Brendan Cowell Save Your Legs!

Save Your Legs!

Cast: Stephen Curry, Brendan Cowell, Damon Gameau, Pallavi Sharda
Director: Boyd Hicklin
Genre: Comedy

Synopsis: Save Your Legs! is an inspirational journey from the heart of Australia to the soul of India. It's the story of one man who refuses to lose his park cricket team to the realities of growing up. An uplifting adventure filled with comedy, cricket and Bollywood music, Save Your Legs! is an odyssey from the suburbs to the sub-continent in pursuit of a boyhood dream.

Save Your Legs
Release Date: February 28th, 2013
Website: www.saveyourlegs.com

Director's Statement

It was the year 2001. Before kids. Before mortgages and renovations. Over a few beers, a friend tells me that he and his D-Grade cricket club are planning a cricket tour. And not just any tour. India; five matches in five cities over five weeks. 'Internationals… Us!' he says.

I signed up immediately, bringing to the party not just a camera and tripod, but my own faded sporting ambitions of representing my country on the world stage. An epic adventure. A wild rickshaw ride from the suburbs to the subcontinent, as a bunch of 30-something mates lived out their dreams in a time and place where anything and everything seemed possible. Anything perhaps, except winning. That was my first documentary. Now more than a decade later, inspired by that first journey, the ride rolls on and Save Your Legs! has become my first feature.

The friendships forged and memories made through those halcyon days have magnified and become myth, feeding the fantasy now being played out on big screens from Melbourne to Mumbai.

I feel incredibly fortunate to have been in the right place at the right time and to have shared this adventure with so many amazing people. And I'm privileged to share with you this tall tale, told large. Save Your Legs! is a film for anyone who has ever had a dream.
A film for anyone who's ever been afraid of growing up.
Or a film for anyone who's ever had a dream about being afraid of growing up.
Enjoy.
-Boyd Hicklin

Production Notes

The Save Your Legs! Journey: From The Suburbs To The Subcontinent

First Innings: From Abbotsford to India

Save Your Legs! began life as a documentary about the Melbourne cricket team, the Abbotsford Anglers who toured India in 2001.

"Expanding a documentary into a feature film is a delicate process," said Boyd Hicklin. "It's a balancing act between being respectful to the original material, but also ensuring that the feature narrative is as dynamic and 'bold' as possible. In our case, we've used the documentary as a starting point and enhanced the drama and comedy of the situations, whilst hopefully staying true to the heart and soul of the original tour. And it was great to have the documentary to fall back on, as a rationale for how weird and wonderful things can occur so organically and magnificently in India."

"I was completely engaged by the idea of a group of men, unified by a sport that they, like myself, loved, but were not particularly good at," Boyd Hicklin said. "I could just see that it had the makings of a terrific and funny film."

But the idea didn't really progress until 2007 when producer Nick Batzias and actor/writer Brendan Cowell both attended the Sundance Film Festival in Utah.

"I was in Sundance for a movie called Noise," recalled Brendan Cowell, who was joking around and playing a few cricket shots. Nick Batzias, who distributed Noise, watched Brendan Cowell's form closely.

"We hung-out together that week," Brendan Cowell said, "listening to the Ashes back at his place on his computer, and I guess we started a bit of a 'bromance', Nick Batzia and I. He sent me a copy of the documentary Save your Legs! and I wrote back, saying, 'Mate, fabulous to meet you, love the documentary; you guys should turn it into a big, bad, blokey, comedy feature film.' Nick Batzias' response was, 'Funny you should mention that; we're thinking the same thing…and maybe you could write it!'. "So I went to Melbourne and met Boyd Hicklin - who lives next door to Nick Batzia in a weird sitcom of their own - and after four years of working on it, we developed a story which is essentially about men in their mid-thirties and the way their lives start to change at that age."

"You wake-up at thirty-five," continued Brendan Cowell, "and look at your friends and go, "how the f**k did you come to be my best mate? Who are you? What do we have in common?' But how do men break-up? We're not like the characters in Sex and the City. We can't just chat over Cosmopolitans about how we feel; we're different creatures. My mates are starting to say to me, 'You know, Brendan Cowell, I'd actually prefer to be with my kids, watching DVDs, having a cuddle and going to bed, then spending my Friday nights drinking beers with you.' That's nothing against me, it's just that guys' priorities shift, and this movie explores that."

With their script nearing the final stages of development, Nick Batzias approached independent producer, Robyn Kershaw. A one-woman dynamo with feature credits including Looking for Alibrandi, Bran Nue Dae and through her work at ABCTV, the hit TV series Kath & Kim. Robyn Kershaw and Nick Batzias had known each other for several years, through their respective roles as Producer and Distributor.

