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The Sum of Us (1994)

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clip 'What you might call cheerful'

Original classification rating: M. This clip chosen to be PG

Clip description

Jeff (Russell Crowe) yells at his dad Harry (Jack Thompson) for never turning the taps off after he has a shower. As Harry dishes out the dinner, he explains to the audience that his son is gay, or as he prefers to describe it, ‘cheerful’. Jeff is rushing to dress and get to the pub, where he hopes to meet up with a man he likes.

Curator’s notes

by Paul Byrnes

This is the first scene in which Jack Thompson talks directly to the audience, breaking down the convention of the ‘fourth wall’. This technique comes straight from David Stevens’s play, but it’s uncommon in cinema, where maintaining the illusion of reality is usually paramount. It’s a risky strategy in a film, because it draws attention to the roots in theatre. Co-directors Geoff Burton, who shot the film, and Kevin Dowling, who directed the initial stage production in New York, have basically decided not to pretend that this is anything other than a good play, well filmed. Maintaining the close contact between audience and the characters would have been harder if they had abandoned the direct-to-audience dialogue. They rely instead on the humour of the dialogue and situations, and the strong casting, to carry it through.

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