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After attending a conference on EBPSM – Extreme Behavioural Problem Student Management – student welfare officer Doug Peterson (David Lennie) decides to give Jonah (Chris Lilley) greater responsibility in the hope that he will 'rise to the challenge’. He strikes a bargain with Jonah: if he and his friends act as 'big brothers’ to a group of year seven boys with social problems, they will be allowed to stage a breakdancing performance on 'Poly Day’, the school celebration of Polynesian culture. Here, Peterson introduces Jonah and his friends to their 'little brothers’.
Curator’s notes
Update from the curator (3 June 2020):
These notes, written in 2008, do not adequately address the use of brownface in the portrayal of the character Jonah in this series. The curator recommends further reading on this topic, for example Morgan Godfrey’s Blackface in a white nation (2014) and Winnie Stubbs’ It’s time for Australia to boycott brown-face (2019).
Original Curator’s Comments
With Jonah, Lilley presents a finely-tuned comic portrait of a confused teenage boy at odds with his environment and at the mercy of his own impulses. Although Lilley does not physically resemble either a teenage girl or an Islander boy, his believability in the roles of Ja’mie and Jonah is remarkable. Part of what is so convincing is his interaction with the rest of the cast and their deadpan acceptance of him as one of their peers. This is particularly effective with Jonah and Ja’mie’s friends, whose convincing belief in Lilley as one of them helps the audience believe it too.
The realistic, understated performances of Lilley’s supporting cast are impressive and add to the documentary feel. A mixture of actors and first-time performers, it is hard to tell which is which. According to producer Laura Waters, while there are no particular rules with their casting process, they prefer not to use actors recognisable from other series as this can break the illusion. They search for performers who naturally display qualities of the character, can play their roles in a real way and are able to bounce off Lilley in scenes that are part scripted, part improvised. The team use no rehearsal process with the actors, instead capturing the action documentary-style, as it unfolds.
