Interview by Parker Constantine
In 2003, a quirky Aussie crime-comedy film called Gettin Square was released to the world. Directed by Jonathan Teplitzky and written by Chris Nyst, the film was littered with soon-to-be stars; Sam Worthington, Timothy Spall, and David Wenham. Gettin Square’s Gold Coast gangsters and offbeat humour charmed the nation, but particularly, the character of Jonathon Spiteri, played by Wenham, stood out. He was simultaneously the dumbest yet smartest criminal, holding up a servo with a screwdriver and blaspheming his way through a court case. Spit is quoted on a near daily basis, and in my personal opinion, deserves the title of national hero.
So it’s no wonder the crew has gotten back together to make Spit, a loving testament to the Aussie yobbo, full of heart, laughs and nostalgia. I was overjoyed to sit down with star David Wenham and director Jonathon Teplitzky to learn more about the film.
It’s been a little over 20 years since Gettin Square, how has it felt for the both of you to return to the story world?
J.Z: Well, we were big fans of the character, so we were really keen to find a way of returning to Spit and his life, and bringing Spit back to an audience. We tried to make something that was not Gettin Square two. We wanted to make it more of a character piece about Spiteri.
D.W: It’s not something we ever thought we’d be doing after we made the film. We never, ever considered doing a sequel or a spin off. More than 10 years later, something was in the air, and both independently, Jonathan, Chris [Nyst], myself, started to think about the character, and then we started to put our heads together. 10 years later, here’s Spit.
David, how has it been to get back into that character? Is there anything in particular that you like to do?
D.W: For this character, I work differently for everything I do. It’s very important that I work from the outside in. As soon as I put my feet into the thongs, that dictates how I move. And I hadn’t worn thongs in 22 years, I put them on, and the character came back pretty much immediately. I’ve got to say, it was as though he was just laying dormant in me, ready to pop out at any particular moment.
When we did Gettin Square, I felt so on top of the character in terms of his creation, that I felt confident that I could put him in any situation and he’d be able to respond and act organically and spontaneously. And that was the same with this. I just, I love the character so much. I have a great affection for him. So for me, this was a gift, because it gave me the opportunity to play, to show more facets of Spit as a person. We get to see Spit’s backstory so we understand why he is the man he is. And then as an audience, we get to experience the world through the eyes and thoughts of Johnny Spiteri.
You touched on it a bit in terms of the creation of Spit, but how was this character originally birthed?
J.Z: David played a huge part in defining what the character would be. Chris [Nyst] wrote him very beautifully. In many ways, David elevated the character into the iconic status that he now holds.
D.W: I think he was birthed in a courtroom on the Gold Coast. Chris Nyst, the writer, is also a very successful criminal lawyer, and he was at the courts one day, and a friend of his said, Look, you got to come and see this in another court. And he took Chris in to watch a guy in the docks, and Chris looked at him and couldn’t quite work out if he was the dumbest person he’d ever seen or the smartest person. He couldn’t quite work out if that guy was consciously navigating his way through this case, and that was the key for him to start the character of Spiteri.
So everything’s in the courtroom?
J.Z: That’s where it started his idea. And then it grew from there. All these things are so much better when they come out of some kind of truth.
D.W: Yeah, I knew from the first time I read the script, I knew the character. I’ve lived down the road from King’s Cross for more than 30 years of my life, so I’ve seen Johnny Spiteri in many different iterations throughout my life. I’ve seen the way he walks or the way he moves, the way he talks, the way he thinks, the way he operates. So he’s not a character that’s far removed from what I’ve experienced through most of my life.
That’s very true for so many of us. So 10 years ago, when you had those seeds planted for spit, what was that?
D.W: The very first time I read Chris’s first draft, I thought, oh my God it’s inspired, because it had to have a very solid reason and foundation to do the film. Chris’s idea for it hooked me in immediately.
J.Z: It’s really important for us all to find new relationships and new places to take Spiteri that would broaden and deepen his character. The bottom line is, I just wanted enough stuff so David could play with it and to take the character to not only the audience’s expectations, but beyond.
You close the film with an amazing Amyl and the Sniffers needle drop and I think that really solidifies the modernity of Spit. How has that process been of bringing spit into the modern world?
D.W: That’s the interesting thing about this particular film, he arrives back in Australia, he hasn’t really changed. Except for the fact that he’s certainly aged, he’s essentially the same person. But Australia has changed quite some bit.
I’m with you on Amyl and the Sniffers. I remember when we shot that scene, we asked the sound recorderist to have some music ready for playback for us to dance to. He had a few things but I didn’t like what he had. Amyl and the Sniffers, I’m a big fan of, so I had it on my phone, and I said, can you just plug this into the speakers and let’s do it to this? And it was like, yeah, it works. That’s the one.
J.Z: It really worked. And the other thing to say is that Johnny is a multi-faceted kind of character, and we really wanted to not only have the fun, but also give him some emotional terrain in which to explore. And that became really imperative in the way that both the drama but also the comedy worked.
At Film in Revolt, we like to, in every interview ask about…
D.W: I’m getting nervous now, we’re getting tested.
Well, what was a film that made a big impact on your youth?
J.Z: Well, the two films that really got me going were Jim Jarmusch’s Stranger Than Paradise. There’s actually a small homage to that film in Spit. That film begins with Screaming Jay Hawkins’s version of I Put a Spell on You, and we’ve got that in Spit. I saw that in France with subtitles, followed by a 20 minute documentary about the making of it. And it made me think, oh my God, the sheet has been pulled away. It’s such a simple but brilliant film. And the other one is The Sacrifice by Tarkovsky, and just the artistic ingenuity and non-naturalistic filmmaking that was going on. I thought, God, if you could join those two together, that’s what started me off.
D.W: For me, I only saw Disney films when I was a kid. So for me, it’s Bedknobs and Broomsticks. I was amazed when suddenly, bang, it turned into animation in the middle of the film! That was mind blowing for me at the age of whatever I was, I was in single digits, and then later on there’s so many…
J.Z: Oh! Sorry, I was just gonna say the other one I remember from that kind of age was Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. And in those days, the car went off the cliff, there’s no visual effects like we know now. And then you’d go to intermission. So you’re like, Mom, what’s going to happen? You have to wait and see. It was the drama of being captured by the cinema experience.
D.W: I’m a huge fan of the 70’s, anywhere. The 70’s in Australia, I believe, was incredible. I think Wake In Fright is my favorite Australian film. And then I love American cinema of the 70’s, French cinema of the 70’s. I just love everything about the 70’s
Because we’ve touched on our favorite films, Gettin Square for me sits amongst a canon of some of my favorite Australian films. How do you feel now about the legacy of Gettin Square?
J.Z: Legacy? Well, I think it’s thrilling as filmmakers to have something that not only an audience embraces, but in a sense, keeps in their cinema going experience, you know, it becomes part of their life experience. And that’s just a wonderful thing, because that’s what we do, is we make films, hopefully for audiences to appreciate and to embrace.
Thank you to David Wenham and Jonathon Teplitzky for the interview. Spit is in cinemas March 6th.