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This
story is printed by kind permission of Sunday Magazine.
Sunday
Magazine Article
By
Maree
Curtis
Page
2
Before Laura, Thornton had been experiencing something of a self-imposed
career hiatus following a four-year stint in the US where she starred
as the "feisty and independent" Amelia in the TV series Paradise.
It was a hit in America (she is in the Cowboy Hall of Fame) but
didn't do so well here after being relegated to a late-night timeslot.
Her name was once bandied around with that of Nicole Kidman as most
likely to succeed in Hollywood. But, when Paradise finished in the
early 1990s, she and Burstall decided to return to Australia.
"I had worked hard and extremely long hours for several years and
I really wanted to have a break from being away from home so much.
So, I made a decision not to do so much acting work and to be extremely
selective about what I did do. I wanted to focus on being a proper
part of the family unit. Not that I wasn't a proper part of my family;
you know what I mean. It's always lovely to have the opportunity
to live and work in another culture but we didn't want to raise
the children there. It wasn't a hard decision."
For more than a decade, from the late 1970s until she left for
the US in 1988, Thornton was, seemingly, never off our screens -
big and small. There were the films: The Getting of Wisdom (77),
Snapshot (79), The Man From Snowy River (81), Street Hero (84),
Slate, Wyn and Me (86), The Lighthorsemen (87). And the tele movies
and series: Father Dear Father (77-78), Cop Shop (79), I Can Jump
Puddles (81) 1915 (82), The Boys in the Bush (84), All The Rivers
Run (85). It has taken her years to shake off the perennial image
we had of her as the corseted and crinolined, but always "feisty
and independent", heroine of period dramas.
"When my career was taking off, we really were making all period
drama. I'd say it was 90 per cent of our output. We had a big romantic
relationship with our past so the chances of getting a gig in a
contemporary drama were pretty slim. Added to that was the fact
that some of the things I worked on became very successful, so I
was consistently identified with that over a very long period."
Since returning from America, she has starred with Olympia Dukakis
in the movie Over The Hill, appeared in the telemovies The Feds
and Whipping Boy and made a memorable guest appearance as a schizophrenic
in GP. And then, in 1997, she was asked to audition for the part
of Laura. Amazingly, it seems now, not everyone associated with
SeaChange thought she was right for the part. Producer Andrew Knight
once said he was nervous because she was "so damn good looking and
so associated with mainstream television". She had to audition three
times before she was given the role.
The ABC has been rewarded with unprecedented ratings and Thornton,
at last, may be able to put away her corsets. "Laura has probably
changed that (image) and that's been very positive. Like any actor,
it's really important to try and continue the state of flux, not
to get locked down and boxed into any particular genre or image,
to continually explore your limitations by moving from one kind
of role to the next. So Laura has been great from that point of
view."
Thornton is obviously fond of Laura. "Laura is someone who likes
a degree of stress in her life. She's a bit of a drama queen, on
a desert island she would find something to stress about. She's
a bit of a fusspot and she has elements of snobbery, but that's
superficial, she is really a humanitarian." She is also strong,
vulnerable and a little bit neurotic.
At a glance, there are few obvious similarities between Thornton
and her alter ego. The actor appears to have little tendency towards
histrionics and she is more busy than stressed. But I touch a tiny
neuroses nerve when I ask her if she is driven. "Yes, I'd probably
say, I probably am, a little driven, yes. Obsessive/compulsive,
yes." She's laughing in a so-what's-your-point sort of way. It was,
she says, this drive that spurred her to success in an industry
with 95 per cent unemployment.
Before making her professional debut at 13 in the Aussie cop classic,
Homocide, Thornton had been attending drama classes and doing panto
in Brisbane for years. "I did quite serious workshops at the Twelfth
Night Theatre Company from about 9, I was actually quite serious
about it. I must have been pretty driven from an early age. I was
certainly saying, 'this is what I want to do'."
As a career, however, acting did come "out of the blue". Thornton's
parents, Neil and Merle, are academics (although Merle is about
to publish her first novel). "There are some correlations between
performance work and the work of a university academic; there is
a level of performance there when an academic goes into a lecture
threatre. But I developed an interest in this work when I was so
young I find it hard to plot the reasons really.
"We lived in the UK when I was small, between 7 and 9, and then
New Zealand for a year. So I had a lot of cultural change in my
early life and that affected my outlook on the world." Political
awareness and activism a Thornton family trait. Merle became known
as Queensland's first feminist when she chained herself to a hotel
bar in 1965, protesting the fact that women were not allowed to
drink in public bars. She took young Sigrid to consciousness raising
groups and the whole family, including Thornton's older brother,
attended anti-Vietnam war demos. "I'd have to say I was raised in
a politicised household where a socialconscience was regarded as
a valuable attribute. I think that has informed the kind of person
I am."
She still exercises her political conscience on a regular basis.
In recent times, she has vocally opposed the privatisation of the
library in her inner city surburb of North Melbourne and the closure
of the local pool. Her presence on the podium is enough to ensure
more media attention than such community activity normally enjoys.
She visited Kenya, Bangladesh, Uganda and Vietnam as an ambassador
for World Vision and is a campaigner for Aboriginal land rights
and reconciliation. She is also active in the film and television
industry. She has served on the board of the AFI, was a member of
the Federal Government's Commercial Television Production Fund,
and she is a member of the Victorian Government's taskforce trying
to come up with ways to revive what has been called the state's
ailing industry. (She prefers to think of it as a challenging time.)
"The State Government is really recognising the opportunity we
have to take the bull by the horns and grow the industry here. But
these issues are above politics. The need for a healthy and vital
TV and film industry is a bi-partisan issue and something that I
think all governments recognise these days."
She is not just being diplomatic. She has worked hard not to align
herself with any particular political party. She was once approached
by former Victorian MP Phil Cleary to stand with a coalition of
independents for Federal Parliament, but declined. "I'm certainly
not a politician. What I've tried to do is keep it issue-based.
I choose to align myself to issues I feel strongly about. When it
comes to the (film and television) industry, I not only see that
as my livelihood, but as an important part of the general health
of our culture."
Despite her commitment to the cause and her own successful career,
Thornton says she would be loath to see her children follow her
into the acting business. "I have been so fortunate and have had
a really lucky run in this career but it is not something you would
wish for your own children. It is full of uncertainty and disappointment
- potentially." She doesn't want to sound too negative.
"But, the satisfactions, when they exist, are enormous, for me
anyway. I have (lacked financial security) all my adult life and
I'm quite conditioned to it now and I've become a bit addicted to
it as well - the element of surprise. To survive in this industry,
you have got to have reasonably thick skin, be ever vigilant and
remain tenacious about what you want to do. "She forgets to mention
that you can obviously achieve all this and still remain a nice
human being.
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