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Arts. Entertainment.
Scacchi
peaks out
h passion
Better known for revealing her body, with
Turtle Beach this actress has a few
points to make. Angela Wellington reports.
DESCRIBING Greta Scacchi as
passionate is dangerous, irre
sponsible even.
' On the one hand the word could conceiv
ably drive the nudge, nudge, wink, wink
brigade to total distraction. On the other it
might reinforce a femme fatale image that
drives the actress herself to distraction.
Failing that, the adjective would proba
bly be dismissed by regular readers of arti
cles on Greta Scacchi as simply mundane.
Passionate? We've heard it all before. Why
stop there? Why not trot out all the old
favourites - steamy, sexy, sensual - any
word that begins with an S and slots in
easily beside Scacchi for a snappy headline
or picture caption.
Ba that as it may. Greta Scacchi seems
like a passionate person. But not "passion
ate" as in exhibiting intense sexual feeling or
desire - though she may well do that too -
but "passionate" as in being capable of in
tense emotion. For Scacchi isn't afraid to
speak her mind on issues that touch her.
. "1 make room to apply myself occasion
ally to imagining what different people's
experiences are like", and how they find
themselves in unfortunate political situa
tions where they have no control and their
lives are affected," she answers carefully
>vhen the question of the extent of her poli
tical interest is put.
!' But this tidy response can be taken out of
the shady realms of generality and sharp
ened into specifics. At the moment "boat
people" could be substituted for "people"
and "refugee crisis" for "unfortunate politic
al situations". Scacchi is unashamedly criti
cal of this state of affairs.
.; "We've all grown up hearing about the
problems in Vietnam but the reality is that
there are people of our generation who are
Vietnamese who have known nothing but
those problems.
, - "There are people living, floating on bits
of wood and tin cans on the harbour of
Macau, children who have never set foot on
land because there is no land that welcomes
them."
; Scacchi's comments were catalysed by
her starring role in the Australian film Tur
tle Beach.
The film confronts the issue of Vietnam
ese refugees in Malaysia. Scacchi became
aware of the plight of these people years
earlier when she read Blanche d'Alpuget's
novel of the same name.
"I really loved Blanche's book and relat
ed to it very closely," says Scacchi. "I was
completely ignorant of the sort of straggles
that the Vietnamese boat people are still
going through."
The sentences tumble out quickly. Now
and again a hasty breath is drawn but rarely
is there a gap sufficient to insert a question.
Scacchi knows what she wants to say and
she is going to say it.
There are no tell-tale signs of improvisa
tion. None of the "aaghs", "urns" and "sort
ofs" that usually pepper the speech of those
who are making it up as they go along.
Either Scacchi has impromptu oratory skills
to rival Mahatma Gandhi or the matter has
been given a lot of thought
Boldly rushing in where angels and Aus
tralian politicians fear to tread, Scacchi in
troduces the topic of immigration to the
one-sided conversation.
"When you find out the details of these
horrors it puts a different light on the ques
tion of immigration and the unpleasantness
and hostility that these people are having to
face when they come to a comparatively
well-ofT country that has lots of space."
Now where could that be? With what is
to become characteristic diplomacy - or
perhaps just a highly developed sense of
self-preservation - Scacchi declines to ac
tually name the country to which she refers.
Hmmm, lots of space. As a completely unre
lated aside let it be known that Scacchi is
now living in Australia. But 1 didn't say a
word, right?
"When it comes to the question of immi
gration we are all immigrants. Human be
ings have been migrating, since the
beginning of time and all our history books
over the centuries tell us of how boundaries
have changed, countries have formed, na
tions have been wiped out or have had to
run and move and change."
She pauses. Into the vacant space is
lobbed a question - or perhaps it's a chal
lenge. A golden opportunity for Scacchi to
up the stakes and anchor the eloquence with
concrete suggestions for action;
What would Greta Scacchi do if she were
Immigration Minister, or even Prime Min
ister, of a country - for argument's sake
let's say Australia?
"Oh I don't begin to pretend to know
what the economic problems are," she
shoots back.'
Scacchi accepts the rope but refuses to
hang herself with it. Instead she seizes the
chance to distance the film from any diplo
matic repercussions detractors say it might
precipitate. If the Malaysians became shirty
over the ABC television series Embassv
wait until they cop a load of Turtle Beach.
In one particularly gruesome scene Malay
sian fishermen slaughter a boat full of Viet
namese refugees as they arrive.on the coast
"In our film we have been accused or
suspected maybe of laying the blame on the
Malaysians," Scacchi says.
"TTiere are some very ugly and powerful
scenes depicting aggression from the Malay
fishermen, who aren't exactly in a position
of power - they're just poor fishermen. Of
course you can t just label them as being
wrong. You can't divide things into black
and white when it's a very grey and chaotic
area.