"I was quite touched that Nick Batzia invited me to join the team and work on Save Your Legs! - it was the confluence of my father's great passion for cricket and sharing my little known tertiary studies in "Drama, Ritual and Magic of SE Asia" which focused on the Raslila - Indian texts and dances of Brindavan".

"Although we hadn't worked together," said Nick Batzias, "I had always been impressed by Robyn Kershaw's strong vision, willingness to tackle cross-cultural material, her clear understanding of the balance between heart and humour, and of course, her commercial sensibilities. She was the ideal producing partner; someone with the right approach and experience, to not only help realise our vision, but assist in taking it to the next level. Initially, we spoke about the project in early 2009, and continued our discussions, on a more formal basis, later that year. By 2010, we were a tightly knit team on the path to making a major motion picture!"

Second Innings: The Story

A road-trip with a big heart, Save Your Legs! is a tale of adventure, mateship and coming-of-middle-age. It highlights the story of Edward 'Teddy' Brown, an average guy in his mid-30s, whose existence revolves around his mates and The Abbotsford Anglers, a suburban D-Grade cricket club.

Ted is a traditionalist; loyal, honest and caring. But unlike his two best mates, Rick and Stav, there's little more in his life than cricket and their friendship, which has always been bound up in their shared love of the sport.

"As his buddies become older and move on with their lives," observed Boyd Hicklin, "Ted realises that his dream of playing for Australia is just that - a dream - which is fading, along with his precious mates and club."

When we first meet Ted, Stav and Rick, they've all been members of The Abbotsford Anglers for 20 years. And Ted has spent 14 of them working at a local cricket centre, run by his boss Sanjeet (Darshan V. Jariwalla), a former professional cricket player.

Stav, played by Damon Gameau, is a confident, successful and larger-than-life character. He has a showcase home and an aspirational wife. She thinks Stav should concentrate on more important things than his small-time cricket club and annoying friends like Ted, who lives on a semi-permanent basis in their garage.

Rick is the wild man of the team. The one who was never going to get married and has always regarded life as one big party. But times change, and Rick, portrayed by Brendan Cowell, has fallen in love with a backpacker, whom he's planning to wed . . . before their baby arrives. If Stav's take on life was the coffin for the Anglers, then Rick's news is a set of shiny nails.

Ted sees life as he knows it slipping away. So he conjures a plan to take his best mates, along with the rest of The Abbotsford Anglers, on a once-in-a-lifetime trip to India to play cricket against the locals. For Ted, it's a do or die scenario; a last ditch attempt to keep together the things he holds sacred. But Stav sees the trip as a chance to share his 'personal legend' on a bigger stage, and Rick sees it as an extended buck's party.

"We wanted the film to explore the themes of 'mateship' and the changing relations of men as they grow older," explained Boyd Hicklin. "Save Your Legs! is about men learning to appreciate the friendships we have as we mature, and how as individuals we have to adapt to the changing nature of our priorities having wives, being fathers and having a family. It's also about chasing dreams . . . taking a shot at something, despite being terrified of the unknown. It's about adventure and the way people from different worlds can connect through sport, transcending cultural differences. Ted hangs onto the dream of wishing he could play for Australia and his naivety is in thinking that all of his mates still share his dreams. The situations our team find themselves in are surprising and often quite odd, but totally plausible. Mostly, it's a subtle blend of farcical comedy and heart, as everything that can go wrong, does - and in a uniquely Indian way."

Nick Batzias adds that "at its heart, Save Your Legs! is a story about three long-time friends and the 'coming of age' of our central character. Teddy Brown. However, on face value, you have a rollicking tale of three mates who take their D-Grade suburban cricket team on a tour of India, and through the laughs and challenges of the adventure, learn a lot about themselves and each other. Oh . . .and there is dancing."

With an upcoming international shoot that promised more than its usual share of obstacles - assembling the right cast and crew was crucial.

"When I first met Boyd Hicklin," recalled Robyn Kershaw, "I was struck by his insights into the heart of these characters - men he knew - I felt like I had been given a look into the secret world of men…their thoughts about women, about children, about each other. This was in spite of me having a father a brother and being married to a man! I made very specific suggestions about delivering the script and with whom I thought would be effective in delivering the story - casting is like creating an exquisite mosaic; each piece has to fit perfectly. In our instance, we also had the complication of not just getting the story right, but the added challenge of being on tour in a foreign environment for a lengthy period of time. Therefore, we spent some time looking for people - actors and crew and the right production company in India - whom we felt would be able to cope with our conditions and circumstances."

Renowned Australian actor Stephen Curry was cast in the pivotal role of Teddy Brown.

