starstruck1982

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Starstruck - Trivia

Gillian Armstrong turned down a number of different projects in favour of Starstruck. One of these was another classic Australian film of the era, Puberty Blues (1981), which co-starred Starstruck's Ned Lander (Robbie). 

It was originally planned to shoot the tightrope sequence at Martin Place in central Sydney, but it proved too impractical and expensive.

Stuntwoman Dale Aspen walked the tightrope in place of Jo Kennedy, and was badly injured when she fell during filming. Fortunately, she escaped without lasting damage.

The crowd of the Wow! Show was composed of actors from Sydney's Australian Theatre for Young People (ATYP). By contrast, the crowd for the New Years Eve finale - filmed at the end of the shoot, when money was scarce - was made up of school students working as volunteers.

John O'May was the only member of the cast with professional experience in singing and dancing.

Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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Starstruck - Trivia

Screenwriter Stephen MacLean's preferred choice for the role of Jackie Mullens was 'Little Nell' Campbell, most famous for her role as Columbia in The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975). The 'Surfside Tango' is noticeably similar to Little Nell's most famous song, 'Do The Swim' (warning, slightly NSFW!)

Had 'Little Nell' joined the cast, it would have been just one of many connections between Starstruck and Rocky Horror. Both films shared the same choreographer in David Atkins, and the same set designer in Brian Thomson - who had just worked with Rocky Horror's director, Jim Sharman, on the stage play Lulu. Sharman himself was a longtime friend of the film's screenwriter, Stephen MacLean.

Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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Starstruck - Reviews

Pittsburgh Press - 27 May 1983

Many of Starstruck's initial reviews were very positive - though a few were admittedly less so. Here is a sampling from Australia and America.

