By Erin Free
Australian director Paul Goldman (Australian Rules, Suburban Mayhem) muscles up for Kid Snow, a tough but tender drama about two warring Irish brothers in the brutal world of 1970s outback tent boxing.
“I love the mythology of boxing tents, I love the early intersection of white and indigenous cultures that you saw in boxing tents, and I love the fact that for a time these boxing tents were the only way that indigenous people could travel around the country…it’s such a rich social milieu,” Australian director Paul Goldman tells FilmInk via Zoom. “There was a rich archive of photographic material that I could delve into, as well as various memoirs, plus, when I was at NIDA, one of my mentors was the director Jim Sharman, whose grandfather was Jimmy Sharman, whose boxing troupe was probably the most famous in Australia.”
For his new film Kid Snow, director Paul Goldman – who has helmed such distinctly Australian works as Australian Rules, Suburban Mayhem, The Night We Called It A Day, and the documentaries Ego: The Michael Gudinski Story and Such Is Life: The Troubled Times Of Ben Cousins – indeed takes as his source of inspiration a true relic of Australiana in the form of the boxing tent. Though Jimmy Sharman’s troupe was the most famous (even inspiring Midnight Oil’s song “Jimmy Sharman’s Boxers”), many of these travelling roadshows roared their way across the Australian countryside through the fifties, sixties and seventies, pitting their own crew of fighters against any locals brave enough to lace up a glove and get in the ring. There were other acts along for the ride, but the fights were the real attraction. Things like safety protocols of course put an end to this form of entertainment many, many years ago, but the historical tradition of the boxing troupe remains a rich one in the Australian canon.
It’s in these dusty travelling tents that the tough but tender story of Kid Snow takes place, as the eponymous young Irish boxer (played by UK import Billy Howle) battles his past demons, his new opponents, and his domineering older brother Rory (fellow Brit Tom Bateman), who runs the boxing tent and the travelling carnival that comes along with it. The brusque, brawling brothers have a fractious relationship, which only becomes more tempestuous when the down-on-her-luck Sunny (Phoebe Tonkin) joins the show as an exotic dancer to make some cash to improve the lot of her and her young son. Hovering around, and caught up in, the brotherly battles are the troupe’s other boxers (Mark Coles Smith, Hunter Page-Lockard), and the other outcasts (including Goldman’s Australian Rules star Nathan Phillips) who staff it.
Paul Goldman’s Kid Snow originated with the Australian writer and actor John Brumpton, the powerful, magnetic character actor who has appeared in tough-minded local films like Romper Stomper, Redball, Pawno, Everynight…Everynight, Dance Me To My Song, Australia Day, Fell and many, many more. A singularly tough, authentic screen presence, John Brumpton had himself for a time fought in the brutal Australian boxing tents to make a living, and based elements of his screenplay on his own experiences. John Brumpton co-wrote the screenplay for Lawrence Johnston’s 1996 unconventional prison drama Life, and really knows his way around a tough, hard-hitting story.
“The film’s producer Lizette Atkins was there at a live table read of the script, and she was really impressed,” Goldman explains. “She optioned the script and then worked with John and a couple of other writers in developing the script. They got to the point when they felt that they needed someone new to take a look at it, and invited me to read it. I loved it…I loved the characters, I loved the milieu of tent boxing, and I loved the epic nature of the project. I loved what John had done, but there were certain elements that I wanted to develop more. John’s script was already populated by all of those characters, and it was real and authentic, and I loved what it was, but as with the development of any script, it just needed a nip and tuck here and there. John had worked with some other writers, like Shane Danielsen, and I brought in Phillip Gwynne, who wrote the screenplay for Australian Rules, and Stephen Cleary. We just wanted to bring some focus to different things, and develop the character of Sunny. There are so many characters and subplots that I just wanted to make sure that everything worked together and meshed really well.”
