takes a while for people to realise there’s a new show on the air. It will take three or four or five weeks for that to filter through, but the people I talk to all say they really love it.
“And people aren’t just saying it’s great, they’ve got a reason why it’s great.”
Corser said he intended to ensure it had a future.
“We’d just love to do a second series,” he said. “From the beginning, it was with a view to hopefully doing three series.”
As we wrote last week, the show may be suffering in the ratings but that is no indication of the product.
With a playful sense of humour, and quality acting, writing and production, Last Man Standing deserves to succeed.
Unfortunately, Channel 7 has a reputation for axing shows before they get a chance.
So it’s fingers crossed among the cast and producers that LMS doesn’t end in the same fate.
Either way, the multi-talented Corser should do well from the show. His return to the stage, after a lengthy role in Rent, will be in the 1960s-era Leader of the Pack.
Also starring John Paul Young and Amanda Harrison, the show is the story of Ellie Greenwich, the woman who wrote hit ‘60s songs.
Leader of the Pack opens at Melbourne’s Crown Casino on July 12.

June 20, 2005 The Herald Sun


Last but not least

It takes a lot more than a dry spell to get actor Travis McMahon down. Kylie Miller reports.
As with many in his profession, Travis McMahon knew early he was destined to be a performer. Such was his confidence in his direction that aged eight or nine he confronted a primary school music teacher who decided against casting him for a role in a play.
‘’The boy who got it wasn’t right,” he recalls, indignation still tight in his voice, although mingled with amusement.
“I think I didn’t get it because I just used to muck up in class. (I said), ‘You didn’t give me that because of other things.’ And she said, ‘Yeah, well that’s the way it’s going to be.’
“It was a tough lesson for a child who already knew his path in life would not be academic.”
Acting is just a chance for adventure. It’s a chance to look at the world through someone else’s eyes, to experience it all,” he says.
Adventure—grabbing life’s opportunities with both hands—is important to McMahon.
The firstborn of “protective” middle-class parents, he attended the private Scots School in Albury where his father, Peter, taught economics. Mother Driz longed to be an actor but worked as a nurse in between raising four sons. Now she reads audio descriptions of theatre for the vision impaired.
McMahon says he didn’t so much struggle at school as “bust out” rebelling against the discipline required for academic success.
After school he enrolled at Wollongong University and spent two years studying creative arts and acting, split by a year working as a bus boy in Sydney.
In 1993, on his second attempt, he was accepted into the prestigious National Institute of Dramatic Art acting course. He felt he was on his way.
Three years later, at the end of his final year, he was horrified to learn that the drama school had cancelled its traditional Melbourne “agents’ day”, showcasing its graduates’ talent.
So he marshalled his classmates, hired a minibus and organised a road trip. In the audience at the Malthouse were Robin Nevin and Tom Gutteridge.
‘’And that’s where it all started for me; they were casting Kid Stakes.”
Nevin cast McMahon as Barney in the Melbourne Theatre Company production. For the young actor it was an affirmation that he had chosen the right career, giving him “invaluable” confidence.
‘’Going to the bank teller in Acland Street, the first time I got paid, for me it was a pretty special moment.”
I’ve been warned he can be nervous in interviews, but McMahon, 33, seems relaxed as he swigs a beer in the bar of a city hotel.
Publicity is part of the job, he says, but talking about himself doesn’t come naturally.
“Some performers seek it out and I don’t. If I’m asked, I’ll do it to help the show.”
He chuckles as he tells stories of youthful misadventure; of hitching up the coast with a mate, sleeping rough beside the road and learning the next day that they failed to pick up a ride because the police had warned motorists not to stop for hitch-hikers after a jailbreak in the area.
Another hitching adventure wasn’t so lucky. Or perhaps it was.
He awoke as he was driven down a deserted bush track well off the promised route. He used his wits and took a chance, escaping a potentially dangerous situation unharmed. Fortunate, he concedes, but all part of life’s big adventure.
On this Friday afternoon he can barely contain his excitement about a forecast of weekend snow and the chance to test a pair of “virgin” skis delivered that afternoon by a rep for Swiss company Stockli.
“They look bloody sick!” he beams, and for a moment it’s as if that precocious child is back.
McMahon has recently moved to Smoko, near Harrietville, on the Great Alpine Road, where he spends his days outdoors; running, skiing, mountain biking and “just stepping back from the city vibe”.
He hums with health and fitness.
Later, he is off to the footy with his co-stars from Last Man Standing and some competition winners from Shepparton.
Winning the role of Bruno Palmer in Seven’s local drama had the added appeal of bringing him back from Sydney to an Aussie rules culture, he says.
The devoted Essendon supporter struggles with his character’s on-screen attachment to Richmond, but relates to his friendships with his mates. “As for the deeper stuff, I don’t like to think too much about similarities as the more you have of them, the less acting you’re doing.”
Last Man Standing’s executive producer, Ewan Burnett, says McMahon was the last of 40 actors auditioned for the role, and the last of the male leads to be cast.
‘’We didn’t want a complete loser or a complete doofus,” Burnett says.
The actor who played the unluckyin- love nurse had to be attractive, but also gauche and with a comic flair.
“He came in and it was just a natural fit,” he says.
So much so, in fact, that coproducer and series writer Marieke Hardy could barely contain her glee.
‘’I had to leave the room to have a bit of shrill screaming time,” Hardy confesses.
