FILMOGRAPHY
2001-02] "The
Secret Life of Us"
1999] Strange Planet
1998] "SeaChange"
1996] Love and Other Catastrophes
1993] The Nostradamus Kid
1988] Lover Boy
1982] Monkey Grip
LINKS
Born in 1969.
Alice has a daughter
named Olive that was born during filming on series 3 of Seachange.
After completing
schooling she worked at the Anthill Theatre Company.
Alice comes from
a family involved in theatre, film and writing, so from early childhood
she enjoyed an environment where self-expression and performance were
encouraged.
Alice is the daughter
of writer Helen Garner who once worked as a teacher until she was dismissed
from Fitzroy High School in 1972 for her frankness in discussing sexual
matters and her use of what was alleged to be 'gutter language' with her
students. In the 1970s, Garner published in journals including The Digger
and Vashti's Voice and worked with the Women's Theatre Group. Her first
novel, Monkey Grip, appeared in 1977. This story of a young single mother
and her heroin-addicted lover in Carlton won the 1978 National Book Council
Award and was filmed in 1982 starring Noni Hazlehurst, Colin Friels &
a 9 year old Alice Garner who played the heroine's (Noni's) daughter.
Her credits include
Skirts, Embassy, Flying Doctors, Nostradamus Kid, Miss Taurus, Maiden
Head and Frail Mary, for which she won Best Female Actor at the Brisbane
Independent Filmmakers Awards in 1996.
Alice was nominated
as Best Actress in the 1996 AFI Awards for Love and Other Catastrophes
& for the same role won Best Supporting Actress in The Film Critics
Circle Awards in 1997.
Also an accomplished
musician, Alice plays the cello in The Xylouris Ensemble, which performs
contemporary, original and traditional Cretan music.
Completed an Honours
degree in History. Alice is an accredited French-English translator and
has a doctor of French history. Her Melbourne PhD studied the history
of representations of sea and shore in south-western France.
Alice on her hobbies:
"There are plenty of other things I’d like to do. For example,
take salsa lessons, and mandolin lessons, and do life drawing. Sometimes
I feel like I’d like a few more lives to have a go at everything."
Alice on living a
full life:
"I’ve got too much on my plate as it is, and I want to keep
getting better at the things I’m already doing… but there are
plenty of other things I’d like to do. For example, take salsa lessons,
and mandolin lessons, and do life drawing. Sometimes I feel like I’d
like a few more lives to have a go at everything."
Alice on what she'd
you do if she wasn't an actor:
"I probably get the purest pleasure out of playing music, but it’s
something that I rarely get the chance to do these days. I’ve found
that practising with a toddler in the house is pretty much impossible.
I guess if I weren’t an actor I’d pursue research and writing
history with a bit more vigour. It’s something I will do alongside
acting, but acting tends to take first place – I try to fit history
around it."
Alice on Seachange:
"I love the character of Carmen. I like to create someone with different
instincts from my own. Carmen is fearless, not constrained by social norms,
and her lack of family support leads her to embrace other things, such
as religion. It was also important to make the character convincing and
not a stereotype of a new age hippie."
Alice on doing the
play 'Meat Party' in 2000:
"It was a great cast to work with; we got on very well and that rapport
made it possible to tackle the dark subject matter of the play each night
without feeling overwhelmed. I enjoyed the collaboration with dancers
and the centrality of music to the production. It was also refreshing
to move away from Eurocentric concerns. My character wasn’t the most
demanding, in that she was essentially a listener, someone who provoked
others to tell their stories, but that was about all I could deal with
at the time; my daughter was only three months old when we started rehearsing."
Alice on which roles
she's enjoyed the most:
"I guess Carmen from SeaChange and Caitlin from The Secret Life of
Us have been my meatiest roles over the last couple of years…. They’re
very different from each other. Carmen came easily - though I did have
to swallow my skepticism and allow myself to embrace her new age-isms
- while Caitlin is more of a challenge. I’m interested to see how
people respond to her, because she’s not instantly likeable. She
comes in as the new woman and doesn’t compare very favourably with
the ex… "
Alice on comparing
herself to her Secret Life Of Us character Carmen:
"She’s not like me at all. Her political views are diametrically
opposed to mine; I’ve actually felt physically sick playing some
of her scenes. But I think it’s important to represent people like
her; if we want to reflect the Australia we live in, we can’t pretend
that everyone shares lefty views. It also gives the other characters on
the show the opportunity to argue with her and present an alternative
view. This is particularly important on a commercial channel, and on a
show which attracts a lot of young viewers. My only concern is that the
friends I’ve made among refugees and detainees don’t confuse
her with me, should they happen to watch the show."
Alice on Actors for
Refugees:
"Kate Atkinson (Karen in SeaChange) and I formed Actors for Refugees
in September 2001. We met at a rally and felt that preaching to the (few)
converted was not the best way to bring about change; we wanted to use
what little celebrity status SeaChange gave us to encourage Australians
to rethink their views. We wanted to help other refugee support groups
get the message out that refugees need our help and understanding, that
they were being demonised for political purposes. Once we’d come
up with the name, AFR took on a life of its own; we’ve had trouble
keeping up with demands for our "services"! We’ve been
finding speakers and readers for events organised by other groups, attaching
names of "celebrities" to various campaigns, developing an informal
network of actors who are prepared to help out in various ways. Actors
who have supported us to date include Tom Long, Claudia Karvan, John Howard,
Joel Edgerton, Catherine McClements, Genevieve Picot, Kevin Harrington
and Rachael Maza. We’ve been visiting detention centres, writing
letters, attending fundraising concerts, rallies… and now we’re
working on putting on a series of readings as a fundraiser for the Asylum
Seekers Resource Centre."