Though many characters move in and out of the story, the central force that binds the film together is unquestionably the relationship of the sensitive, emotionally damaged Kid Snow and the blustery, bullying Rory, two tough Irish boys cutting their way through the Australian outback. With the characters being Irish, Goldman threw his casting net wide, looking at actors both here in Australia and in the UK. The lure of international names of course played a part, with that giving the film greater opportunities with regards to international sales. Goldman eventually settled on Billy Howle (who has appeared in the films On Chesil Beach, The Seagull and Outlaw King, and on TV in acclaimed works like MotherFatherSon, The Serpent, The Beast Must Die, Under The Banner Of Heaven and The Perfect Couple) and Tom Bateman (Murder On The Orient Express, Death On The Nile) to play his warring brothers.
“Billy Howle brings such a soulfulness to the character,” Goldman says. “Kid Snow is an interesting character because he’s so interior, but we do see a lot of that in Australian cinema…we’ve seen many interior characters. But he’s also, of course, a boxer, which makes for a real dichotomy. And Tom Bateman is great as this real showman of a character. When casting a role like that, you just live in fear of the Rory character becoming a monster. So many people are so affected by Rory by the end of the film.”
Providing the final point in the film’s essential relationship triangle is Phoebe Tonkin, who shot Kid Snow prior to her acclaimed performance in the TV adaptation of Boy Swallows Universe. Tonkin is terrific as the tough but damaged Sunny, who turns her exotic dance act into something special, and ends up rocking the already shaky metaphorical foundations of the travelling roadshow. “There are so many great actresses out there, but it was just a godsend getting Phoebe,” Goldman says. “Everything about it was tough. The role was tough, and then Phoebe also had to deal with shooting in Kalgoorlie in WA with a predominantly male cast in basically the middle of nowhere. I also wanted to make everyone look bedraggled, and sweaty…she’s got a bruised eye when we meet her. I wasn’t interested in doing anything that would make Phoebe look like the beautiful, wonderful young woman that she is. She was hungry for the work, and the challenges inherent in the role.”
Phoebe Tonkin also went the extra mile on set when it came to nine-year-old Jack LaTorre, who plays her son in the film. Though LaTorre’s own mother is an acting coach, and Goldman had his own acting coach – legendary Aussie character actor David Field – on hand too, Tonkin was a major support for the young actor. “There’s almost a duty of care for an actress to look after a young actor in a situation like this,” Goldman explains, “and Phoebe was so generous with Jack, and their relationship just blossomed. Jack is wonderful in the film. It was great to watch.”
All of the actors in the film were beset with major physical challenges – Billy Howle is a boxer, Tom Bateman is a man living with a severe limp after an injury, and Sunny is a dancer – which meant maximum preparation. “I didn’t want the actors playing boxers to have body doubles,” Goldman explains. “So, they really had to do the work. That’s always a risky thing to shoot too: one wrong move, and a punch that’s supposed to miss can suddenly land, which can obviously make things very difficult. And Phoebe had to dance in front of a tent full of men. But I think actors love those challenges…they love the physicality of a role. As well as wearing callipers, Tom put rocks in his shoes to help more with his character’s limp. Actors love it…cinema is littered with actors who go above and beyond. That allows them to immerse themselves in characters and embrace characters in ways that they wouldn’t be able to otherwise. I love working with actors. It’s one of the richest, most rewarding parts of making a film for me.”
Though Australia doesn’t have too many of them, Kid Snow certainly joins a very long list of international boxing movies. “I love boxing films, and I was very aware of them,” Paul Goldman says. “Obviously, Raging Bull is one of the very best and, like Kid Snow, it’s about two brothers and the woman who comes between them. John Huston’s Fat City was also very important to us, especially in terms of the look. Many boxing films are also down-at-heel stories…I like stories about the damage that men do to each other. It’s a very rich vein of storytelling, and all those films became inspirations. I’m not afraid of picking the eyes out of them for ideas. I wanted the boxing scenes in the film to be very visceral…I wanted to show how impactful and violent boxing really is.”
Kid Snow is released in cinemas on September 12.