Previously, the producers had considered character actors for the role; “less physically gorgeous specimens” of the “little bald man” variety who would trail along behind Cameron and Adam being hilarious, she says.
McMahon, who had earlier auditioned for the role of Adam, was thought to be “too spunky”.”
Travis plays it so beautifully,” Hardy says. “It could easily have gone down the path of cardboard cut-out character number one, but he’s a very intense actor, very serious and disciplined.
He’s obviously got a strong comic feel but he never goes for the easy laugh - he analyses very deeply what his character would do.
‘’The naivety he infuses allows Bruno to get away with morally ambiguous behaviour, she believes.”
He really gets away with some things that if Cameron said it you’d really think, ‘You prick!’”
And although Hardy put him through excruciating moments—such as a recent scene where he masturbated on his virgin girlfriend—McMahon never complained, albeit turning occasionally to deliver a wry grin during script readthroughs.
‘’I’m crazy about him. I think he just did such an amazing job as an actor.”
In 1997, soon after he finished Kid Stakes, McMahon won his breakthrough role in Good Guys Bad Guys, an unconventional crime series from Melbourne producers Roger Simpson and Roger Le Mesurier.
After three difficult auditions he was cast as Reuben Zeus, a drycleaner with Tourette syndrome, a rare neurological disorder characterised by involuntary sudden movements, or tics, and inappropriate language.
‘’I remember coming out of the auditions with a headache, thinking, ‘Oh, this role’s going to be full-on’, trying to wrap my head around Tourette’s.”
McMahon threw himself into researching the role, absorbing books and documentaries and spending time with afflicted people. He created a map on the wall with notes showing what happens in the brain.
“I’d wander around late at night on football ovals, swearing and ticking and doing stuff.”
He felt strongly that he had to give the role his all, knowing that if he had any doubts it would mess with his performance.
He won accolades for his effort and, the same year, landed a role in a Halifax f. p. telemovie, working with Rebecca Gibney and Guy Pearce.
Aged 26, and a year out of drama school, he was pretty pleased with his life.
‘’I thought it was going all right. I was genuinely excited to be working and in television ¿ I was really happy to have that job, to be able to act.”
The good times didn’t last. After two years of regular work, Nine dropped the series. For McMahon and his co-stars, the decision was a surprise and a disappointment.
‘’It wasn’t a great time, professionally, after that, for me,” he says.
“There was a perception that I was working, Good Guys was still on, it was still a great show. All of a sudden there wasn’t a lot of work.
‘’After living well and doing a lot of work, the first time that happens to you it is a little bit confronting. Especially if you start running out of cash and you are still on TV.”
Having bought an apartment during the first season—“I thought, ‘That’s it, all the responsible stuff is done!’ “—McMahon hadn’t prepared himself, mentally or financially, for unemployment.
There followed a string of cash- flow jobs: an early-morning paper run, working as a bicycle courier in Sydney—“that was a tough job”—and as entertainment co-ordinator in a strip club.
He had a few guest roles, including one playing a violent misogynist in an episode of Blue Heelers and another in Stingers.
To his relief, the acting kicked in again in 2000 when he was offered a role in the international touring production of Cloudstreet, which kept him employed for a year. Acting has paid the mortgage since then.
Although it seems unlikely given its disappointing ratings, McMahon expects to find out this month whether Seven will commission a second series of Last Man Standing. He loved working on the drama and hopes it will go again.
“Experience—that’s exactly the word. I enjoyed and appreciated the opportunity to gain experience. I just love working in this industry and going to work every day with good people and good scripts, and that has to be a step in the right direction.”
He has recently finished directing a year 11 production of Kid Stakes at his former high school in Albury, and talks about a film he shot in Adelaide a couple of years ago, a privately funded feature by first-time writer-director J Harkness. Harkness cast him after seeing his work in Good Guys Bad Guys.
McMahon is eager to plug Shot of Love, his first feature, which he describes as a “complex love story” in which he plays a drug dealer. “It explores the themes of love and intimacy and drugs.”
He is proud of the film—although he later admits he would say it was good even if it wasn’t—the same pride he feels in his first professional theatre role, Kid Stakes, and television job, Good Guys Bad Guys.
‘’I love doing what I do. I would like to direct some more. I would like to get a role in another film and see where that takes me, shoot another season of Last Man and just quietly keep working on the very early stages of a project that ideally will be a film.”
The project he refers to is a novel about violence.
Why violence? “Why? It’s just a feeling that that story has got legs and should be told. The idea is to start work on the book and see how far I get. I don’t know how much talent I’ve got as a writer. I’m not too enthused about that, it’s just the beginning stages.”
Should it unfold the way he hopes, McMahon would engage an experienced writer to develop a film script in which he could star. “If you are gonna get something up, you might as well get something up for yourself!” he laughs.
In the meantime, acting is part of life’s colourful journey.
“I just naturally love life. I just naturally do and gravitate to things that make me feel good when I do it. Acting is how I express myself at the moment. It is a very big part of my life.”
And while he doesn’t know what came of that primary school teacher, he reckons he owes her thanks.
“It’s my first passionate memory of the arts and a first step on what has already been an incredible journey ¿ and there’s plenty more juice in the tank!”
Last Man Standing screens on Tuesdays at 9.30pm on Channel Seven.

