First things first: yes, that is the guy from Slow Horses. And yes, he’s always been Australian.
Christopher Chung is best known for his Bafta-nominated performance as slacker and cringe-inducing computer expert Roddy Ho in UK espionage thriller Slow Horses. For those who have seen him in this role alongside Gary Oldman, Jack Lowden and Kristin Scott Thomas, his casting as the swoon-inducing lead in a period piece might be surprising.
But from the moment he trots on to screen as Harry Beecham, on horseback in a suitably open shirt, it’s clear Chung’s got range.
Netflix’s adaptation of My Brilliant Career, which follows the 1979 film starring Sam Neill and Judy Davis, is a triumph. On paper, with its Divinyls needle drops and photogenic cast, it’d be easy to reduce My Brilliant Career to simply being Australia’s answer to Bridgerton – and while it does seem poised to achieve the same sort of popular success, the six-part series has a far more feminist and feral bent than that British series with plenty of bush wees and bloomers flashing from the very first episode.
Miles Franklin wrote My Brilliant Career while she was still a teenager, and it was published in 1901 when the author was 21. One hundred and twenty-five years since the novel’s publication, Netflix’s adaptation, the story of Sybylla Melvyn (played in the series by Philippa Northeast) feels unflinchingly modern. The new adaptation expands Franklin’s world to include a Chinese Australian lead in Chung (there were around 33,000 people of Chinese descent living in Australia at the time), First Nations characters (played by actors including Sherry-Lee Watson and Miah Madden), and a queer storyline.
Broadsheet spoke to Chung in Sydney about acting in his native accent and whether there are any similarities between Roddy Ho and Harry Beecham.
This is your first project in Australia in a while. What did it mean to do a project at home and in your native accent?
Since I moved to the UK 14 years ago, my driving goal was to be able to come back to Australia and do some kind of job, and the fact that it’s been My Brilliant Career is something that still flabbergasts me because it’s such an iconic piece of Australian literature and such a beloved film. I was thrilled to get the role, to be able to use my native accent and to educate people that I am actually Australian because I’m surprised by how many people think that I’m British. It’s really nice to be able to come back to Australia, it feels like a real rite of passage. It’s been a wonderful experience to get to work with the cast and the crew in Adelaide. It’s everything that I could have wanted from an Australian production and more.
Harry Beecham is such an iconic Australian heart-throb, made popular by the late, great Sam Neill. How did it feel to step into Sam’s shoes?
I never really intended to step into his shoes, opposed to making my own pair of shoes for that part. It was really lovely that he did give me kind of a handover of Harry. It was very, very sweet and gracious of him, which is what we all know him to be. But again, he really defined that role back in the ’79 film, and I wanted to honour as much of his portrayal of the character, but also put my own stamp on it. But to have his okay on it was very special to me.
This isn’t the first adaptation of My Brilliant Career. What is it about this story that makes it so ripe for adaptation?
It’s a really incredible piece of writing that is about pursuing your own life. There are so many things in today’s society that get in the way of you doing what you want to do, and external influences that can shape which path you decide to take. I think Sybylla’s journey is really about her honouring what she wants out of life, and going against societal norms and what she’s been told to do. That story is universal and it’s not generationally specific, so I think that’s why [this story] continues to be retold in many different ways.
My Brilliant Career has always felt so ahead of its time, but this is the most modern version yet thanks to expanded storylines and new characters. How did the creative team explain those modernisations to you?
When I read the scripts I knew that their goal was to broaden the world that was already on the page to make it more inclusive and show a more accurate representation of what Australia would have been like at that time, and, in doing so, open up other avenues of conversation around My Brilliant Career. We have an inclusion of a queer storyline, of the First Nations storyline, and also my presence within the piece [as an Australian Chinese character]. All of those avenues of representation were really integral to this retelling of the story because it allows an access point to a broader audience to see points of themselves reflected.
Now you’ve gotten the chance to play an Australian on screen, are you hoping this is the start of getting to tell more Australian stories?
I hope so. I definitely see myself coming back to Australia more often to work. This show has opened a lot more doors for me in my career, which I’m really excited about. It’s been a really incredible opportunity for me to show a different string in my bow, so people can place me anywhere within the spectrum between Roddy Ho and Harry Beecham.
That’s quite a spectrum.
They’re kind of polar opposites. Roddy is so obnoxious and self-serving and doesn’t really care about what people think of him. Harry is very much always thinking about what people think of him and what the societal expectations are of him. Ho has none of those [concerns]. I think Roddy actually thinks that he’s a lot like Harry Beecham, but he’s nowhere near that.
Were there any moments on set that were particularly special to you?
It was such a gift to be able to learn how to ride a horse. I became so fond of Harry’s horse, Prince. It was really difficult to say goodbye because I felt like I had such a strong connection with the horse. They’re incredibly intelligent creatures, and you definitely feel they have their own personalities, and sometimes they’re having crappy days and don’t want to perform.
There was also one scene in particular with me and Pip on a kind of vast open plain where I’m [teaching her how to crack a whip]. That morning when we woke up, the field was just desolate and empty, but we had this blood-red sunrise with incredible gum trees in the background with a huge flock of cockatoos flying behind them and kangaroos jumping. It was one of those moments where you stand there in awe of how small you actually are, and how beautiful [Australia] is.
What have people’s reactions been to the show so far?
It’s been really positive. There’s been such great anticipation because we finished filming about a year ago. Now it’s like “Oh, it's finally here!” But everybody that I’ve spoken to so far has been super positive, and has binged it, which is really lovely. So I’m quietly hopeful that it will resonate not just here, but on a world scale.
My Brilliant Career is streaming on Netflix now.
