Craig Silvey’s beloved best-selling novel leaps onto the big screen in a charming new Australian family movie. RUNT is the heartfelt and hilarious tale of eleven-year-old Annie Shearer and her best friend Runt, an adopted stray dog with remarkable abilities. In a bid to save their family farm, the two aspire to compete in the Agility Course Championships at the prestigious Krumpets Dog Show in London, whilst overcoming hurdles, obstacles and nefarious villains.
As Runt prepares to leap in to Australian cinemas for the school holidays, Nick L’Barrow spoke with the film’s villain, actor Matt Day, about the freedom of letting loose in a performance, the Roald Dahl inspirations behind his character, and how his acting process changes from stage to screen.
Nick: Fergus Fink is such an extravagant, flamboyant villain, both interiorly and exteriorly. I’m curious to know how much of Fink’s personality you had worked out just from reading the script, and how much did Fink’s personality evolve once you put these outlandish costumes on?
Matt Day: Well, I had an idea because when I read Craig [Silvey]’s book, he kind of jumped off the page in terms of what I was going to do. Then I think it was the amalgam of all the bad guys in those scary, Roald Dahl films that I grew up with, you know? The child catcher from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang was in there. All of those literary bad characters kind of came to play.
But really, it was when I stepped into the costumes, when I came in and did my first fitting, they pulled out this black sequined suit, and I went, “Yes, I know exactly who this guy is now”.
Then came the Cuban heels, and I’d grown the moustache—which is something I offered up to John [Sheedy, director], and he liked that. That was all my own hair as well. With Jen Lamphee, our incredible makeup artist, we’d spend two hour every morning blowing that up. So, it was kind of easy to do once you had that all configured.
I wasn’t really sure what was going to happen day one. I wasn’t sure how it was going to go until we did a dry run with my dog, Chariot, on a mock agility course. And John just wanted to me to come up with some moves, and they had someone there filming it all, and it just kind of started to happen, you know?
I started to throw in all of these bits, like Bruce Lee, some kung fu moves, and some dance moves. There was a bit of disco happening. So, by the time we turned up to shooting, it just kind of all came together.
Nick: I read an interesting quote from Craig Silvey [writer] where he said Fergus Fink is “the embodiment of overcompensation”. It made me curious to find out that with a villain as extravagant as Fink, and in a profession like acting where there is so much thought and work that goes into crafting specific things about characters, does overcompensation allow playing a villain like this feel freeing?
Matt Day: Yeah, I did find it really freeing. That’s interesting that you say that because it was kind of a good step into a world where you cannot be too big. Like, John [Sheedy] knew that when we were making it, no choice is too big. You have permission just to go over the top and go for it. We were trying to make, you know, Baz Luhrmann meets a delicate Sofia Coppola story [laughs].
And I really hurt myself doing this! I can tell you, if you run an agility course in Cuban heels 10 times in a row on a hot day… that was a test. That was an acting test!
But I had a lot of fun with it. It was great to have permission just to be ridiculously over the top, and kind of theatrical as well. So often when you’re working on films, it’s all about keeping it contained and keeping the performance down a bit more. But this was not that in any way.
Nick: It’s interesting you bring up the theatre comparison, because I was curious to know whether your process of crafting a character changes depending on whether you’re performing on stage, or doing it for a film?
Matt Day: Yeah, it’s really different! They’re almost two different kinds of skill sets. With theatre, you have this rehearsal time to kind of prepare and to make discoveries and build up towards the performance. And then, you have this eight-week run, generally speaking, to kind of perfect it and get it right. Then, if you feel like you’ve got it right, you can go again the next night. It’s very different in a way.
Often times in film and TV, there isn’t much rehearsal time at all. You’re kind of just expected to turn up and deliver. So, you have to do a lot more homework, in a sense, before you get there.
When I was younger, I was quite happy to turn up and wing it, but now, I really like to make sure things are locked in place, and that I’ve done the work before I get there. I’m probably a little more disciplined. Or maybe more fearful!
Nick: If you had the chance to expand Fink as a character more, say over an eight-week theatre run, is there a specific aspect of him you’d love to explore?
Matt Day: Oh, yeah, totally. I think there should be a Fink spin off! That would be awesome. There’s plenty more of this character to explore.
Nick: There’d at least be plenty of work for the amazing costume desginers…
Matt Day: [laughs] A lot of people would be very happy getting a lot of work. A lot of people who do sequin work would be in work for a long time!
Nick: I’ve often heard an age old saying in cinema that you should never work with children or animals. However, based on what I’ve seen in Runt, it would seem that the experience was quite enjoyable. Are there any unique advantages to working with kids and animals?
Matt Day: There are none! [laughs]
Nick: So, the saying is true then…
Matt Day: The saying is true for a reason. It slows everything down, makes everything difficult. I’ve worked with a lot on animals when I was a teenager on A Country Practice. We had a lot of kangaroos with burnt paws, and wombats, and things like that.
But, no, my dog, Chariot, was really well trained! She would do everything as she was told to do, and would run the course, loved being on camera. Most of the animals worked really well.
And the kids were great on this as well. Lily [LaTorre, actor]’s fantastic. There were all great and seemed to have a really good time. So, from my perspective, it went really smoothly. It could have been a nightmare, but even if it was, it doesn’t necessarily mean it’s a bad film. Often the ones that are hard to shoot, turn out really well.
Nick: Without sounding too juvenile, I am a huge advocate for good toiler humour in films, and your delivery of, “I’ve been defiled” after a dog urinates on your shoe was absolutely hilarious. In your opinion, what’s the difference between good toilet humour, and petty, poor toilet humour?
Matt Day: There is no difference! There is no such thing as petty, poor toilet humour! There’s only good toiler humour. I mean, it’s a universal language because it’s a shared experience, you know? There’s not a human who doesn’t understand it.
Nick: To close out, you mentioned earlier about inspiration you drew from family films for Fink, but I’m curious to know what some of your memorable family film watching experiences were when you were growing up.
Matt Day: All the classics, I suppose. E.T. and The Black Stallion were ones I loved when I was a kid. But the problem with a lot of those films from the 70s and 80s was that they had really sad endings, right? Like Storm Boy, that’s a beautiful film.
I think there’s always a good lesson in these films for kids. And I think Craig [Silvey] really hit on that with his book as well. I really hope that with this film, it just gives an alternative to all the usual huge, Hollywood stuff that comes out during the school holidays.
For families to go along and see something that is Australian, and full of Australian characters, and set here, maybe that will live with kids a little bit longer than the usual, more disposable stuff.
Thank you to Matt for taking the time to chat, and thank you to StudioCanal and ThinkTank Communications for organising the interview. Runt is opening in Queensland cinemas on September 12, and in all other Australian states and territories on September 19.
