- 10 hours ago
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:14Hello. Everyone who meets actor-director John Paulson seems to agree on one thing.
00:21He is a singular force of nature.
00:24More than 30 years ago, John had an idea for a festival that would allow amateur filmmakers
00:30without qualifications or connections to show what they could do.
00:35It turned into Tropfest, one of the largest short film festivals in the world.
00:41But John Paulson's journey to get there has been far from smooth.
00:50I'm so excited.
00:51If you tried to quantify the contribution that Tropfest has made to the Australian film industry,
00:57I mean, it would be next to impossible.
00:59What's happening today is enormously down to John's drive.
01:04There's a person there that's very good at what they do.
01:08Okay, straight to the camera for me. Thank you so much.
01:10John's a hustler, like in the best possible way. He's like, why not? Let's do it. Yeah, okay, great.
01:17He's definitely a showman and he's definitely a salesman and he knows where the bread's buttered
01:22and he knows how to make it look exciting and put some jam on it.
01:25The fact that it started at Tropicana Cafe and has turned into this, you know, 30 years later
01:30or whatever it's been is, it's a real testament to John.
01:34Here we go. George, how are you?
01:35With all the great movements in Australian cinema, the first sound movies and so on,
01:41probably Tropfest has been one of the most significant events.
01:46What John did with Tropfest is like create this platform where he could really make, you know,
01:51all these other filmmakers, actors, superstars.
01:54And the proof is in the pudding of all the people who have come out of Tropfest.
01:57Rebel Wilson, Nash Edgerton, Joel Edgerton, Justin Curzell.
02:02And then COVID hit and the next thing you know, there's been no Tropfest for two, three, four, five years.
02:07I was very devastated.
02:09We always felt like there was a little bit of something missing for John because it was so much a
02:13part of him and what he had built.
02:16Founder and director of Tropfest, please welcome John Paulson.
02:25After a seven-year hiatus in which Tropfest had no right to exist anymore, the world had changed too much.
02:33Suddenly, and I don't really know how, it rose again.
02:38Tropfest is finally home again.
03:05John walks into any room and people go, who's that?
03:09That looks like good trouble.
03:11His innate talent, not only as an actor, but as a director and a showrunner,
03:17basically took him out of Australia to probably the toughest place in the world to make it, is New York.
03:26You know, he started in film, but he's really carved himself out a little niche for directing these amazing TV
03:33shows in the States.
03:34And there he made a family, and there he made a life.
03:37But he was always coming back each year to run Trumpfest.
03:42Here's one of those rare examples where life, his early life, is tough.
03:47And somehow uses it to transcend all of that.
03:52And his reaction to that is almost his superpower.
03:58There was like a fork in the road, and he could have easily gone down the path that, you know,
04:04many of the people that he grew up with went on, even people in his family.
04:08So it was not a done deal that he would be able to get himself out of it.
04:12If a flame is to grow, there must be a glow.
04:17My parents met in New Zealand. They're both New Zealanders.
04:21My mum was a very brilliant piano player.
04:24And my dad, he wanted to be an artist. He had a nice voice.
04:29It was an unusual existence, I suppose, compared to what other people had.
04:34And I'd say, Mari, what's for breakfast?
04:37And she'd sit down to the piano and say, what would you like to hear?
04:44So they met and decided to move to Sydney, which I think at the time was the big smoke in
04:50terms of jazz.
04:53Had many kids very quickly.
04:56It wasn't a lot of fun.
04:59You know, they fought a lot. And almost straight away they split up.
05:04She was left with four kids under the age of five.
05:09His mother was not really present, and the four kids were just roaming around.
05:16My mum had demons.
05:18I think she'd had quite an abusive childhood, which leads to a lot of pain, which leads to a lot
05:23of self-medication.
05:26She was into hard drugs. I mean, she was into heroin with needles.
05:31I mean, that's about as hardcore as it gets.
05:37My mum hooked up with this guy who was a drummer, who was a heroin addict.
05:43He was a pretty tough customer.
05:46It was like, if he wanted to beat you, you'd get a beating.
05:51And my mum was like that too, to be honest with you.
05:53It was chaos. It was chaos, yeah.
05:56If you can imagine someone who's on heroin, and the only way you can get attention is to be explosive.
06:02You know, so that's what he was doing, you know, to find ways to get attention.
06:11I was very close to my mum all of her life.
06:15I saw her as, you know, she was a victim too.
06:20Like, it wasn't like she woke up and said, I'm going to beat my kids, or I'm going to use
06:24heroin.
06:26When I was 12, she was put in, you know, a mental hospital.