Canberra Times - 12 May 1982 Having Great Fun Avoiding Hazards Dougal MacDonald A ROCK musical set mainly in a pub in Sydney's Rocks area might not seem all that much of a good idea, yet Gillian Armstrong's film makes the most of the genre at the same time as being great fun. Scriptwriter Stephen MacLean has re-invented the simple plot about a girl prepared to do anything to be noticed on her climb to singing stardom, then embellished it with enough serious ideas to keep it from wasting its time. MacLean says he had the teeny-bopper audience in mind, from 9 to 18. It's a measure of the film's quality that an old fogey like me found it agreeably entertaining. It's very easy to make a bad film around rock mu sic, based on the notion of a great talent frustrated by absence of recognition yet winning through against all opposition to reach the final reel in a burst of success and acclamation. The idea is simplistic, excessively cutesy and burdened by more than half a century of over-exposure. 'Starstruck' en counters all these hazards and disposes of them. How it does so is worth examining. Both writer and director have let the Him find its own pace. Never forcing it, they accept its occasional stumbles and get it moving again, the dramatic action and the musical numbers taking separate paths and crossing in a manner at once logical and relaxed. One should resist the temptation to compare this with the counterpart elements in 'Fame', since the two films have quite different purposes. Instead, one can admire for its own sake the energy that pervades 'Starstruck' and take pleasure from both the production values of its musical numbers and the cultural accuracy of its dramatic content. There is a bigness about the musical production and a nice satirical quality to most of the staging of the songs. Jackie (Jo Kennedy) goes on a TV talent-quest program for the obligatory "I blew it" number and to the Opera House for the big finale against a backdrop of the Bridge in flashing lights. The love-song is small, tightly controlled, and full of the pathos of Jackie's shock at finding out that her femaleness cuts no ice with Terry, the TV compere (John O'May) who wants her only for her voice, his sexual preferences being of his own gender. Linking the songs is a story of life at the Harbour View, a pub for the work ing man and woman, a neighbourhood escape from boredom, a surrogate family, a place where the counter-lunches are some thing that, in one drinker's words, you wouldn't serve to a Jap on Anzac Day (the film was finished before the brown dog became in famous). The pub is a reference point with reality, from which Jackie and her younger cousin Angus (Ross O'Donovan) launch their campaign to take the entertainment world by storm. To win, they must defeat the entrenched forces of family and public fickleness. The battle is a lot of fun for the film-goer. That the material from which the film is fashioned is slight does not detract from its effectiveness. The talent of the young per formers is manifest and major, especially Jo Ken nedy. The music is adequate of its kind and once or twice excellent. And there are enough meaty ideas to be found in the script to lift the film above the epithet of mindless. The Age (Melbourne) - 12 April 1982 ‘Starstruck’ is Armstrong’s brilliant satire Neil Jillett Gillian Armstrong’s Starstruck (Midcity) is a brilliant bombshell of a film, perhaps the first satire thrown up by the Australian cinema’s New Wave. But will the public accept it for what it is, or even see what it is? Armstrong’s first feature, ‘My Brilliant Career’ (1979), was little more than nostalgia clumsily dressed in feminist drag; yet it won extravagant praise. Its successor, a much better film in nearly every way, seems to be in danger of being misinterpreted or dismissed out of hand. If this is to be its fate, the promotional campaign and Armstrong’s own comments will be partly to blame. In a campaign that might have been designed to scare off anyone older than 25, the publicity for 'Starstruck' announces the arrival of "the first Aussie modern musical comedy" and spouts other waffle about the pop/rock scene. And Armstrong is quoted as saying that she signed up as a director because "I wanted to work with Australian pop music at a time when it's beginning to get the international recognition it deserves." That explanation sounds sanctimonious. It certainly underestimates Armstrong's achievement with 'Starstruck'. It encourages a general impression that the film is a spin-off from the TV show 'Countdown', garbage for the adolescent drive-in trade. 'Starstruck' does owe a debt to 'Countdown,' but an unusual and complex one. 'Countdown' is a fascinating programme, if only because it shows the ABC's persistence in using taxpayers' money to promote and subsidise local and overseas record companies and other branches of commercial showbiz in their campaign to extract millions of dollars from teenyboppers by selling them a largely worthless product. In the pop/rock industry the packaging is usually the product. Promotion is more important than talent. It is 'Starstruck's witty awareness of this point that makes it such a fine film. The plot, economically laid down by Stephen Maclean's screenplay, looks at what happens when a group of youngsters turn the manipulative tables on the exploiters. The kids are not particularly talented - their music is as imitatively bland as anyone else's - but they use their own promotion tactics to fool the media and to subvert a competition being run by a TV talent show. The leaders of this children's crusade are Jackie, an 18-year-old singing barmaid, and Angus, her 14-year-old cousin and manager. On their devious way to the top we are subjected to much rocking and popping, dancing and singing, mainly through the efforts of music director Mark Moffatt and a New Zealand group, The Swingers. The result does not sound any different to the average contribution to 'Countdown', but the visual style is far more exciting, and the performances have a sense of real rather than contrived enjoyment. Jackie and Angus live in their family's pub. near the Southern pylons of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, and this setting is exploited by the film - visually and as a plot device. The pub is almost broke and may be closed by the brewery, and the attempt to keep it open is shown in entertainingly corny tandem with the kids' efforts to hit the pop big time. The pub's customers are mainly people of the age of the 'Countdown' generation's parents, and while the kids are out laying siege to the TV show and storming the top 10s barricades, the adults are behaving in a no less grotesque way back at the pub, having boozy fun when they are not crying into their beer. The generations sneer at each other until they are united by the realisation that they have a common enemy. The System (represented by the TV show and the brewery), which can be beaten by a united front. The adults and the kids are not going to abandon their drugs (beer and music), but they have learned to become masters of their own dosage. The film moves with tremendous energy through Brian Thomson's attractively garish sets, which are recorded with sympathetic boldness by Russell Boyd's busy, wide-angled camerawork.  Armstrong lets the pace drag only twice, in love scenes between Jackie (Jo Kennedy, who has the right bounce in the rest of the film) and her true love, Robbie (Ned Lander, with the fixedly prognathic expression familiar from 'The Restless Years'). As Angus, the ferrety cousin, Ross O'Donovan is sometimes uncertain, though at his best he has an amused and amusing swagger. There are some top line performances in the smaller, older roles. New Zealander Pat Evison is a superb caricature of a fat, smelly but still loveable old Nana; and Dennis Miller as Angus's Dad, dashingly garbed in signet and see-through shirt, is very funny having quick fumbles with Margo Lee as Jo's agreeably surprised Mum. In the musical scenes the sound is at a merciful level, though lips and words sometimes seem out of  synch. In the general rhubarb that too often accompanies the dialogue some good lines may have been lost, but one survived and will stay with me for a long time. "Geez," says a pub customer looking at his counter lunch, "you wouldn't give that to a Jap on Anzac Day!" Whatever the quality of the talk and music, 'Starstruck' is always a good-looking film, thanks several times to the choreography of David Atkins. His best effort is an Esther Williams parody in which the homosexual compere Terry (a neatly defined cameo by John O'May) cavorts in a rooftop pool with a balletic corps of male surf lifesavers. In this dig at images of Australian masculinity the satire, as in the rest of the film, is sharp without being cruel. The lifesaver scene is also typical of what I would hope is this film's broad appeal. As a spectacle, it can be enjoyed by all ages. It gives all of us - but perhaps most obviously those around the 18 and 40 year marks - a chance to laugh at ourselves and each other. And on a more serious level 'Starstruck', in its entrancing and comically romantic depiction of Australian youth and middle-age, is a rather alarming record of the values which this country holds most dear.