"I don't think the Malay fishermen are to
blame, though that kind of violence is unac
ceptable. It's a result of responsibility not
being taken by the powers that be."
"Those powers are all the countries of the
globe. And the immigration problems, most
political problems, religious problems, en
vironmental problems and probably most
causes of war have to do with territory and
increasing population.
"Increasing population is definitely a
global problem."
Doing their little bit to help, Scacchi and
American actor boyfriend Vincent d'Onof
rio are expecting their first child in early
April. The family will be based in Sydney
for at least a year.
Speaking on personal matters the com
ments from Scacchi become less ordered,
less fluent - less studied. She pauses to
consider the impact of what she is about to
say. She hesitates.
Often the responses return to a general
perspective. Intelligence can provide an im
penetrable armour.
Scacchi is philosophical about how she
will blend motherhood with her upwardly
mobile career.
"I know that I'm doing what I want to do.
I knew that my feelings and my needs told
me that I wasn't going to give up this experi
ence and it's something that's happened and
feels absolutely natural.
"I happen to have a man who's very
enthusiastic about having a family and is
\cry dedicated to the principles and morals
of family. Then, in practice it might be that
'as willing as he is to do 50 per ccnt of the
work, he might not. I might feci that he's not
pulling his load completely."
The last sentence is delivered with a
laugh. It is hardly a damning indictment of
d'Onofrio failing to do the vacuuming. The
concept is bigger - more a comment on the
relative positions of the sexes.
"I believe that the females in many dif
ferent species are designed to think more
about where are we going to get the food for
tomorrow, and how are we going to take
care of this and that. Whereas men are more
designed for awareness of more impulsive
..she struggles to find the right word,
then abandons the pursuit.
"The important thing is to do what you
want to do, I think. So I felt that if I was
going to have a child I had to be ready to
take what comes, and be ready to look after
the child 100 per cent of the time if neces
sary.
"1 cant guarantee that the relationship
will work out. There are no guarantees. I
can't afford to put such expectations on
another person that I give him the power to
drag me down in the future should some
thing go wrong."
Which brings us to the obvious question.
Is Scacchi getting married?
At last an "um", hotly tailed by an "I
don't know". For a second or two it seems
she might leave it unanswered.
"1 don't know what to say about it really.
I don't want to sound like a heathen but
marriage, as an official sort of institution,
has never been something that I've had any
reason to have any respect for."
Whether married or unmarried, mother
hood is a role at odds with the femme fatale
image that has haunted Scacchi for the last
few years. To many people she is the defini
tive sex-siren, a blue-ribbon glamour puss.
The mental picture of Scacchi dunking dirty
nappies just doesn't rank as a plausible scen
ario.
"1 try not to think about what people
think of me and the sort of image that's
bantered around," she says with conviction.
"I've always chosen to play strong wom
en and have always chosen a variety of very
different roles. White Mischief was the first
really widely seen film that I was in and it
was a very striking, glamorous role.
"When it came out in England, at least,
there was such expectation and scandal sur
rounding it that the newspapers preceded
the opening with all of these allegations of
smuttiness, steaminess, sexiness." The
dreaded "S" words are punched out with
mock drama.
Prominent roles in Presumed Innocent
and, more recently. Shattered followed in
the same vein. Three big budget films, three
glamorous parts - the die was cast
Turtle Beach sees Scacchi adopt the
more earthy persona of an Australian pho
to-journalist; Judith Wilkes, who goes to
Malaysia to report on the Vietnamese refu
gee situation. The film centres largely on her
relationship with Minou Hobday (Joan
Chen), wife of the Australian High Com
missioner and a former Saigon bar girl. Jack
Thompson and Art Malik take the less
meaty male roles.
Scacchi describes Wilkes as a woman
who sees the world in black and white terms
- her ideals almost set in stone.
"What really inspired me and drew me to
playing Judith is that I understood how you
can have those ideals, how your upbringing
and your education can make you feel com
pletely adamant about certain ideas of jus
tice. Judith's very much a woman of our
generation. This generation of women to
day who grow up expecting to have an equal
share of life to a man. They feel they have a
right to the same amount of ambition, to the
same amount of career expectation, as any
man.
"And why not?" There, is now a tone of
defiance, border-line anger. "That's how
I've grown up certainly."
For the time being Scacchi is content to
apply the brakes to her hectic lifestyle. The
sole work commitment on the horizon is a
season in the Sydney Theatre Company's
production of Miss Julie. There is a new
work ethic - she intends to stop and smell
the roses along the way.
"You ask if I was minister for this or that,
I'm not, I'm an actor, so I can do things as
an actor. That's what I chose to do. It's what
I do best."
Turtle Beach is now showing in Canberra at
Greater Union Cinemas in Civic.
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Greta Scacchi: She is not afraid to speak her mind.
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