‘Pale, stale, male’? How John Farnham film creators beat funding hurdles
The story of John Farnham will soon be told for the first time on film, but its creators were surprised by the response at their first meetings.
The life story of titanic Australian pop singer-songwriter John Farnham will soon be told for the first time as a feature-length documentary film.
After two years in development, the timing of its cinematic release is unintentionally ideal, given the intense public interest in the 73-year-old entertainer following his mouth cancer surgery in August last year, and several health setbacks since he went under the knife.
On Monday night, the Farnham family released a media statement to advise that the singer has “made a full recovery from a recent chest infection in late March which required hospitalisation. He is now comfortable and continues to receive ongoing treatment and rehabilitation care.”
Titled John Farnham: Finding The Voice and directed by Poppy Stockell, the film will screen nationally in cinemas from May 18.
Yet according to its executive producer and co-writer, Paul Clarke, the production team had trouble securing funding from screen organisations to develop a feature-length work about the iconic King of Pop.
After being approached by Farnham’s longtime manager Glenn Wheatley in early 2021 with the idea for a biopic film, both men were surprised by the muted response.
“No-one was initially that interested,” Clarke told The Australian. “I think there’s a shifting pendulum of what’s important in Australian culture, and that’s absolutely fair – but in some ways, I think, to funding bodies, John’s story felt like a ‘pale, stale, male’ story, and it took a little bit to cut through some of that feeling.”
“I think the diversity in storytelling in Australia is incredibly important – but I mean, he’s our Charles Aznavour,” said Clarke, referring to the late French singer who was often compared to Frank Sinatra.
“He’s our Bono,” he said, referring to the vocalist of Irish rock band U2. “He’s the kind of voice that, as a culture, we really turn to, and it was just trying to find a story frame that would fit the process that we all went through, to find this guy that was under our nose all the time.”
Rather than reshaping the pitch to make the film more appealing to funding bodies, Clarke and Wheatley decided to double down.
“It was more a case of being determined, and we’re absolutely determined people,” said Clarke with a laugh. “They gradually saw it our way. But a number of networks passed on it, and we were very lucky to find ourselves with the Seven Network, and Sony Pictures, who have been phenomenal partners.”
Commissioned in late 2021, the film took about a year to make, and received funding support from Sony Pictures, Screen Australia, Screen NSW and VicScreen.
Wheatley was interviewed on camera for the film, but his shock death from Covid complications in February 2022 threw the project into jeopardy.
Clarke said that Farnham’s manager was sending text messages from hospital, “cheery as ever”, up until two days before he died, aged 74.
“The story just kept changing, and getting more serious, and it became a greater responsibility – because Glenn passed away, Olivia Newton-John passed away [last August], John became ill, and I’ve never had a project with greater weight on my shoulders in my life.”
“The responsibility to make it great was enormous,” said Clarke. “It couldn’t have been made without Gaynor Wheatley and the Farnham family. They were just incredible.”
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