06:30And then suddenly, Mari was not around and he had to go live with his dad.
06:35Well, I tried to bring some stability.
06:38He wasn't very fond of authority.
06:43And that didn't go super well at school.
06:47So I bounced around a few schools.
06:49And by the time I was 15, I was out.
06:52And I don't think I ever really hurt anybody.
06:54But I was hanging out with the kids who were breaking into cars and stealing boats.
07:01But yeah, I got in a lot of trouble. I got arrested many times.
07:04I can remember on one occasion I was in a shop at Crow's Nest.
07:09And I just happened to be looking out the window.
07:12And there is John with a friend breaking into a car right in front of my eyes.
07:19He was seconds away from prison, you know, whether it was for stealing or lighting the school on fire.
07:26You know, like, he was delinquent.
07:27He couldn't, you know, he couldn't find his place inside an institution.
07:30Well, I think to this day, that explosive personality of his is the thing that he's going to have to
07:35deal with.
07:36You know, it can escalate.
07:37It's like all of us. We learn how to, you know, learn our little, you know, demons that we've got
07:41hidden away.
07:42And we try to work with them the best way we can.
07:50I've got this podcast, Invisible Roadmap, where really it's inspired, I suppose, by people like me and John to try
07:56and inspire young people like the path is never straight.
07:59And sometimes it is very challenged.
08:02Is there a moment or a person that really shifted your life and changed the kind of, you know, the
08:07roadmap of your life?
08:08There's, there's a few.
08:10I got arrested for stealing a motorbike when I was about 17 and you get one phone call that all
08:15that stuff is true.
08:17And I called Robin Gardner.
08:20One of my parents' best friends was Robin Gardner, who had just started an agency.
08:27One day Robin called and said, hey, do you want to do an audition?
08:33And I'm like, what's an audition?
08:36So I was literally on my way to prison.
08:38I mean, I was arrested.
08:39So I called Robin to say, and she told me on that call that I got that part.
08:45And from that moment, he was totally fixed on his career as an actor.
08:51It was just, just completely a turnaround from the sort of delinquent that we knew to a budding actor.
09:04John was lucky enough to be adored and seen very, at a very young age by directors like George Miller.
09:13From that first time I met that 21 year old, that, that, that enthusiasm on the set where he was
09:22happy to be part of a team of a family that was doing something and creating something.
09:28I was hoping you could have come to Sydney with me.
09:32Oh, Serge.
09:33He wasn't trained as an actor necessarily, but life had trained him for it.
09:37Come on, let's see, give me a go! You bastards!
09:41I think acting gave him the ability to channel this energy that he had stored up.
09:46I've got to beat the shit out of you.
09:48Well, why don't you try it?
09:50The light bulb came on.
09:51I thought, wow, I can put all this stuff into a place and get paid for it.
09:58It's insane.
09:59Well, up your bum.
10:03I think it was a real testament to how art can, you know, transform you in many ways.
10:11It gave him a sense of self-worth.
10:12It gave him a place to express himself.
10:15You know who that is.
10:16That he was never allowed to explore for himself at all.
10:21Acting saved me and actors saved me because what also happened was I suddenly was part of a community, you
10:27know?
10:32It's quite emotional, actually, to be driving around these old streets,
10:35which is where it all happened, where I was riding my bike around when I was in my 20s,
10:39being an actor, going to auditions.
10:43John used to live with my ex-wife.
10:45So I was always a bit like, you know, John Paulson guy.
10:51Everyone loved John because he was so witty and funny.
10:53I was like, he's got one joke, you know?
10:56But I don't know, there was something sort of, I don't know, like a little bit of a mongrel dog
11:01about him that I liked.
11:04This has never left me, these streets.
11:07You know, this is, uh, this is who I am.
11:10I inherited John through the Sydney acting scene.
11:14And he was always at the Trop, obviously.
11:17We all were.
11:18So I'm here at the Tropicana, where it all started.
11:23The Tropicana was a hotbed of really creative people meeting there every day.
11:29You know, the dancers, musicians, actors, bouncing in and out.
11:33I tried to get out of film school many times.
11:35They were like, dude, you didn't finish high school.
11:37You're not coming here.
11:39My memory of him is like, he was always doing something.
11:42Okay, if he didn't have an acting job, what am I going to do?
11:45I've got to do something.
11:46I'm not going to just sit around and do nothing.
11:48I kind of like the hustle.
11:49I think I thrive off the energy of it.
11:51Maybe because of my background and my childhood, chaos is almost, it settles me down.
