Worlds apart: Bernard Curry’s very different dramas.
Playing a clean-cut detective in the new local series My Life Is Murder is far removed from his role in Wentworth as a corrupt prison guard but Bernard Curry revels in the extremes of his characters. Melenie Parkes reports.
Bernard Curry’s latest two roles could not be more different. On Wentworth, he plays corrupt prison officer Jake Stewart and on new series My Life Is Murder, he plays squeaky-clean police detective Kieran Hussey. Talk about the battle between good and evil. “It’s just been a great little kind of breath of fresh air,” says Curry of his new role.
“Jake Stewart, the character I play on Wentworth, he’s more of a duplicitous, opportunist character and he will sort of cross the line between what’s good and bad to get what he wants and to survive in this world.
“Whereas, coming across to play Kieran Hussey, he’s a professional and he’s just trying to get to the bottom of these cases.
“He comes from a good place and he’s a person who has a lot of integrity and just wants to do the right thing.
“They are both really kind of contrasting characters that are not really like each other so it’s been great. I’m having a really good time in my career at the moment.”
My Life Is Murder follows former homicide detective Alexa Crowe (Lucy Lawless) as she helps solve cases fed to her by Detective Inspector Kieran Hussey.
Curry says the drama-comedy is a procedural, meaning each episode is self-contained but the characters put a different spin on the murder-mystery genre.
“I think Alexa Crowe, played obviously by one of New Zealand’s favourite daughters, Lucy Lawless, she kind of has this unique take on how she sees the human condition.
“She used to be a detective, an investigator, but she’s chosen to leave the field for various reasons that you kind of start to understand over the course of the series.”
Crowe’s approach to detective
work is certainly unorthodox. In the first episode she hires a male escort in an attempt to find out more about a woman who died after falling from his balcony.
“If she was working within the confines of the law, she wouldn’t be able to do half of the things that she does to be able to try to solve these cases. So I guess Lucy is certainly living up to her name in that respect and she’s Lawless in that way,” he laughs.
Curry says Lawless is “a joy to be around”.
“She imbues the set with a sense of positivity and kind of fun and humour,” he says. “She is the absolute consummate professional. She never complained and she had a really huge workload.
“We became quite close over the course of this season and I feel quite blessed to call her a friend.”
While there is no suggestion of romance between their characters, the 46 year old says it could be on the cards if there are future seasons.
“I sort of equate this with something like Moonlighting where you had Cybill Shepherd and Bruce Willis. If they hooked up too early it would have been the end of the show.
“People like to kind of play along with the clues that are being left throughout an episode.”
– Bernard Curry
“So you need to kind of create that, a little bit of that sexual tension and draw it out a little bit rather than just kind of pulling the trigger too early.” There’s a lot of crossover between Curry’s two shows with many of the crew members working on both Wentworth and My Life Is Murder.
The first two episodes of My Life Is Murder were directed by Leah Purcell, who plays Rita Connors in Wentworth.
“So we had a real connection there between Wentworth and My Life Is Murder and a number of people who work on the crew of Wentworth also came across and worked on My Life Is Murder.”
Curry, who has two children with his wife Sonya Bohlen, says My Life Is Murder has enjoyed success in Australia, Europe and Africa.
“People like to kind of play along with the clues that are being left throughout an episode and you kind of try to guess who the perpetrator might be.
“It’s challenging without being too challenging. It’s not kind of like emotionally wrenching. It’s a bit of escapism and just kind of pure TV-watching enjoyment.”