By Kylie Miller August 18, 2005 The Age


Last Man falls

THE declining interest in quality home-grown television drama claimed another victim yesterday.
Seven said poor ratings for the heavily hyped and critically supported Last Man Standing meant it would not go into a second series.
The “dramady” about 30-something blokes navigating the pitfalls of modern life debuted in June.
But it languished with around 750,000 weekly viewers - 400,000 below the numbers needed for prime-time survival.
Seven will air all 21 episodes produced, the station’s programmer Tim Worner said.

September 01, 2005 The Daily Telegraph


Reviews: Last Man Standing

Well, we’ve tried eloquent reviews, we’ve tried Jedi-mindtricking our friends and we’ve even tried slipping “Watch Last Man Standing” drugs into the Green Guide ink but as the ratings and 10.30pm timeslot would indicate, none of it has worked.
So let me make one, final, mildly pathetic plea: give Last Man Standing a shot, because it really is that good. Seriously.
For one, writer Marieke Hardy demonstrates an ear that is disarmingly well-tuned to the colloquialisms of the young Australian male (Says Adam, played by Rodger Corser, upon entering one drinking hole tonight: “Bit of a wank, isn’t it? I mean, who goes to wine bars?”)
The reply from Travis McMahon’s rather hapless Bruno - “Derryn Hinch” - will make anyone who’s frequented bars on St Kilda Road piss themselves.
And, when her characters mouth off at the price of oysters at the David Jones Food Hall or the ubiquity of Birkenstocks, you can’t help but laugh for the same reason you laughed at the “013” reference in Two Hands: as a local, you recognise the truth of the moment.
These are beautifully drawn characters, and tonight, they continue to move in arcs that make sense: Bruno runs hot and cold with a flirty waitress; the maturing Cameron (Matt Passmore) announces his divorce from Zoe (Miriama Smith); and Zoe, in turn, encounters strain in her under-wraps relationship with Cameron’s mate Adam.
It’s gritty, messy stuff, lacking the aspirational appeal of, say, Sex and the City or The OC.
Indeed, if I could improve one thing about Last Man Standing, it would be the styling: even allowing for the fact these men aren’t meant to be fashion plates, the leather jackets and moleskin blazers are a bit much.
But it’s also wonderfully entertaining, by turns hilarious and heartbreaking.
For one last time, then: give Last Man Standing a shot, because it really is that good.