12:00He was there having coffee every day with actors and would-be directors, despairing about their chances.
12:10And he was the one who said, well, I'll make a little film, just on whatever resources he had.
12:15I made a short film and it was a mockumentary called Surry Hills 902 Spring Roll.
12:21It was something to do.
12:22It was a project.
12:23Give us the money back.
12:24Hey.
12:27Your first thought is, well, I've got to show it to the people who made it.
12:31This room right here was where I put the little TV that night in 93, when I was a lot
12:38younger.
12:39And it was in that, kind of in that corner there.
12:44I benefited from people not really being able to see it or hear it.
12:48And so as a result, I thought it was brilliant.
12:51I'm pretty sure somebody else said, hey, we should have a festival, you know.
12:56But I was the guy who got on the chair and said, you've got X number of weeks or whatever
13:02it was to make a film.
13:04And I set a deadline.
13:06That was the beginning of Trotfest.
13:08It was just a cool thing to do.
13:10The idea of showing up and seeing these films with an audience was inspiring to people that may never have
13:17even got off their arse to do anything.
13:19I had no idea if anyone was going to make a film.
13:23And nine people lined up at the desk with movies.
13:27And a thousand people showed up that night to watch them, which was insane.
13:34I remember the atmosphere and the kind of enthusiasm that everybody had.
13:40It was so small.
13:41It was so spontaneous.
13:43And the very next year, the entire street was blocked off.
13:48One year's free coffee at the Tropicana plus the coffee machine and three kilos of beans.
13:55There's tens of thousands of people in Victoria Street and the roads blocked off and everything.
14:00And I'm like, oh, shit, this is bigger than I imagined, you know, because I'd never been to anything like
14:05it.
14:06From these humble cafe beginnings three years ago, the Tropicana Film Festival has taken off.
14:13The Australian film industry have recognised Trotfest as a place to nurture young talent.
14:17It's a stepping stone between amateur and professional.
14:21I had no business model.
14:23I had no education and this kind of thing.
14:25I had no schooling, period.
14:27So it took me a few years to realise, actually, there is a way to do this where I'm not
14:33paying out of my own pocket and I'm not doing it alone.
14:36Would you please make welcome Dr George Miller?
14:39Even back then, he had an instinct for it.
14:42It's intrinsic to him.
14:43It's not something you learn in a book or a seminar or through education.
14:49I think it's the greatest thing happening in Australian film because it's anybody can have a go.
14:54And then it just keeps getting bigger and bigger and bigger.
14:58It's an amazing crowd.
14:59There's about, I think, about 8,000 on Victoria Street and probably more than that down in Rush Cattersway Park.
15:03I do remember, I think, for me, it was The Domain and I was like, this is insane.
15:09More than 20,000 fans of the short film genre crowded into The Domain to see offerings from 16 finalists,
15:17all ambitious young filmmakers trying to make a name for themselves.
15:21OK, in my hand is what's being contested here this evening.
15:25It was something that happened at the right time for me and a lot of young filmmakers that really kicked
15:32careers off.
15:33There were hundreds of films being made every year, so, like, it was encouraging people to collaborate and work together
15:40and make stuff.
15:43He was like a benevolent Pied Piper. He was just calling people to filmmaking and people emerged.
15:59One of the best moments in the whole Tropfest calendar is calling the finalists to let them know they're in.
16:06So I'll be making those phone calls today with a couple of the other team members.
16:11John and I, because we both come from really low socioeconomic circumstances, I think one of the things that we're
16:18both very passionate about is access.
16:20It's John Polson from Tropfest, mate.
16:22I have minions do the bad news, OK? So, yeah, it's good news.
16:25You're in.
16:26Holy shit.
16:27Congratulations, mate.
16:29What a movie. I love it.
16:30When Tropfest started, you had to get into film school and make a graduate film to get out and to
16:37go on to be something.
16:38So Tropfest completely blew that model up and said, you know what, if you've got talent, I don't care where
16:46you've come from or what you've done or haven't done.
16:48You know, what can you do within seven minutes that can put you on the map?
16:54You've got to take it, man.
16:55Get your hands off me, mate.
16:56I made a short film called Deadline that John stars in with me for $80.
17:00Two minutes after the f***ing deadline, you want to take my film?
17:03Deadline? What are you talking about, mate? It's tomorrow.
17:05I made it in a week and it won the festival.
17:08The winner is Deadline.
17:10Deadline!
17:16And I think it gave me a confidence that maybe I can do this and I think just as a
17:22filmmaker, like that feeling that the film gave me, the reaction from the audience gave, I think I've been chasing
17:29ever since with anything that I make.