New York Times - 10 November 1982 “Starstruck” Down Under ... by Janet Maslin LIKE Gillian Armstrong's first film, ''My Brilliant Career,'' her second has a red-haired heroine with decidedly headstrong ways. That's where the resemblance ends, however, since ''My Brilliant Career'' was set in turn-of-the-century rural Australia, and the new film takes place among the punk-rock vanguard of modern Sydney. ''Starstruck'' is the story of Jackie (Jo Kennedy), who will stop at nothing to get herself on television, and who during the course of the story dresses up as, among other things, a long-playing record, a topless tightrope walker and a red kangaroo. Is this the sort of thing that would make a movie lovable? I think it is, but there will be those who don't. They are advised to avoid the Sutton theater, where ''Starstruck'' opens today in all its dizzy, impudent, highspirited glory. On the other hand, anyone who finds this intriguing probably ought to hurry over. ''Starstruck'' doesn't have much of a plot; it tries to get by mostly on charm, and its charm is of a singular and limited sort. First and foremost, this movie is a costumer's dream. Jackie never fails to be dressed in something appealingly ridiculous, and her mother is apt to appear in ruffly pastels of mid-60's vintage, with little bunches of fake fruit at her neck and ears. The wit of Luciana Arrighi and Terry Ryan's costumes is rivaled by the set decoration of Brian Thomson, who also did the sets for ''The Rocky Horror Show.'' It is Mr. Thomson, presumably, who was responsible for giving Jackie an inflatable sandbox in her beach-wallpapered bedroom (she sleeps on a Mondrian print raft in the middle), or for giving her little cousin Angus (Ross O'Donovan) Elvis Presley bedsheets. The pub where Jackie sometimes works as a barmaid is another bit of masterful decor, and it is full of older-generation types liable to break out into spontaneous singing and dancing as Jackie trots across the countertops. ''Starstruck'' is silly through and through, but it's also full of happy, musical surprises. You may never again see a swimming pool sequence featuring chorus boys flanked by a line of inflatable plastic sharks. On the other hand, you may never want to see such a thing even once, and that's something that can easily be determined ahead of time. On the rare moments when the story makes itself obtrusive, it does seem old-hat. Jackie is just another sweet kid who wants to break into show business. There's a nice boy who cares for her and another, more jaded fellow who catches her eye. And Jackie hopes to enter a television talent contest just as her mother's business is about to be foreclosed. Will she win? ''Starstruck'' is too cheerful a movie to spring any unhappy surprises, and in any case Jackie's indomitable optimism is established from the very start. Even with a woebegone cockatoo on her shoulder - the costumes are always unusual, as pointed out previously - she retains her assurance and her cool. Incidentally, the bird-on-the-shoulder look proves so successful that it is eventually adopted by Jackie's entire band. ''Do you like the Beatles?'' an older character asks Jackie. She replies, with a superior sniff, ''They broke up when I was two.'' The movie shares a little of Jackie's overconfidence; even at times when she might have tried harder to win a wider audience, Miss Armstrong is content to adopt a take-it-or-leave-it stance. That, and the relative ordinariness of the music, and the fact that it all lasts a bit longer than it needs to, are perhaps the film's biggest drawbacks. But ''Starstruck'' is an original, and an energetic and funny one at that. It reveals a new side of Australia to anyone whose principal film memories are of the Outback. And now that ''My Brilliant Career'' has established Miss Armstrong's talent, this one demonstrates her versatility in no uncertain terms. She may be an original, too. The Pittsburgh Press - 27 May 1983 'Starstruck' Shines Brightly at Times By JIM DAVIDSON Jackie is a rambunctious 17-year-old determined to become a singing star. Angus, her cousin, is a twerp of 14 who fancies himself as her promoter and manager. He promises to make a star so bright she'll set Sydney, Australia on its ear. Such is the gossamer storyline of "Starstruck," a refreshing Australian musical comedy that opens today at the Kings Court. Peculiar movie. Not unlike the Scottish import "Local Hero," it has an understated sense of humour that dares a moviegoer to love it or hate it. "Starstruck" is either dopey or charming, take your pick. Betcha the marketing executives didn't know what to make of it all. And it remains to be seen whether the rock music audience will buy its sweetness, upbeat fantasy and jaunty rock 'n roll. The style owes something to "Fame." One moment "Starstruck" shows ordinary pub patrons quaffing their ordinary beers and minding their ordinary business. Suddenly music blows up from somewhere, and the old ladies and gents turn into a conga line. Or suddenly Jackie is practicing her high-wire act on a rope strung above the bar. "I want a band, I want amplifiers, I want I want I want," says Jackie (Jo Kennedy) at the start of the movie, just as she notices a kangaroo suit in a store window. She wants that, too, and winds up wearing it to amateur night at the Lizard Lounge. In that get up, she looks smashing on her cousin Angus's (Ross O'Donovan's) motor scooter. This is the younger generation, replete with post-punk costumes and music. Wise-guy Angus, proud of his generation, brags that he was 2 years old when the Beatles broke up. Jackie's innocent dream is an old movie dream, and her fate is an old movie fate. Thanks to some crafty wrangling by Angus, Jackie meets writer/TV host Terry Lambert (John O'May) and her career starts rolling. The grand finale talent show is staged in Australia's most famous building, the Sydney Opera House. "Starstruck" is all surface. Director Gillian Armstrong, coming back from a four-year hiatus after "My Brilliant Career," settles for a winsome tone and doesn't try and explain her characters' psychology or account for their zany stunts. Spectacle is enough, especially when Jackie is on her high wire. The production designer is Brian Thompson, credited in the small print with the set design for "The Rocky Horror Picture Show." The new movie uses confectionery colours, garish costumes, impossible hairstyles and lots of offhand weirdness like the Elvis Presley sheets on Angus's bed. Most of it is tasteful and inoffensive, although poolside spoofs of Busby Berkeley and Esther Williams are certainly old hat by now. The dense accumulation of details - some of them perhaps hard to spot until a second or third viewing - suggest "Starstruck" could wind up as a cult movie on the midnight circuit. Miss Kennedy is irresistible in the finale, "It's the Monkey in Me," bounding gawkily about the stage and singing with a studio echo to her voice. "New wave" is the rage they're sticking on the music, but to these ears it's like the Tommy James and the Shondells hits of the late '60s. Most numbers are on the saccharine side, and many look as if they were engineered especially for the MTV network on cable television. The segments are brief, colourful, full of quick and jarring cuts, and basically empty - just like the videos on MTV. Jackie defines star quality as "that little something extra." She has it, and so does the movie.

Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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Starstruck - American Release

Starstruck received a sneak preview in Los Angeles on March 24, 1982, but it was not until August that year that an American distribution deal was announced. The film was picked up by the New York-based Cinecom International Films, a newly formed distribution company that hoped to focus on bringing the best international and independent cinema to American screens. 

Starstruck was given a very different visual theme for its American release, with the bright day-glo colours of the Australian marketing campaign replaced by a softer palette of pale blues and pinks, and the title itself adjusted to Star Struck. Several reviewers commented on the difficulty of marketing the film. Was it a bouncy musical for the same teens who had loved Grease, a more mature picture for the adults who enjoyed Saturday Night Fever, or a quirky oddity for The Rocky Horror Picture Show crowd? Ultimately, Cinecom would try it out in all three markets, with more success in some cases than others. "We want to avoid the public misinterpreting Star Struck as a film for teenagers," distributor Ira Deutchman told industry newspaper Variety. "You have to target the primary audience for the film and reach the adults first." The film was initially released at New York's Sutton Theatre on 10 November 1982, where it performed very well and played for six weeks. It was also well received in its West Coast debut at the Fine Art Theatre in Los Angeles in January 1983, but the film's takings were more uneven in its limited release on the mainstream regional market in later months.  A better strategy was found when the film was adopted as a midnight special at New York's Embassy Theatre towards the end of the year. Limited suburban engagements continued to take place, but it was not until it appeared on cable television that many American viewers first became aware of Starstruck.

Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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Starstruck - Australian Release

Starstruck was given a very distinctive visual theme in Australian promotions, highly reminiscent not only by the palette of Flamingo Park and its ilk but by the quirky style of New Wave bands such as Split Enz. The man responsible for the look was Sydney artist Paul Worsted, who had also produced colourful posters and album covers for many bands, and helped define the signature aesthetic of Starstruck soundtrack contributors Mental As Anything. Along with Mental as Anything band member Reg Mombassa, he was one of the earliest artists to work for the iconic Australian design label, Mambo.

Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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Starstruck - Release

Sydney Morning Herald, 4 April 1982

Starstruck went on release to 30 screens across Australia on Thursday 8 April 1982, debuting at a time of almost unprecedented optimism for the Australian film industry, thanks in part to tax concessions that had encouraged private film investment. Amongst the other Australian films in cinemas at the time of Starstruck's debut were Gallipoli, Heatwave, Puberty Blues, and Mad Max II. According to Variety, Starstruck 'opened solidly', earning $AU 42,980 in its first week in Sydney, $AU 34,800 in Melbourne and $AU 24,000 in Brisbane. Business was expected to remain strong as the May school holidays began.  Though there is a perception that the film under-performed in Australia, it was a quite respectable box office achiever,with an Australian gross of $1,541,000. The problem was that its higher-than-average budget made recouping costs all the more difficult, as did the fact that as a youth-oriented film, many members of its target audience paid a concession price for their tickets. "It was a hit, but not the huge hit that we hoped it would be," concluded producer Richard Brennan.  Multiple sources reported that Gillian Armstrong and Stephen MacLean initially hoped to collaborate a second time, either on a second rock musical or an adaptation of American actress Anne Baxter's autobiography, Intermission. Unfortunately, nothing ever came of these plans, and Armstrong eventually chose the very different Mrs Soffel (1984) as her follow-up to Starstruck.

Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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She's Got Body, She's Got Soul

'One Good Reason'/'Gimme Love' was not the only song on the Starstruck soundtrack that had originally appeared elsewhere. 'Body and Soul', written by Phil Judd's former Split Enz bandmate Tim Finn, had appeared on the Split Enz album Frenzy (1979) under the title of 'She's Got Body, She's Got Soul'. Here's the original version.

Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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The Swingers

Though The Wombats were created for the movie, The Swingers were very much a real band, formed in New Zealand in 1979 from the remainders of the Suburban Reptiles and Split Enz, of which lead singer Phil Judd was a founding member.

'One Good Reason' (known on the Starstruck soundtrack as 'Gimme Love') was the band's first single, released in 1979. It was not until 1981's 'Counting the Beat' that the band found themselves with a legitimate hit, the song reaching number 1 in both Australia and New Zealand and remaining one of Australasia's most beloved pop classics to this day. 

If The Swingers had hoped that Starstruck would be their ticket to international fame, they were to be disappointed. Amidst ongoing tensions, the band split up at around the same time that the film was released. Phil Judd went on to pursue a solo career, later composing music for a number of other Australian films, including The Big Steal (1990), Death in Brunswick (1991) and Mr Reliable (1996).

Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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Starstruck - Locations

Over thirty years have elapsed since Starstruck was filmed in inner Sydney, and yet many locations remain almost as they were - at least for now. The majority are within easy walking distance of one another, so why not visit my full location guide map and make an afternoon of it?

Full details of each major location that was used are available at the full website: Starstruck: A Complete Guide to the 1982 Film.

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Starstruck - Cast

Jo Kennedy (Jackie)

Jo's only formal acting experience at the time she was chosen for the main role in Starstruck was a stint with a children's theatre company. Sometimes uncomfortable in the limelight after her sudden ascent to fame, Jo later proved her acting chops in theatre productions, and on screen in a number of edgier roles in low-budget films such as Tender Hooks (1988), for which she was nominated for an AFI Award, and Wrong World (1985). Her performance in the latter film earned her the prestigious Silver Bear for Best Actress at the 1985 Berlin International Film Festival - the only Australian woman aside from Nicole Kidman to ever take this honour. She later attended the Victoria College of the Arts to study film direction, producing and directing a number of acclaimed short films. Visit the dedicated Jo Kennedy page on this website for more articles about her later career. Where Are They Now? Jo is now co-proprietor of Focusing Australia, where she is a teacher and practitioner of a method of meditative psychotherapy known as Focusing.

Ross O'Donovan (Angus)

Gillian Armstrong admitted that casting the role of Angus was one of the most difficult tasks of the entire production. "Finding a 14-year-old boy with the mind of a 30-year-old is not easy," she said to the Sydney Morning Herald. "He's such a unique character and so many boys are introverted at that age." In fact, Ross O'Donovan was 17 years old at the time of filming, and would graduate high school the following year (perhaps wearing blue made him look shorter), but Armstrong described him as 'very close to the character'. Like Jo Kennedy, his previous experience was minimal. A small part in the 1983 film Phar Lap remains his only other big-screen credit. Where Are They Now? Ross now works in the area of health advocacy and mental health, with a special interest in indigenous communities. He and his wife live in Queensland and have eight children. 

Margo Lee (Pearl)

Having initially trained as a concert pianist, Margot instead became a well known actress in early Australian radio serials. She made her film debut in 1949's Into The Straight, and became one of Australia's earliest television stars, appearing in The Twelve Pound Look in 1956, the first drama ever to be broadcast on ABC Television. Though she was wooed by Hollywood, she decided to place her family first. Margo was still prominent in the television and theatre world when she played the role of Jackie's mother inStarstruck, which coincided with her 40th year in show business. Where Are They Now? Sadly, Margo became ill not long after completing Starstruck, and died of cancer in 1987.