"Stephen's 'Ted' is a beautiful everyman," enthuses Boyd Hicklin. "He's charming, unaffected and boyish, with an enthusiasm for the simple things in life that is infectious. Stephen Curry shares Ted's unbridled passion for the game, for India and his mates and it shines through on screen." Remarks Nick Batzias, "It also helped that aside from being a fantastic actor with great comic timing, he is a cricket tragic who immediately got what we were trying to achieve . . .!"

For his part, Stephen Curry was delighted to be involved.

"The script was very funny which is essential for comedy, because surprisingly, you read many scripts that aren't. The dialogue was snappy and the characters were really recognisable and likeable. The friendship between Ted and his mates was also very reminiscent of pretty much every experience that I've had in the last decade. The 'Peter Pan Complex' is pretty rife in this society and in some ways it's almost celebrated. And I guess that Save Your Legs!, if you will excuse the term, is about the 'coming of middle-age', which so many people, nowadays, try to delay by several years. It's very reminiscent - almost painfully reminiscent - of many experiences that I've had."

Up to this point in his life, Ted's love affair with cricket has pretty much excluded any other sort of romantic entanglement. But this changes when he arrives in India and encounters Anjali, his boss Sanjeet's stunning and sophisticated daughter.

Anjali's role is twofold: she represents a possible future for Ted, if only he can break free of his cricket cocoon, and she also reflects the face of India. Beautiful, educated and intelligent, Anjali is a contemporary smart career woman who embraces Western culture, whilst still respecting the many traditions and values of a traditional Indian/Hindi upbringing.

"This balance of taking on the new, whilst respecting and keeping the best of the old," said Robyn Kershaw, "not only mirrors India, but is also a metaphor for Ted and his journey. And clever Anjali sees the potential of the man in Ted, but is aware that until he acts upon it, they have no future."

Pallavi Sharda, a classically trained dancer, who is emerging as one of Bollywood's brightest new talents, portrays Anjali. Pallavi Sharda auditioned for the role in Mumbai and was cast immediately.

"We were aware of Pallavi Sharda's work through friends," recalled Nick Batzias, "but after seeing her audition in 2011, it was obvious that she had to play Anjali. She was just perfect for the role. And having been raised in Australia, she totally got the sensibility of the men we wanted to have portrayed on screen."

Leading Indian actors Darshan V. Jariwalla (Gandhi My Father) and Sid Makkar (The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel) also feature in key supporting roles. And in the early part of the film, cricket legend Sir Richard Hadlee makes his debut feature film appearance in a cameo as a local umpire.

Stumps: The Abbotsford Anglers Return to India

Following a one-week shoot in Melbourne during December 2011, the film's cast and key crew travelled to India in January 2012 for the bulk of filming. Shoots took place in Varanasi, Kolkata (Calcutta) and Mumbai (Bombay) over a five-week period.

In India, the Save Your Legs! crew collaborated with the team at India Take One Productions (ITOP), the company behind Indian shoots for productions such as Mission Impossible 4, Eat Pray Love, Slumdog Millionaire, Life of Pi and The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.

"The Indian cast and crew were astounding, fabulous to work with," Boyd Hicklin said. "As a first-time director, I needed help and guidance through the madness and they were always on the same team, working for a great end result. There were some cultural communication and aesthetic differences and you could never quite predict where the next curve ball was coming from. But the actors and crew were A-Grade Professionals, in particular my first AD, Ananya Rane, who was a superstar."

With a cast and crew of enthusiastic, amateur cricketers, there was never any shortage of cricket knowledge on-set to ensure authenticity.

"The cricket scenes were shot as naturalistically as possible, so that the audience gets a sense of what it feels like to be out there on the pitch, playing park cricket," said Boyd Hicklin. "Everything was captured in-camera so that the Anglers' abilities have been allowed to be as raw and honest as any D-Grade park team should be. It's not so much about skill, it's about passion, and passion for cricket comes from an understanding of the absurd and a shared sense of humour. What other game encourages men to dress in white slacks and stand around in the sun for hours on end? It's also about heroes, as cricket provides a fabulous stage for them. Cricket is a great vehicle for establishing a hero . . . one man with a bat versus 11 opponents baying for blood, the eyes of the crowd and the world watching . . ."

And did Stephen Curry, as Teddy Brown, undertake rigorous cricket training for his role? Apparently not.

"In the film, I portray a D-Grade cricketer," said Stephen Curry, "and in real life, I'm just below D-Grade - I'd say probably E-Grade. I've never risked being graded, but I daresay I'd probably just scrape into an E-Grade team. So I did have to learn how to have a straight bat because Ted Brown is infamous for never playing a shot outside of the 'Geoff Boycott' style of forward defensive; that 'getting your eye in' kind of shot. So, yes, I guess a long answer to that short question is, 'no', it came naturally to me. I'm crap at cricket!"

