Ball’s in Wally’s court
A new four-part crime drama Sunshine, starring Anthony LaPaglia, Melanie Lynskey and a new South SudaneseAustralian cast, is set to start on SBS. One of its new stars, Wally Elnour, tells DANIELLE McGRANE about making his acting debut and what to expect f
Wally Elnour had no ambition to be an actor. Most of his spare time at home in Melbourne was spent on the basketball court.
Originally from South Sudan, Elnour immigrated to Australia in 2002 at the age of five with his family.
Basketball is something he excels at. Five years ago, he was recruited to play for the Melbourne-based team the Longhorns. In that time, the team have won three championships and, last year, Elnour went to a US school to play basketball at Montebello, Denver.
He ended up finishing high school in Oklahoma, play- ing for the Redemption Life team.
“The basketball was way different in the US. It was more intense and fast-paced. I was playing a lot,” Elnour said.
“That was my senior year, so it was their year 12 over there. I graduated there.”
Strangely, after his return to Melbourne, it was basketball that helped him break into acting – a profession that wasn’t on his radar until now. While competing in the national South Sudanese Basketball Tournament in Australia, he heard about a new TV show looking for cast members.
“My team made it all the way to the finals and during the break they were passing out flyers about a new TV show coming out and they needed people to audition,” he said.
That new TV show was SBS’s upcoming crime drama Sunshine, which focuses on a basketball team in a South Sudanese community in Melbourne.
Initially, Elnour wasn’t interested in the project; his sights had been so firmly set on basketball for so long, but when his friends decided to go to the audition he joined them.
It was a lucky, last-minute decision, because Elnour discovered he had a talent.
“We went to the audition together, and one by one all my friends were getting cut from the auditions until I was the last one left,” he said.
Elnour is now playing a lead role as Jacob Garang in the crime drama opposite seasoned Hollywood actors Anthony LaPaglia and Melanie Lynskey.
Aside from the crime investigation that drives the storyline, Elnour says this is a story about his community. “It’s so realistic, it relates to the community right now and how we live,” he said. “The majority of Sudanese guys are basketball players and our story is being told now through basket- ball and this perspective of how people view us.”
The story follows a basketball team at the centre of a police hunt for the perpetrator of a violent assault, which has left a young teenage girl in a coma fighting for her life.
LaPaglia plays a former basketball player who Jacob picks to coach his underperforming team, the Sunshine Kings, while Lynskey plays the lawyer who questions Jacob and his teammates about the assault on the young girl.
Elnour believes the show is important in how it represents his culture in a respectful manner while also tackling issues of racism. It’s important it’s acknowledged, he says, as it’s something he experiences frequently in his own life.
“It’s every day life for Sudanese guys, especially young Sudanese guys. Some of these kids do crazy stuff and the media judges everyone by it. Just being black in this community in Australia is kind of tough,” he said.
“I think it’s important to show different views of different people and how they live. Before you judge you’ve got to understand what they go through and what they do.” Sunshine Wednesday, 8.30pm on SBS