17:31Tough, tough year, but it never left my list of finalists.
17:37This is what I love, like, you sort of like, this is part of why I do this.
17:42You live vicariously through these filmmakers and it reminds me of, you know, when I was just starting out.
17:48Chopfest helped leverage his career.
17:50It certainly, you know, skyrocketed the possibilities.
17:59Ethan Hunt. G'day mate, I'm William Baird, but Billy's okay. Anything you need me to get, move or watch, just
18:04let me know I'm your man.
18:05Tom Cruise, I met once or twice because I was very tight with Nicole.
18:10And then I got cast in Mission Impossible 2 and we became pretty tight.
18:15I went to America and at the end of that movie, I really had no reason to come back.
18:21Actor-director John Paulson is on a high.
18:24With a role in Mission Impossible and his first director credit with Siam Sunset, his career's booming.
18:30At that time I was finishing up Siam Sunset, my first film.
18:34So he asked if he could see my film because he's Tom.
18:37He's like, I'd like to send it to L.A. and set up a few screenings.
18:42And I started to get calls like, hey, you know, let's talk.
18:47That's a very powerful voice to have in your corner.
18:52The first thing he did when he went over to America was he worked as a director on Without a
18:56Trace.
18:57From there he did a lot of freelance work on different TV shows, Lore and Aura and those sorts of
19:02things.
19:02He could see the potential in being a filmmaker more so than just being an actor.
19:06So on action, she's already back there.
19:09He wanted to be more in the driver's seat.
19:12I am directing New York City. It's incredibly cold.
19:17We're on the upper west side of Manhattan.
19:21GW Bridge over here.
19:22Behind me is the crew for Blue Bloods, a TV show on CBS over here.
19:28We did a fair few episodes of The Mentalist, so we worked together on that.
19:31Part of the challenge of directing and particularly directing television is just to keep the energy light and to keep
19:40moving.
19:41And he's really good at that.
19:42Roll it.
19:43As a showrunner, he's at his best doing that sort of stuff.
19:47He's in control of the whole show.
19:49Cut.
19:50Pretty good.
19:51Let's go.
19:51He got his very first film to direct in America, which was called Swim Van.
19:57And he was looking for a casting director and was very charming and asked me if I wanted to cast
20:04it.
20:05And that's when me and Amanda really, you know, started hanging out and falling in love and that was it,
20:11you know.
20:14Our first date, my credit card didn't go through.
20:17That's where I was, you know, so it's not like she married money.
20:22John is innately a survivor and he goes towards what nurtures him most.
20:30Amanda has the ability to control his worst characteristics and to nurture his great characteristics.
20:37And she's a very, very calming influence on him.
20:44Fatherhood to John is everything, really everything.
20:48And I think that coming from the childhood that he came from, he was determined to not repeat any of
20:57the experiences or any of the parenting that he did not receive from his parents.
21:04You know, I'm damaged goods like most people.
21:07And you just, all you can think is, well, let me try and step up here and not do what
21:12my parents did.
21:13But from the moment they came out, I've just been all over those kids.
21:18It's really important to me, way more important than any of the other stuff.
21:24He was able to cobble together and figure it out.
21:26What kind of dad do I want to be?
21:28And he's really stood right up to that.
21:30He's not backed away.
21:33That's what he would say if you asked him, what is like your greatest accomplishment?
21:37He would be like building this amazing family.
21:50So today is Friday and the event's on Sunday, so a couple days out.
21:55So this year, it's not quite 1993, the Tropicana Cafe when I had one TV screen.
22:02A lot of expensive equipment up there.
22:06The success of Tropfest gave him a lot of confidence, but I think he felt a certain responsibility to it
22:14that was maybe sinking him a little bit.
22:18Having established himself in New York and coming back and trying to sort of keep it going.
22:24And then eventually that was an impossibility, that he couldn't do both things.
22:30So he handed it over and I had what I thought were good people running it.
22:35And then I remember about a month before the 2015 event, I got a call saying, hey, we don't have
22:42the money to put this on.
22:43Tropfest has been cancelled this year due to a lack of funding.
22:46Tropfest has been cancelled in what was supposed to be its 24th year running.
22:53We were like a million dollars in the hole.
22:55And meanwhile, the people running it sort of disappeared, stopped answering the calls and it was a disaster.
23:02And I do take some responsibility for this.
23:04Taking your eye off the prize a little bit, you know.
23:08Not only did it fall over, I think it fell over literally 24 hours after I'd called all the filmmakers
23:15to tell them they were in.
