Ben O'Shea: The Deb

Ben O'Shea popped in to chat with the guys about Rebel Wilson's directorial debut - The Deb. The film is based on stage production of the same name has a lot of songs written Meg Washington and also had a lot of behind the scenes drama. Tune in to hear the full chat. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Spite the flick with bed o'shade. Good morning, morning, good morning.
Now we've got to talk about Rebel Wilson's directorial debut.
It's called The Dead Bit's a film with epic drama,
huge fights. It's just unfortunate that all of that happened

(00:22):
off camera between her and one of the producers and
it wasn't captured on film. So yeah, So this film
is fascinating, it's the story about it has to start
with the controversy around the production before the production even started.
In fact, we're talking a Blake Lively Justin Baldoni esque
legal fight that's been really going behind the scenes for
the last couple of years. That was huge, ye, But

(00:45):
obviously the people involved aren't merely as famous, so not
many people have heard about this one. So before the
shooting even started there was an incident and post production,
Rebel Wilson was denied a writing credit, and then in
response to that, allegedly she has filed a lawsuit against
UK producer Amanda Ghost, alleging that Amanda Ghost, among other things,

(01:08):
there was some sexual misconduct with the film's lead actress,
Charlotte Mcinness. Apparently they had a bath together and now, yep,
it sounds weird. It sounds weird. Interestingly, Amanda and Charlotte
don't deny they had a bath together, but they were
both wearing swimsuits and it was for a medical emergency. Apparently, Yeah,
just research it, google it yourself. And in response, Amanda

(01:31):
Ghost has sued Rebel Wilson for defamation and called her
a liar, a bad actor, all this kind of stuff.
And so this has been going backward, backwards and forwards.
It's delayed the release of the film. It looked like
at one point there is there is the billionaire Lens
blown that Vic and they were on his yacht, all
this kind of stuff. It's bigger than Ben heard this

(01:51):
drama behind the scenes, and it did look like the
film was never going to get released, will never see
the light of day. They were accusing Rebel Wilson of
deliberately making sure the film would never come out. She
denied that. She's like, I'm really proud of this film.
I want people to see it. Finally people get to
see it, and you'd think, what the what the heck
is this movie about? Right, It's not about potato. It's

(02:11):
a lighthearted no, it's a lighthearted ossie musical about the
phenomenon of the Debutante ball that happens in country towns
all over Australia. There may be some mashed potato happening
behind the scenes and so exactly. And it's based on
the stage musical of the same name. And it's full

(02:32):
of songs by Meghan Washington the Aussie scenes. Yeah, she's
great and the songs are really catchy. It tells a
story of Charlotte mckinnes's character Mayve, who is a city slicker,
goes to a private school, is super woke, forces her
woke agenda on all of her schoolmates. Eventually, her mum,
who's the principal, gets fed up with her carrying on
and gives her the boot, banishes her to go live

(02:52):
with her country cousin Taylor, played by Natalie Abbott. And
she's she's a you know, a girl who's like a
bit selfnos is bullied by the local girls in the
town and dreams of going to the deb being the
bell of the ball and that will fix all of
her problems. Right. So you've got this fish out of
water in may You've got this ugly duckling story in Taylor,

(03:13):
and the two have to come together with the deb
hanging over everything. Will they sort of learn to appreciate
each other's differences that sort of a thing, and so
you go, you know what, there's some good stuff in here,
for sure. Shane Jacobson plays Taylor's dad. You know, he's wonderful.
It's one of those rare movies where you really notice
the influence of the director, and not in a good way,

(03:35):
Like the performances are good, the songs are good, the
premise is good, and you go, do you know what,
this could actually be a great Aussie movie, Muriel's Wedding,
you know, strictly ballroom, all of those types of films
that you think it could be like. But it's not
because the musical numbers are just so clunky. You look
at some of the camera angles and the way the

(03:56):
scenes are set up, and you go, oh, man, you
can really tell this is the first time director who
doesn't have any experience with this sort of genre. So
the Great, the late great Julian McMahon has a cameo
in it as the Aussie PM. He shows up at
the deb Poor old Julian McMahon. I feel bad that
this was probably this is probably this is probably the
last thing that he ever did know. Oh dear, all right, well,

(04:20):
how many dead by name, dead by natures are you
giving it on? Behalf of all the people involved in
this film that tried their best. I'm going to give
it two and a half. But I think the real
the real action here is going to be the ongoing
legal fight, which is still you know, before the courts.
So let's see what happens there. Stay chue publicity, the

(04:40):
movie about that is going to make. That's what they're after.
Thank you, Ben, Thanks guys,