Pat Evison (Nanna)

The New Zealand-born Pat Evison's professional acting career began when she was awarded a scholarship to London's prestigious Old Vic Theatre in the 1940s. She later appeared in numerous stage productions. Pat was a latecomer to the big screen, but won an AFI Award for her role in the feature Tim (1979). Just prior to appearing in Starstruck, she was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire for her services to the theatre. Her autobiography, Happy Days in Muckle Flugga, was published in 1988. Pat specialised in 'larger than life' characters, and became best known for her role as Violet in the TV series The Flying Doctors.  Where Are They Now? Pat passed away in 2010, shortly before her 86th birthday.

Max Cullen (Uncle Reg)

After pursuing an early career as a newspaper artist and journalist, Max Cullen began to build up a profile as a stage character actor in his early 20s. He made many appearances on television before taking his first major film role in Sunday Too Far Away (1975). Since then, he has become one of the most recognisable faces in the Australian entertainment industry. An acclaimed painter, he has held numerous exhibitions of his artworks, and once acted as arts correspondent on Channel 9's Sunday show. In 2010 he published an autobiography, Tell 'Em Nothing, Take 'Em Nowhere. Where Are They Now? Max continues to be kept busy by many roles in television, theatre and film. His most recent film appearance was in Baz Luhrman's adaptation of The Great Gatsby (2013)

John O'May (Terry Lambert)

Though Starstruck marked John's big screen debut, he was already an experienced stage performer. He first arrived in Australia from his native America in 1972 after an unsuccessful period as a high school teacher. He played his first role in the musical Godspell in 1973, and within a few years was director of Melbourne's Arena Theatre. His subsequent CV ranges across nearly every aspect of the performing arts, including singing, acting, writing and directing, but particularly musical theatre. He is the recipient of two Green Room Awards, Australia's equivalent of the Tony. John released his first album, The Usual Way, in 2000. Where Are They Now? John O'May will shortly be seen in a film version of Opera Australia's Tony Award-winning stage production of South Pacific.

Ned Lander (Robbie)

Ned first became known to Australian viewers as the roguish 'Hodgo', a popular character on the TV soap opera The Restless Years. He departed that role after less than a year, to gain more formal qualifications in acting. Aside from Starstruck, he played a prominent role in another Australian classic of the era, Puberty Blues (1981). By the time he appeared in Starstruck, Ned had already won an AFI Awards jury prize for Wrong Side of the Road (1981), which he co-directed. He has since moved entirely into direction and production. Between 2001 and 2009 he worked as a Commissioning Editor at Australia's SBS Television. Where Are They Now? Ned continues to work as an independent director and producer. His most recent project was the TV movie Dangerous Remedy(2012).

Dennis Miller (Lou, Angus' Father)

Dennis's brief but memorable role as Angus's deadbeat dad followed a television career extending back to the late 1950s, as well as theatre work with the Union Theatre Repertory Company (later the Melbourne Theatre Company). Aside from roles in the early Australian TV shows Homicide, Matlock Police and Division 4, he made small appearances in a number of Australia's most iconic films, including Stork (1971), Alvin Purple (1973), Emerald City (1988) and Evil Angels (1988, aka A Cry In The Dark), as well as popular shows of the 80s and 90s including A Country Practice, The Flying Doctors, and Water Rats. Where Are They Now? Dennis has been inactive on both the small and big screens since ending his recurring role on the long-running TV series Blue Heelersin 2000.

Minor Cast

Future Oscar-winner Geoffrey Rush

A number of Starstruck's minor cast members would go on to become well known in the entertainment industry:

Kaarin Fairfax (Angus' Ice Cream Girl) became a familiar face on Australian television screens during the late 1980s and early 1990s, and is probably best known for her major role in the television mini series The Harp in the South (1987) and its sequel, Poor Man's Orange (1987). For many years, she was married to musician Paul Kelly, a contributor to the Starstruck soundtrack. Kaarin was also under consideration for the role of Jackie Mullens.

Mark Little (Carl, of the Wombats) has since made multiple appearances in film and on television, but became best known for his role as Joe Mangel, son of the busybody Mrs Mangel, on the long-running soap opera Neighbours, on which he appeared from 1988 to 1991, followed by a brief return in 2005. He has been based in England since 1992.

Geoffrey Rush (Wow! Show Floor Manager) - Alas, nothing more is known about the promising young actor who played the floor manager who is forced to sneak off stage when Jackie and the Wombats ambush the Wow! Show's New Years Eve special ... just kidding! Geoffrey Rush is now one of Australia's best known and highly respected screen actors, having won an Oscar for his role in the film Shine (1996), and received wide critical acclaim for other hits including Shakespeare in Love (1998), Quills (2000) and The King's Speech (2010). Starstruck was one of his earliest screen roles.

