More from
THE GRASS IS BROWN ON BOTH SIDES OF THE FENCE

Blue Murder part 1

A show like this doesn’t come along very often. In fact, they never come along - it was a one-off.

At the initial audition, I was introduced to the director Michael Jenkins. I was given a scene that didn’t give much away as to the subject matter, other than it was a police show.
Some auditions go better than others and in this one I felt I had nailed it. Michael Jenkins must have thought so too because in a day he was back to me saying that he wanted me in it. I then asked to see the script. I was asked my phone number and my address. I was staying at this time in Surry Hills, Sydney. I gave Alison Barrett, the casting director, the address and phone number and was told to wait for them to call me back. They did. I was then told to go to the Mazda dealership on the corner of Albion Street and Anzac Parade, where I was to wait. I was to look out for a black 4-wheel drive that would pull up on the opposite corner. I was then told that a girl will get out, she will be wearing an orange top, black trousers and sunglasses and she would then cross the road to me. Identify yourself and she will hand you the script and you are to take this back to your address and read it behind locked doors. When you have read it, ring us and we will send someone to pick it up.
This was far removed from the normal procedure to get to read a script. You did not have to be that bright to dovetail together what was happening. There had been a lot of coverage regarding police corruption in New South Wales and Neddy Smith and Roger Rogerson had become well known identities. I read the script and understood why the producers were not keen to see it out and about. It was hot stuff. Very hot. Ian David’s script implicated that Roger Rogerson, New South Wales top cop, was a key player in the Sydney underworld of the 1980’s and had given notorious criminal Neddy Smith the go ahead to commit any crime in NSW he wanted to. There was only one rule that Smith had to comply with and that was he was never to shoot a cop.

On finishing the script, I rang them to say that I had done so. I was told to remain where I was behind locked doors until the script was picked up. About half an hour later the black 4-wheel drive pulled up in the lane outside my address. The door to the house I was staying at opened onto the footpath. I opened that door and passed the script through the iron barred security door of the house into the hand that appeared out of the 4-wheel drive. Not a word was spoken. Up went the dark tinted window and away went the 4-wheel drive. The next day I met with the director Mike Jenkins who asked me if I was interested in being in Blue Murder. I told him that I was but I also added my concern about who was going to protect the actors involved. Mike told me not to worry as these guys were all going away for a long time.
It was a huge cast and the producers had no trouble in getting top actors to play small parts that they would normally reject. Actor’s egos, being what they are, were put aside as we all felt we were on one team and that the show was bigger than any individual.

We workshopped the show and everyone was free to give their opinions at any time. Nick Lathouris was drama coach and we improvised the text with the director and Ian David the writer. This would give the show an authenticity that such an expose demanded. Lawyers poured over the script to uncover anything that might be contentious.
Richard Roxburgh bore an uncanny likeness to Roger Rogerson and this would be a break-through role for him. Likewise for Tony Martin as Neddy Smith. Most of my scenes were with these two and as the scenes were largely improvised I had to get in with my information where I could. This paid off for my character development, as I had to be so sycophantic to try and drag their attention in to include me. Although I had one moment of triumph where the roles were reversed. We were filming around a swimming pool. There was Richard, Tony and Gary Sweet who was playing Christopher (Rent a Kill) Flannery. As with a lot of the improvised scenes each character will have some information that was important to the plot. How you got this information into the scene was over to you. My information in this scene that I had to impart was that a plane carrying drugs was coming in from Port Moresby. Gary Sweet is in bathers and running around twirling a pistol. Gary loves it when he’s not wearing a shirt, as we all know. Add to that the closeness of Richard’s and Tony’s characters who saw my character as a necessary hanger-on. I knew I was going to have my work cut out to get in the information about the drug-laden plane.

The scene starts with Richard and Tony, who have a lot more information to impart than mine, getting stuck into it. Gary is in his element pretending to shoot kids splashing around in the pool. I sense a gap in the dialogue and start in about the drug-laden plane. I’m totally ignored as Tony and Richard carry straight on about their own agendas. I think I see another opportunity and try again. Ignored again. Gary Sweet has now dived into the pool, splashing around and I’m trying to avoid getting drenched. Tony and Richard are still having their discussion. I have another shot at butting in. Ignored again and there was no luck with my next attempt either. This isn’t worrying me personally as my information will have to be fitted in there somehow. Finally, everybody has got their respective information into the scene except me. The others are aware of that. Maybe not Gary, who is now doing muscle man poses at the end of the pool. So Richard, knowing that the drug plane info is the only thing that hasn’t been stated, says to me ‘what’s this about the plane from Port Moresby?’

My moment in the sun had arrived and it was my turn to fuck around with them - so I said, ‘fuck you I’m not going to tell you now.’ This brought a gleam to Richard’s and Tony’s eyes as they knew it was over to them to get the information out of my petulant stance. They kept pumping me for the info. I stuck to my guns ‘Nah fuck yah’. We were all laughing as they continued to cajole me for the info that in the end I gave them. Great fun and a good example of the freedom that one felt under the direction of Michael Jenkins.

There were tensions on the set because there were a lot of NSW policemen working on the show, and it stood to reason that there were spies among them. One copper who I don’t think fell into that category asked me who I was playing. I told him the real-life name of my character. He mockingly swallowed, implying fear by making his Adam’s apple go up and down. I responded by repeating what I had been told, that apparently these guys were all going down for a long time. The copper looked me straight in the eye and said warningly ‘Oh no. I don’t think they will get him’. That’s when my Adams apple went up and down for real.

Then I received a distressed phone call from my partner in Melbourne. She had received a weird phone call. Someone had rung her pretending to be me. She initially had believed it was me. That takes some doing. What helped this guise work was the simple ploy of saying ‘Hi it’s me,’ when she picked up the phone. She replied saying that I sounded funny. The voice then said that he had a bit of a cold. For a while she believed it was me before becoming suspicious, and when she did, the voice became threatening and implied that violence was headed our way.
I was on the set, preoccupied with the ramifications of such a call, and outraged that someone would threaten my partner in this way.
Richard Roxburgh sensed my concern and asked me what was up. I told him and he then said to me he had also been getting weird calls. When I asked him what his were, he told me that it sounded like a pig being slaughtered at the bottom of a wheat silo.
We approached Errol Sullivan, the executive producer of the show. We prefaced what we had to say with. ‘This is probably just a coincidence… but...’ etc.

He was not in the least bit taken back, apparently there had been lots of threats made to lots of different people, including the writer who, like Arafat, was never sleeping in the same location twice. He was in a different motel each night. I then expressed my concerns regarding my conversation with the policeman about my character. Errol felt my concerns warranted a change of name for the actual character I was playing. We were then all told not to use our home phones to discuss any aspect of the show.

Because of this I had rung my father on my mobile to say that I would not be ringing his landline for a while. I then explained the reason for this was an order from the producers of the show, as continued threats from unknown elements were still coming, and it was in the interests of all those involved in the show to be careful about what they said over the phone.
I found out much later my father had then rung my sister after I had spoken to him, to tell her ‘he has gone mad and thinks the NSW police Department is corrupt.’
However, because there had been a lot of NZ media coverage about police corruption in NSW, he was to admit grudgingly that I had turned out to be right.

Click or touch here to continue this Chapter

 

 

This is a private page, so to go to the website click here.