The female contingent of Nothing Trivial - the upcoming Kiwi dramedy about life's big and little questions - chat to Barney McDonald.
Television shows have an eerie tendency to reduce human personalities to a line or two of characteristics, with writers, directors and actors developing roles around a couple of key traits and a flimsy back-story.
Witness this description of the three female leads in upcoming Kiwi show Nothing Trivial:
"Catherine
is a busy professional, solo mother and, as it turns out, still holding out for that one big love; Michelle is in the midst of an ugly separation and above all wants revenge; Emma has an uncanny ability to pick losers and shysters, though all she wants is a father for her children."
On the face of it, not very compelling, though in all fairness the descriptions are plucked from a brief press release about Nothing Trivial, which trails the fortunes of five friends who get together at pub quiz each week to check up on each other.
But in the hands of talented TV writers Rachel Lang and Gavin Strawhan, who penned hits Outrageous Fortune, Go Girls and The Almighty Johnsons, anything is possible. And with actresses Tandi Wright, Nicole Whippy and Debbie Newby-Ward playing the three women, the possibilities are endless.
Interviewing Wright, Whippy and Newby-Ward is a little like being in a scene from the show. The conversation veers between the disposable and the earnest.
The women struggle to be serious because they clearly enjoy each other's company. Laughter erupts often. Weighty questions are greeted with thoughtful silence before Wright, who unintentionally dominates the session, gets the ball rolling each time with an intelligent, insightful observation that elicits grateful approval from her comrades.
"I love Catherine; I wish I was more like her," begins Wright, in one of her eloquent moments. "She's really smart, with a dry sense of humour. She's quite reserved but warm and she actually has really good self-esteem. She doesn't need other people's approval, so she's quite happy to sit back and watch, then she'll suddenly be disarmingly direct about something. There's an economy in that. And she's got great fashion sense."
Clearly there's more to these characters than meets the eye, especially since they spend much of their time interacting with Mac, "divorced father of two, still holding a candle for his ex", and Brian, "a commitment-phobe with a troubled past".
The guys are played by Shane Cortese and Blair Strang, of Outrageous Fortune and Shortland Street fame. Outnumbered by the women, their characters seem to bear the brunt of female hysteria, at least in the first episode, screening on TV One on July 20.
"All the cast was challenged by these roles for one reason or another," says director Mark Beesley.
"Part of the challenge was playing characters of such similar age and background as themselves because that leaves an actor nowhere to hide. The issues the characters are dealing with can become a little close to home.
"Another challenge for the ensemble was stepping into lead roles after playing support for many years in other shows," he continues. "There's a natural fear of being terrible and blowing the opportunity: 'Am I pretty enough, funny enough, subtle enough, good enough? Do they really want me? Why didn't they get Robyn Malcolm for this'?"
Lang, who has worked with all of Nothing Trivial's leads over the years, gives her seal of approval of the cast, which is just as well since she was closely involved in the casting.
"The thing that's nice is the actors seem to really like the characters and enjoy the script," she says. "I'm really loving everyone's work so far. It's been really fun."
Lang is convinced audiences will be pleasantly surprised by the performances of these well-known actresses, who pop up with disarming regularity in local shows and, in Newby-Ward's case, throughout an on-going series of insurance commercials.
"For those who know Outrageous Fortune well, Nicole will be quite a surprise because Michelle is very different from Kasey," she insists.
"I think Tandi's great as well. She was in This Is Not My Life and Outrageous Fortune, playing two completely different people, and Catherine is different again. Debbie has been in quite a few of the things I've done but only smallish parts.
"So it was particularly exciting to watch her audition and go, 'Yes, this is the perfect part for her', because I know she's really good."
With shooting wrapped on season one's 13, one-hour episodes, Wright, Whippy and Newby-Ward are now facing the inevitable reality of waiting for work to find them again.
Wright and Whippy are mothers, so they constantly have their hands full, but all three are mindful of the vagaries of acting careers in this country.
"The joy of being an actor in New Zealand is you're allowed to play across the genres," says Wright.
"If you want a career of some longevity you have to. I don't think every actor can do it but we've all been cast on Nothing Trivial, the guys included, because we can move from quite serious material to light, bright material. And that's the nature of the show."
Lang agrees: "Acting in New Zealand is particularly hard yakka, and even if you get a role you're still going to be unemployed for much of the year. I mean, it's not Hollywood."
Nothing Trivial notwithstanding, what have been the women's favourite roles to date?
Newby-Ward: "Oh gosh, I'd say Trina in Outrageous Fortune. It was pretty outrageous. And I got to smash a car window with a crow bar, so that was fun. I had to smash it for a good half hour before I actually broke it. But I got there. I had a bit of physio on my hand afterwards, as you do."
Wright: "That's a really hard question because I love different roles for different reasons. I guess one that's still really close to my heart is Julie-Anne Bryson in Out Of The Blue [about the Aramoana massacre], because of the nature of the material. I felt the gravity of the situation and we wanted to do that story justice."
Whippy: "I'm the same as Tandi. Every role for different reasons stands out for me. I've liked pretty much all of them. Kasey from Outrageous, obviously. Getting to kiss Tammy Davis! And, definitely Michelle on Nothing Trivial is a career highlight."
Nothing Trivial débuts on TV One, Wednesday July 20 at 8.30pm.
