By Nick Dent
Christmas stories come loaded with emotional peril. Expectations of celebration, harmony and goodwill inevitably set up characters for egregious failure and ultimate redemption, which is how we get Scrooge, Dr Seuss’s Grinch, and the imploding George Bailey of It’s a Wonderful Life.
In Australian culture, we have Joe, the narrator of Paul Kelly’s adored 1996 song How to Make Gravy, who is in the heartrending situation of writing a letter home to his family because he will be spending Christmas in prison.
In the days before Christmas in 2019, Nick Waterman and Meg Washington received a text message from a friend suggesting that How to Make Gravy would make a great movie. By chance, Kelly was performing in Brisbane a few nights later.
“It got to the point where he sings How to Make Gravy,” Waterman recalls. “Everyone was holding each other, crying. We looked at each other and we were weeping too, and we just thought, we have to find a way to do this.”
Five years later that movie is about to drop on Binge as Waterman’s full-length directorial debut, and the streamer’s first local feature film production. Daniel Henshall (Snowtown) stars as Joe, a man struggling in the wake of his mother’s death and whose anger issues land him with an 18-month sentence.
French actor Agathe Rousselle (Titane) is his partner Rita, trying to hold the family together; Brenton Thwaites is Dan, the younger ‘Funcle’ who has become a rusted-on presence in the household; and Hugo Weaving is Joe’s prison mentor Noel.
Daniel Henshall as Joe and Jonah Wren Phillips as his son Angus in How To Make Gravy.Credit: Jasin Boland / Binge
For those who know the song there are also the “brothers are driving down from Queensland” (Kim Gyngell and Eugene Gilfedder); Stella (Kate Mulvany), “flying in from the coast”; and Stella’s obnoxious partner Roger (Damon Herriman). (“I’m even gonna miss Roger,” Kelly pointedly sings.)
“Every element of the film is extracted from the song,” Washington says. “Even the phrasing of the lyrics informed choices we made.
“Paul sings ‘Give my love to Angus’, and he pauses, and he says, ‘And to Frank and Dolly’. So that’s how we ended up with Angus being Joe’s nine-year-old son and Frank and Dolly being his older twin sisters. The song’s been our bible from the beginning.”
Washington and Waterman received Kelly’s blessing for their film treatment and got to work fleshing out its world. “It had to be a Christmas film, but also a prison film,” Washington notes.
Meg Washington in character as ‘Kelly’ in How to Make Gravy, with her husband, director Nick Waterman. The two co-wrote the film’s screenplay.Credit: Jasin Boland / Binge
COVID prompted a period of online research. Waterman drew upon his own male angst, but to get into the head of a self-sabotaging recidivist they consulted Massachusetts psychiatrist Dr Richard Goldwater. Goldwater also helped with the inner workings of men’s help groups.
“We wanted a more rounded representation of Australian masculinity than we’ve seen a lot on screen before,” Waterman says. “To show that it is possible for men to talk about their feelings.”
Weaving was the first actor cast, and his commanding presence anchors the Gold Coast-shot film.
Hugo Weaving plays prison cook Noel.Credit: Jasin Boland / Binge
“We built the cast around him. Daniel is one of the finest actors we have in this country – we knew that it had to be him for Joe. When Agathe’s name appeared on a list I was incredibly excited because I’d seen Titane and she’s such a strong person, but she has a beautiful...”
“Fragility,” Washington finishes.
In 2016, six years on from Washington’s multiple ARIA-winning debut album I Believe You Liar, the musician met aspiring filmmaker Waterman, also from Brisbane. Mutual friend Bertie Blackman introduced them at the Sydney Mardi Gras. They were married just three months later.
“It felt like the logical thing to do,” Washington says.
“Everyone thought we were crazy,” Waterman adds.
Agathe Rousselle as Rita in How To Make Gravy.Credit: Jasin Boland / Binge
They moved back to the River City in 2018. Their son, Amos Vivienne, is now seven; they live in New Farm.
“And now there are ferries on the river that look like Bluey and Bingo, so we’ll never leave,” Washington laughs.
Washington famously voices the school teacher Calypso on Bluey, and her 2021 song Lazarus Drug plays in the closing moments of the 28-minute episode The Sign – a soundtrack to dads worldwide choking back tears.
She has acted all her life. In Gravy, she has a small part as a neighbour who nakedly fancies Dan. Screenwriting, however, is a new development.
“The invisible beats of songwriting are the same invisible beats of screenwriting and storytelling… A lifetime of growing up with a stutter has made me exquisitely sensitive to the nuances of other people’s speech. So, for me, writing dialogue in the shoes of other characters has been really meaningful.
“It’s been a beautiful kind of unfurling for me.”
How to Make Gravy streams on Binge from Sunday, December 1. Meg Washington is touring the nation in solo mode until December 21.