By Kenneth Nguyen September 1, 2005 The Age


Talking Point

THE sad news that there would be no second season of Last Man Standing came as no surprise. The disappointment that Seven felt about its Melbourne-made drama had been leaking like salty tears from the network since the morning after the show's debut on June 6.
Seven had hoped that Last Man, a funny, sexy drama focusing on the friendship of a trio of mates approaching their 30s, might capture the audience that once spent Monday nights avidly tuned to the exploits of Carrie and co. on Sex and the City.
But regrettably, and fatally for this cleverly written and well-cast local production, it failed to meet the "magic million" mark on its debut, or in the weeks that followed. And as it didn't immediately attract more than a million viewers nationally, both a crucial ratings threshold and a psychological hurdle, one could feel the network losing faith. It hung in for a while, allowing the series a plum Monday night slot, and then started the familiar, frustrating shuffle to later timeslots and different nights.
Seven is a lot less adept at hiding its disappointment than Ten, a network that has worked hard at making a virtue out of some of its programs' limited appeal. Most weeks, Last Man earned ratings comparable to those of a show such as The O.C. but while Ten enthusiastically makes its glossy Orange Country soap look like a hot property, Seven conveyed the sour impression that it was stuck with a lemon.
So the vultures started to circle, to anticipate Last Man's demise and to feast on its carcass with a sense of Schadenfreude. There were the inevitable dark musings about whether Australians were interested in watching home-grown productions if they didn't involve tangos or renovations of property and sagging bodies.
It's particularly dismaying to add this headstone to the cemetery of local dramas that have died young. It's a graveyard that has seen a lot of activity in recent years, and the brutal attrition rate wouldn't be lost on Nine as it nervously launches its new baby, Little Oberon.
It's sad because Last Man Standing, a 22-part series mainly written by the prodigiously talented Marieke Hardy, has a lot going for it and deserves a longer life. As it approaches its 17th episode, the series continues to offer a vibrant collection of characters and a community to care about. At its warm heart is a full-blooded, funny and flawed foursome: sweet-natured food photographer Adam (Rodger Corser), harbouring a passion for his best mate's former wife, Zoe (Miriama Smith); landscape gardener Cameron (Matt Passmore), with his love of women but unable to sustain a relationship; well-meaning but bumbling nurse Bruno (Travis McMahon), generally luckless with women but a great pal to his colleagues on the ward.
The show's skill is perhaps most evident in the evolution of Bruno, a unique character in local drama. Bruno can say silly things without being branded as the clown. He can be sensitive and boorish, clumsy and caring, and he's believable as both a good friend and a romantic interest, even as he bounces around, loudly asserting opinions that more sensitive or sophisticated blokes might only think. Hardy has said that the challenge with Bruno was not to turn him into Nudge from Hey Dad!: the buffoon who lurched in grinning and said something stupid in order to raise a laugh. She succeeded.
It's clear that she holds a genuine affection for all her characters and around the core group, she has woven a robust extended family that further enriches the show's texture. It includes Adam's mother, brother and sister, and her lesbian lover; Bruno's high-spirited parents and Cameron's coldly estranged ones; and Bruno's delightfully gormless housemate. Adam's relationship with his younger brother, Anto (Fletcher Humphrys), is a particular joy to behold, a beautifully drawn, thoroughly believable combination of love and exasperation.
Hardy's characters' conversations are authentic and spirited, just the kind of joshing, cutting, constructive chat that city folk with a history together might have as they mull over their messy lives. I'm going to miss spending time with them.
It's a shame that Last Man won't be standing this time next year.

By Debi Enker September 22, 2005 The Age