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Clip description
As training concludes with the customary bathtub full of tinnies, coach Jack Cooper (Matthew Johns) takes Grub (Matt Nable) aside to discuss the judiciary hearing. Jack warns him his style of game is dead. Grub declares his style of play is why the crowds come to watch the games. At home, Grub takes out his rising frustrations on the punching bag. His wife Emma (Raelee Hill) tries to talk to him, but he accuses her of siding with the people who want to see him rubbed out.
Curator’s notes
The inclusion of rugby league personality Matthew Johns was a casting coup for the production, given the huge profile he enjoys with Sydney rugby league fans. Johns also appeared in Footy Legends (2006), Khoa Do’s enjoyable rugby league comedy. For The Final Winter, a much more demanding role, both Johns and Nable went through several months of training with actor and teacher Terry Serio. Nable’s approach during filming was to get deeply into character, according to Johns, and stay there for long periods. At times during Nable’s performance there are echoes, whether deliberate or not, of some of the most famous sporting movies of the last quarter century – specifically that of Robert De Niro in Raging Bull (1980) and Sylvester Stallone in Rocky (1976). The use of the punching bag in this scene evokes both, although Nable’s performance never becomes self-conscious.
