The
Sunday Mail (
The IT man.(Features)
Byline: Anne Simpson
I have no success barometer, I'm only interested in how successfully I think
I've done a role
DAVID Wenham might not be comfortable being one of Australia's A-list actors,
but over the past year he has managed to find himself walking the red carpet
at some of the film world's most illustrious events.
His almost anonymous Moulin Rouge role as the cross-dressing artistic director
Audrey took him to opening night at this year's Cannes Film Festival.
Last month his latest Aussie flick, The Bank, opened the
International Film Festival.
And next week he will be in the spotlight again at the Venice Film Festival
for the opening of the Balkan western Dust (in which he co-stars with
Shakespeare In Love actor Joseph Fiennes) then on to
the Toronto Film Festival
with The Bank.
Not that Wenham will tell you all this. He plays nonchalant very well, perhaps
not unlike down-to-earth Diver Dan from TV's SeaChange,
the character for
which he is best known.
"I have no success barometer at all,'' the ruggedly handsome actor says. "I
am only interested in how successfully I think I have done a role. That's the
only thing interesting me.
"Of course I'd like as many people as possible to see those roles. But
whether I am an A-list actor, to me, is totally irrelevant.''
The 35-year-old Sydneysider attended drama classes
from an early age and even
had a small role on the long-running soap Sons and Daughters as a teenager.
While he continues to be passionate about acting, he says some of his best
performances came while studying drama at the
"Of course, because they were drama school times, no one ever really saw
them. Ironically, one of the people who did see them was Robert Connolly,
before we even knew we'd become great friends and co-collaborators.''
The pair later worked together on The Boys (Connolly was producer), the
chilling thriller in which Wenham plays a psychopath released from jail in a
performance that earned him an Australian Film Institute Award nomination.
When a futures trader gave Connolly the story idea for another thriller, this
time set in the cut-throat world of banking, he told Wenham.
"We bounced the story back and forward until Robert decided to go and
write
the script,'' remembers Wenham, who was involved throughout development of The
Bank.
Wenham jumped at the chance to team up again, this time with Connolly as
director.
Wenham plays Jim Doyle, a genius mathematician who has designed a software
system to predict the stock market. Doyle is employed by a ruthless bank CEO
(Anthony LaPaglia) who needs to keep his profit
margins high at any cost.
It is a fascinating story with great relevance considering "the Australian
public's vehemence towards banks'', Wenham says.
Wenham admits he has never been much of a mathematician.
"The maths was a bit of a stretch, because I ain't too good at it!'' he
laughs. "However, I did spend a lot of time
trying to understand the formulas
and the logic involved.
"I avoided maths at school and now it just
frustrates me. It intrigues me and
it frustrates me because I find it very difficult to get a grasp on it, but I
want to.''
Unexpectedly, Wenham interrupts the interview with "Excuse me, I'm
vibrating''.
For a moment his recent Australian films roles flash to mind -- the
philandering husband Ethan in Russian Doll and the mostly undressed Josh in
Better Than Sex.
But no, it's just the hunky actor's mobile phone. After a brief interlude he
returns and apologises.
"Jim Doyle is certainly an enigmatic character who conceals far more than
he
reveals,'' he continues, ``which is very difficult for an actor to achieve
because he's the protagonist in the film yet he doesn't seem to propel the
action.
"The audience know he's doing something, but they
don't quite know what.''
For all his modesty, Wenham is not without ambition.
Last year he went at his own expense to
Manchevski and audition for Dust, the story of two
feuding cowboy brothers who
enlist as mercenaries on opposing sides during the Balkans War of 1912.
"I went expecting to audition but I met the director and he offered me the
role. I think any actor in the world would want to work with him,'' he says of
Manchevski, whose debut feature Before the Rain
earned an Oscar nomination.
Shot in
heatwave in 30 years, with cast and crew hit by
sunstroke and dysentery.
"I was one of the resilient ones, because I like extreme heat,'' Wenham
says.
"Most days it hovered between 45C and 47C and I was in leather. However, I
did get bitten by massive wasps.''
Wenham may be taking yet another red-carpet stroll before the end of the year
for the premiere of The Lord of the Rings, in which he plays the warrior
Faramir.