23:16So we went from this massive high and the next day that Tropfest had fallen over.
23:21That was a tough feeling.
23:26John came back from America and like Tropfest was dead in the water.
23:30Having the rug pulled out that there is no Tropfest this year, there may never be a Tropfest, was a
23:35devastating, devastating feeling.
23:37Yeah, that's a tough part for me.
23:44You know.
23:48By the end of the week that he'd been here, he turned that around and had raised about $2 million
23:53in sponsors' money to get Tropfest back on its feet.
23:58Welcome to Tropfest, everybody!
24:00We're back, babies!
24:03He can surf chaos.
24:05He's learned to triage trouble.
24:08He resurrected Tropfest, which was an amazing achievement.
24:11It was going great until COVID hit in 2019.
24:14And that really was the death run, really, to it.
24:17Publicly, I was kind of like, well, you know, it's run its course.
24:21But privately, I was like, really?
24:24Is it just dead?
24:30We'd be talking and he would say, it doesn't sit well with me that this is not still happening.
24:36And he would meet Australians in New York or wherever and they would say, what's happening with Tropfest?
24:40You always felt like there was something where he was really sad, you know, for those years it didn't happen.
24:48One dark moment was sitting at breakfast with my own kids and they're saying, what happened at Tropfest?
24:55And they're like, dude, do you realize it's gone?
24:58It's been five years.
24:59It's over.
25:00How did you do that?
25:02I feel like I always wanted it to come back.
25:05Even though, thinking about Tropfest, I don't always remember it so well because the last one was, what, seven years
25:12ago?
25:13There were a big reason why it came back because they kept sort of talking about it.
25:16You guys wanted Taylor Swift to come and perform and Olivia Rodrigo.
25:22So I do remember he got this email overnight from Brian Brown and it was, hey mate, let's talk about
25:29Tropfest.
25:30You know, what's happening with it?
25:32We got on one Zoom and it was Sarah Murdoch, Peter Volanis and Brian and myself and Rich Weinberg.
25:40And it was music to my ears.
25:41They wanted to bring it back as a not-for-profit, which was perfect for me.
25:45They wanted to do Tropfest the way that I wanted to do Tropfest, but on steroids.
25:55The world's biggest short film festival returns to Sydney after a seven-year break.
25:59Tropfest is back and Hollywood is right behind it.
26:05Putting his whole heart and soul into it again, it lights a fire in him.
26:09There's nothing really like it that I've seen him invested in so fully in the time that I've known him.
26:17My team would probably say, this guy's on every email, about every napkin.
26:23You know, those things are important to me.
26:24When you think about it, Tropfest is me personified as an event, right?
26:32Hello Centennial Park and hello to everyone watching across Australia and around the world.
26:41There was a lot of love for the fact that the festival came back this year.
26:47People were excited about it.
26:51It's lovely seeing his enthusiasm for it again.
26:54We had over 700 submissions this year from every corner of Australia.
27:00And I have to tell you, the quality was incredible.
27:05He's not doing it alone.
27:07Like, I do think he's got proper partners now who understand what it can be.
27:12And so he feels very supported by them.
27:15None of this would be possible without our new not-for-profit board.
27:20And for our incredible panel, led by Margot Robbie.
27:25That's the amazing thing.
27:27By it collapsing, the essential idea was so powerful and important that it rose up stronger.
27:49I don't feel like a success story. I really don't. I'm not trying to be fake, humble.
27:54I feel like I've got a long way to go and I'm like, I don't see myself that way.
28:02He had a pretty challenging childhood, but he never is used that as an excuse.
28:09If anything, it's given him a little more, you know, fire, a little more drive to succeed.
28:16I'm, uh, shooting a TV show here.
28:18But today is Saturday to get the day off. I'm gonna go flying.
28:25Learning to fly a plane, that's when I really see him light up.
28:31Flying for him, you know, being in control of this thing really suits his personality.
28:40If you want to stay alive, but in flying, you've really got to be focused all the time.
28:45John's love of flying exercises that level of focus and tenacity and will that brought Trumpfest into being and has
28:56sustained it.
28:57So now I have a moment to look at how beautiful it is up here.
29:01It's an incredible sense of, uh, freedom.
29:04I think young John would be pretty impressed with how far he's come and the life he's made for himself.
29:12It's pretty astounding.
29:15We, we crave for people that remind us that anything's possible and Johnny is such great proof of that.
29:22We'll see you next time.
29:25We'll see you next time.
29:33Bye.
29:40Bye.
29:43Bye.
29:44Bye.
29:45Bye.
29:46Bye.
29:52Bye.
Comments