Unilke Damon Gameau who also adds to his significant and substantial vocabulary as a dramatic actor by giving a great comic turn as Stav - Stav-ishnu, Stav-alicious and on occasion the battered Stav. During an earlier visit to India remembers 'We travelled from the Kumbh Mela in Haridwar to Chennai by bus and train before finally hopping into a cab to make it to the MA Chidambaram stadium where India was playing Australia. A buddy and I were the only Australians in the stands. With India losing, we ended up being the sole duo among thousands, cheering the winners hoarse."

Producer, Robyn Kershaw - probably the only key member of the team who was not a self-professed cricket expert - was keen to ensure that Save Your Legs! would have broad appeal. "I don't get to games," she admitted, "So I was very much the voice saying, 'Let's make certain you don't have to be a cricket aficionado in order to appreciate the games in the film.'"

Said Nick Batzias, "With cricket, we also get to build a wonderful bridge between two very different cultures in Australia and India. As any Australian who has been to India would know, as soon as you mention cricket, you have immediate rapport - whether you are talking with a Bollywood star, a maharaja, a farmer or a child."

Stylistically speaking, the filmmakers decided that they needed to strongly delineate between Ted's home-city of Melbourne and the exoticism of India. Melbourne was shot so that it appeared green and lush, with a simplicity that evoked the style of an English village, providing a stark contrast to the vibrant maelstrom that is India.

They were also keen to differentiate between the three cities that form the backdrop for the Angler's Indian adventure.

"To help the audience distinguish between Varanasi, Kolkata and Mumbai we applied different colour palettes to each," said Production Designer, Paddy Reardon. "It was also a good design solution for the 'madness' of the colour palette that's awash throughout India. Varanasi, with its predominance of red, orange and yellow tones, was an easy choice, and after surveying Kolkata, we decided to concentrate on rich greens, whereas Mumbai was depicted with modern blue tones. Our Director of Photography, Mark Wareham, also adopted this theme by using a primary lighting palette for the majority of locations."

Mark Wareham ensured the selected cricket pitches also had personality at each of the matches. "When we shot the cricket scenes, we were sometimes managing environmental issues like fog and wedding tents on the cricket pitch, actor illness and of course time is always the enemy. Boyd Hicklin had a specific perspective on how he wanted to shoot the matches so that in Kolkata (park match) we chose to shoot the scenes (observational) in more landscape framing - to accentuate the vastness of the maidan. In Varanasi we wanted to highlight the bleachers that emphasized the ghats in Varanasi (campus style grounds). And in Mumbai we had a night game which gave a stadium feel to the game - just like a Twenty20 Game." He said "So with the shooting style we went in closer and wider. We wanted flaring of the lights, with the bright oval against the dark sky."

And of course the comedy was paramount throughout and "Boyd Hicklin talked a lot about the camaraderie of The Hangover as a shot style - that the characters were seen in groups and he wanted this to be in juxtaposition with graphics and animation. We both wanted to have a slightly heightened level of honesty in the portrayal of India and Melbourne."

Mark Wareham had his own bromance with Paddy Reardon - a long-time collaborator "I couldn't have done the film without him - he really thinks through the pressure of a tight schedule and he is a seasoned overseas production designer. He is mega experienced and I have great short-hand with him."

From the birth of The Abbotsford Anglers in 1999, followed by the 2001 tour of India that formed the basis the 2005 documentary, bringing Save Your Legs! to the big screen was an incredible undertaking for all involved.

"Brendan Cowell, Nick Batzias and myself," said Boyd Hicklin, "were privileged to embark on this massive adventure together, which started with a chat in a pub in Windsor (Melbourne) and ended with a shoot on a rooftop in Mumbai. In between, we had writing trips, seminars, net sessions and workshops where we shared stories and ideas, created characters together and built the narrative that you see on screen.

"If you're going to change," added Brendan Cowell, "you're going to change in India because it's a pressure cooker. It's a wonderful, colourful and sensorial place, but it's also intense and it throws everything at you. I mean, when you go away with a group of people, you learn about them - even if you just go to the beach for a weekend. But if you travel to India with people, you see right to the end of their soul."

Boyd Hicklin adds, "Save Your Legs! is a comedy, but it's not a set 'em up and knock 'em down with a punch line comedy. It's an adventure, but it's not a travelogue. It's a film that features sport and a little bit of romance. It really is, for me, entertainment. Wherever people with an open mind and a bit of that spirit of fun and adventure can fit it into their lives, I'd like to think that they can see a bit of themselves or their own lives transformed into this whacky and great adventure that is India."