Stories from our elders: Bryan Brown's road from Bankstown to Hollywood
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All this week on Conversations, we're bringing you stories from our elders. Today it's the story of Brian Brown. Now in his late seventies, Brian has had more film and television acting roles than he's had birthdays and is an instantly recognizable figure on screens around the world. From Breaker Mirant and Newsfront to Two Hands and Sweet Country, a huge number of classic Australian films have Brian in a starring role. In the nineteen eighties, working on the American made series The Thornbirds utterly changed Brian's life. He and his British co star Rachel Ward fell in love and married soon after. In twenty eighteen, Brian won a Lifetime Achievement Award at The Actors, Australia's version of the Oscars, and in his speech he spoke about his enduring love of playing Australian blokes and also paid tribute to his late mum.
I spoke with Brian in twenty nineteen about his life story. Hi Brian, welcome to Conversations.
Hi, Sarah.
You finished that acceptance speech by holding up your award and saying, Molly Brown, I salute you. Who was Molly Brown?
Why do you have to make it so hard at the beginning and get me emotional? Um Molly Brown. Molly Brown was my mother.
And what kind of person was she? What was her background?
Yeah, that's a very good question because I never got to know Her parents Which I would have loved to because I didn't ever get to know it Enough about her. I spent um you know, forty years with her. That's her child. But she uh she was a l a lady that ha she was an only child.
How did Bryan Brown’s early life in Bankstown shape his future acting career?
Her father was a flortist in the bands where the cinemas used to have uh orchestras beforehand, he was a flortist. And when um that all started to change, he was out of work. Her mother, I've only recently found out, had an ownership of a guest house in Katoomba.
Maybe even a year younger than that. And so she left school to look after her father. And then her father died before she was like twenty. She had no brothers and sisters, but And so She was sort of on her own. There's a period she lived in the cross, I know there where she was a young woman, and then and then she started to work during the war she worked at um Mark Foys and she used to tell me like Mark Foys was where the the women worked who were Catholics and David Jones was where they worked where they were Masons. Which I found pretty great. You could
do the rosary at lunchtime at Mark Four.
This is like, Oh my goodness. So networking happened back then, you know.
How did she um encounter your dad for the first time?
He came back from the war, but So obviously there were dances for the servicemen and back then 'cause she used to talk about there were dancers and the the American blokes used to come and the Australian blokes were really pissed off with that, you know, 'cause they had the money and the Ozzy blokes and so she must have met Mum there at a dance or something like that. My father was married and either he met mum while he was married and with the woman or it was after. So I found out w when I was young that dad had another another family, another and and there was a son by that marriage. Of course my father left by the time I was two or three, two maybe. And of course I said to mum Once I said s so hold on, Dad left when I was two
How come I've got Christine? And she said, Well he came back one night and And sweet talked her into the sack. And my sister was born. Which was like Thank goodness. Because my sister's fantastic. Um but it also showed the sort of innocence of Mum and the she was very in love with him. But he couldn't deliver. Irresponsible. Quite a nice bloke and everything, but no responsibility.
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Chapters
5 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–2:22
2
How did Bryan Brown’s early life in Bankstown shape his future acting career?
2:22–7:34
3
What influence did Bryan’s mother and his childhood community have on his values?
7:34–23:19
4
How did Bryan transition from school sports and piano lessons to amateur theatre?
23:19–46:23
5
What sparked Bryan’s decision to pursue acting professionally in the UK?
46:23–48:30
Speakers
4 identifiedMore from Conversations
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