More fun for comedy creators
HAVING done their “homework” during season one of Tasmanian-made TV comedy Rosehaven, creators Luke McGregor and Celia Pacquola say season two was even more fun to make.
“We’re more confident, we already know things that work so we can go further with that stuff, everyone’s a bit more relaxed,” Pacquola said.
McGregor said they had come to know the characters and the people who play them.
“All those skeletal things that we had to do early on, that almost felt like homework,” McGregor said.
“Season two developed and we could just sort of have fun.”
Rosehaven, set in a fictional Tasmanian town, premiered on ABC TV last October and was a hit with audiences and critics, fast becoming the ABC’s top-rated comedy series for the year.
Season two, which starts on Wednesday, was filmed in June and July in the Derwent and Huon valleys and Oatlands.
In the new season, Daniel (McGregor) has to prove he has what it takes to earn his place in the family real estate business and his best friend Emma (Pacquola) has to decide if small-town life is for her.
The Tasmanian winter is a key part of Rosehaven’s look.
But Pacquola said unlike in real life where people would be complaining about the cold, “our characters don’t ever say it’s cold, they’re just breathing fog”.
Pacquola said she and McGregor were welcomed back to Tasmania by locals.
“Even though people were very welcoming and warm to us last time, it’s been even better this time around because they didn’t have to trust us that we weren’t making fun of them. This time it was, ‘Oh, it’s you guys again.’ ”
Filming in Tasmania is also a homecoming for McGregor who grew up in the state.
“I always thought when I moved to Melbourne then that would feel like home and Tassie would stop feeling like home, but now I feel like I have two homes,” he said.
McGregor and Pacquola were in the state this week for a premiere of the first two episodes of the new season at the State Cinema at North Hobart.