Other familiar faces that can be seen amongst the minor cast are Syd Heylen (famous for his role as 'Cookie' onA Country Practice) and Lucky Grilles (from the TV series Bluey, revived in comedy form during the early 1990s by ABC's The Late Show, as Bargearse).

Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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Starstruck's Lost Sequence

The original Australian release version of Starstruck lasted 105 minutes. An initial American trade screening was reported to be 102 minutes. At some point the film was cut down further, to 95 minutes. This is the only version that exists today (an even shorter version, omitting the song 'It's Not Enough', circulated on home video and cable television). We know that a few sequences were trimmed, as revealed in the 2005 DVD release. What became of the other missing minutes?

This very rare deleted sequence gives us at least part of the answer. Though the film-makers have been known to claim that it never made it to cinemas, many members of the film's original Australian audiences remember otherwise.

Most recall that the scene was at the very beginning of the film, suggesting that the story originally opened with Angus having spent an afternoon day-dreaming in his school chair. Perhaps, after the sequence had played out in his mind, he rushed out to a nearby pay phone in a sudden burst of inspiration, attempting to turn his dreams into reality and moving in to the film's beginning as we know it today (you could even extrapolate from this opening that the entire film takes place in Angus's imagination!) The fact that Carol Burns appears in the credits as 'Teacher' when no teacher is seen in the film is further evidence that a more extensive school room framing device may once have existed.

Some shots appear in the Australian trailer for the film, and the visual motif was adopted for the cover of the 'Starstruck' single, but if the sequence had not been issued as a music video that somebody happened to record from television, it might easily have been lost forever, as it appears the majority of the other footage has been. 

But why was it removed in the first place? 

The most common theory is that it pushed Starstruck's exaggerated but basically realistic world too far into the realms of fantasy. Even so, the opening would have made a neat bookend to the film, and was certainly eye-catching enough for so many viewers to remember it, and to wonder what had become of it when they re-watched the film. 

Without further ado, here it is.

Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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Starstruck - Production

Australian Womens Weekly - 15 July 1981

The cast underwent two months of intensive dance training, a process which, according to Gillian Armstrong, also helped the actors to feel at home with one another. By the time shooting began in June 1981, the rag-tag barflies who populate the Harbour View Hotel gave every impression of being old pals. "Dancing is the most fantastic way of bringing actors together," said Armstrong. "The group of people in the bar in Starstruck were so relaxed they felt they had known each other for a long time. It was fantastic and I think it really helped the film." Jo Kennedy, whose singing experience was limited to garage bands, received vocal training lessons from singer Janice Slater. She also spent some time working at a Kings Cross pub in order to appear an authentic barmaid. Veteran costume designer Luciana Arrighi was enlisted to design a series of ultra-modern costumes, but other commitments meant that she was only able to work on the production for a short time, passing collaborator Terry Ryan the bulk of the work.  Production designer David Thomson, who had just worked with Arrighi on director Jim Sharman's production of the play Lulu for the State Theatre of South Australia, was responsible for some of the film's most imaginative touches such as Jackie's fantastical beach-themed bedroom, embodying the film's thin line between outright fantasy and cartoonish reality. As Thomson explained to the Sydney Morning Herald in mid 1981, "I hate naturalism. I prefer to envision how a person might have felt at a certain time and place."  Shooting began in June 1981 and lasted for ten weeks. The complexity of directing the musical scenes in particular took Gillian Armstrong by surprise, and this and other complications saw the budget balloon to $1.9m and eventually $2.2m over the course of production.  Filming ended in early September, and a rough cut assembled by the end of the month. A final cut was ready by the end of 1981, in anticipation of a release to coincide with the 1982 Easter school holidays - as well as an all-important visit to the Cannes Film Festival, the world's biggest film market.

Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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Starstruck - Pre Production

Australian Women's Weekly, 3 March 1982

A number of different directors were shown the script for Starstruck, but the one who was eventually chosen seemed the most unlikely option of all: Gillian Armstrong, whose debut feature, the historical romance My Brilliant Career (1979), was a critical and popular hit. Since the success of that film, Armstrong had been flooded with scripts for dour period dramas, and was searching for an entirely different kind of project with which to prove herself. "I had my agent tell them [screenwriter Stephen MacLean and producer David Elfick] I was interested," she recalled to the Sydney Morning Herald, "and they replied they weren't really interested in me because I made these boring period pictures." It was by more unconventional means that Armstrong convinced MacLean that she was up to the task. The two unexpectedly met up at a party, Armstrong wearing a particularly flashy pair of high-heeled blue suede shoes that tickled MacLean's fancy. "He told me 'anyone who wears shoes like that should be able to make my movie.' Armstrong remembered. "I got the job." Her involvement was made public in January 1981. Clearly, the most important roles in the film would be that of Jackie Mullens, the madcap aspiring songstress, and her ambitious cousin Angus. The filmmakers deliberated for some time on whether the parts should go to experienced performers or raw new talent. Ultimately, they issued an open casting call, eventually narrowing the field down to six pairs.  A cheeky gambit won the day for 21 year old Jo Kennedy and 17 year old Ross O'Donovan. "At the second audition they told us to improvise auditioning for another movie and we decided to go all out at being young and silly. A week later we were both doing screen tests," Kennedy told the Sydney Morning Herald. Rushing in with a fire extinguisher, the pair claimed there was a fire in the building, and all but threw themselves out of the window.  The producers were impressed not only by their obvious rapport, but by the fact that the stunt came straight from the Angus Mullens playbook. For Jo, who had come to the audition wearing a tatty old secondhand jacket and had been living on unemployment benefits only a year earlier, it was a long way to come - and for Ross, even further. The film's $1.65m budget was increased to $1.75m as production approached - a relatively large amount for an Australian film of the time. $500,000 of this was contributed by the Australian Film Commission.

Read more at Starstruck: A Complete Companion to the 1982 Film

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"Temper, Temper" - Jo Kennedy and the Swingers (soundtrack to Starstruck)

Visit the unofficial fansite at http://www.starstruck1982.weebly.com!

Why not contribute? Do you have a Starstruck memory? Do you remember seeing it at the movies?

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Starstruck

The ultimate fan guide to the 1982 Australian film, complete with rare articles, artefacts and other bits and pieces from this New Wave classic, is now online, at http://www.starstruck1982.weebly.com!

"We only want to take you for a ride ..."

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The Birth of 'Starstruck'

Starstruck was the creation of screenwriter Stephen MacLean, based on his own experiences of growing up at a struggling pub at which his mother worked as a barmaid, whilst raising her four children. More than a bit starstruck himself, Stephen was determined to break into show business. Much as in the film, he prevailed upon his older sister Colleen to use a nearby phone booth to help find his big break. Stephen spoke to The Age in Melbourne about the origins of the story:

"The Newport Hotel, which is just by the Newport railway station, is where'Starstruck' began. My mother used to work there, and it was a really thriving place, really bustling, until they put in the overpass. Then the pub just died. That's where I got the idea of the fading pub in 'Starstruck'.  Rene, the woman who ran the place then, is dead now. I got a tape from her son while I was overseas, about her death, and it really started my memory going. I started jotting things down, and I finished the first draft while I was in London. I spent so much time in the place. I used to get into trouble all the time for going up and dancing on the roof, so the chandeliers started bouncing in the dining room. I had got out in the world really early. I left school the week I turned 15 and went and lived in a flat in St Kilda which was considered pretty daring then. I had been a child actor when I was about 11, doing Crawford's TV shows. When I turned 15 I went to Crawfords as a messenger and pretty soon I started doing props. When I was 16 or 17 I was designing 'Homicide' [a successful Australia TV cop show]. All those dreadful sets where the walls shook when they closed the doors, that was me. I did 'Video Village', all those kinds of things. Then when I was 19 I switched to being a journalist with 'Go Set' [a popular music magazine].

Incidentally, the 'real' Starstruck hotel is still in existence at 1 Mason Street, Newport in Victoria. It now operates as the Seagulls Nest Club, home of the Williamstown Football Club.

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Angus and Jackie define star quality as 'that little something extra'. It's no coincidence that this is the same phrase James Mason uses to describe Judy Garland's character in another famous tale of rags-to-riches stardom, A Star is Born (1954). MacLean was a classic film connoisseur and in particular, a lifelong Garland fan. Nor is it any accident that Starstruck follows the same basic formula of many of the Judy Garland-Mickey Rooney musicals of the 1930s and 40s - two crazy kids decide to 'put on a show', usually helping a friend or family member out of calamity and finding fame and fortune at the same time. Themes of stardom, ambition and patronage from other MacLean favourites such as Sunset Blvd (1950) and All About Eve (1950) also found their way into the story. Aside from Starstruck, MacLean's best-known work was his biography of Australian singer Peter Allen, The Boy From Oz, on which the hugely successful stage musical of the same name was based. Sadly, Stephen passed away in 2006. Read more at Starstruck: The Complete Companion to the 1982 Film