Convincing Dolly Parton wasn’t the laborious half.
When filmmaker and actor Krew Boylan conceived of Seriously Red, a brand new Australian dramedy movie, she all the time knew it was going to want the nation music legend’s blessing.
After all, what was a film a couple of Dolly Parton impersonator going to be if the grand dame herself wasn’t on board?
“It was such a love letter to Dolly, we really had to get her blessing but also her music,” Boylan advised news.com.au.
Seriously Red stars Boylan as Red, a younger(ish) lady who decides to throw her boring life in and turn out to be a Parton impersonator. It’s a coming-of-age story about discovering your folks if you’ve all the time been advised you’re too out-there or unusual, and discovering who you might be by way of the lens of another person.
Taking on the persona of Parton provides Red the boldness and outlet she’s on the lookout for, and she or he falls into an esoteric world of impersonators, teaming up with Kenny (Daniel Webber), the premier Kenny Rogers impersonator, and placing up a wierd rivalry with EP (Rose Byrne), an Elvis impressionist. It additionally stars Celeste Barber, Jean Kittson and Bobby Cannavale.
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Boylan wrote the script in addition to starring within the title position, and she or he produced it with Byrne by way of their manufacturing firm, Dollhouse Pictures.
And no, it wasn’t going to work with out Parton, and it was each an ordeal and a breeze to get her blessing. Byrnes was pregnant and capturing in Atlanta when she drove throughout two states to bodily hand the script to Dolly’s supervisor, Danny Nozell, Boylan recalled.
“She went, ‘We’ve got five cents, this is a love letter to Dolly, this is our first project as Dollhouse Pictures, this is a prayer, can you please read it, and can we start talking about it?’
“To his word and generosity, he did, he read it. And Dolly read it twice that evening and we got a phone call going, ‘Yep, we’re on board, we’ll support it, we’ll help, lets us know what else we can do.’”
Boylan mentioned that despite the fact that the group persuaded Parton simply, it took one other eight years to persuade everybody else.
“She’s been behind it and supporting it and she’s loved and watched it, and tweeted about it,” Boylan mentioned. “We’re all kind of blown away and really grateful that she is who she is.”
Parton tweeted simply earlier than the movie’s premiere at South by Southwest in March, “I just loved #SeriouslyRed! The film is a wonderful tribute to being the best version of yourself.”
When Boylan lastly met Parton, the interplay drove her to tears, joyful tears.
“It was so important it was Dolly – what Dolly represents and who she is and why I adore her and how I affiliate myself with some of her attributes, which is kind of silly but truthful. I really wanted it to be Dolly.
“When I met her, I was really in my body, which was weird. I felt so grounded. I thought I was going to be like kissing her too much and getting a bit stupid but we just met each other’s energy and she grabbed my hands and jumped up and down and said, ‘You played me, you played me!’ And I started to cry.”
Directed by Gracie Otto, Seriously Red is riotously enjoyable – a free, typically chaotic however all the time big-hearted film.
On a December afternoon in 2020, the crew was sprawled over the Twin Towers leisure advanced in Tweed Heads. The scene being filmed on that day exemplified the movie’s outlandish and joyous spirit.
A stunt double for Boylan was decked out in Red’s bedazzled threads, a mass of blonde wig piled on her head. She burst out of a bathroom cubicle door, the wig alight, flames licking the ceiling, the stuntwoman thrusting about till it’s lastly out – all managed, after all.
The shot that instantly preceded it featured Boylan costumed in the identical outfit, sitting atop a bathroom in considered one of Twin Towers’ loos. Red’s head begins to loll backwards in these jerky actions we’ve all carried out once we’re about to go to sleep on a bus or on a aircraft.
But most of us don’t roll our flammable wigs again into the trail of a candle, catching it alight. And most of us then don’t should exit on stage for a Kenny Rogers duet of “Islands in the Stream” with half our wig flattened and singed, however smile nonetheless plastered on.
For a film known as Seriously Red, it doesn’t take itself too significantly. The level is to have enjoyable with it.
Boylan loves to bounce and sing, so when she wrote her script, she made certain it was all around the pages.
“I loved all that stuff. I grew up going to a [renowned performing arts] school called Brent Street, which is in Sydney. So, I grew up dancing and acting and doing acrobatics and singing. That’s why I wrote all of that stuff in, it’s very much a part of my world and what I find juicy and interesting, but also cool to look at.
“I like keeping things a bit bright and a bit lush versus the Australian outback of tumbleweeds, dark music, heaviness and someone driving a s**t car. I prefer to play in this world.”
Boylan desires Seriously Red to convey pleasure right into a world that wants it, and perhaps alongside the way in which, audiences will discover a little bit one thing further in the identical method that Red does by way of exploring a unique aspect to herself.
And to recollect how a lot all of us love Parton.
“Dolly is getting better and better. I love that Dolly is the only person that we can all agree on. She will never be cancelled.”
Seriously Red is in cinemas now
The author travelled to Tweed Heads as a visitor of Roadshow Films
