TALKING EDEN FALK by Kat Gillespie I chat to Eden Falk on the second day of rehearsals for Death of A Salesman, his first Black Swan production. This is a homecoming for the Sydney based and Perth trained actor, who graduated from WAAPA in 2003 and left the state soon after. I can’t help but ask how things in Perth have changed since then, and he obligingly reminisces about his old favourite local hangouts (“I used to love going to the Hydey on a Saturday night, but that’s all over now”). Soon we’ve veered off topic to talk about Perth’s music scene. Falk expresses his excitement about the In the Pines line-up – “every band playing is one of my favourite Perth acts.” The days of the Hyde Park hotel being the only Saturday night option are clearly over, and Eden is already down with newer Perth venues like the Bird. “It’s becoming very Melbourne here,” he observes. “It’s like as soon as I left, Perth suddenly became cool.” Leaving Perth for those mythical Eastern States was once seen as a necessity for local actors aspiring to longterm careers in theatre or film. Indeed “there was a mindset…that you were trained here and then you’d go out. I hated that it was like this, but for me, if I wanted to continually work, I needed to go. I don’t think you could have sustained a career back to back as an actor in Perth.” Nowadays, young drama graduates have even higher ambitions. “The big thing now isn’t to move to Sydney, but to move to LA. That was never a thing that was ever on the cards for me or anyone I knew at the time I graduated. It’s just another world.” Yet now there is perhaps also an option to stay put or even return home. Eden acknowledges that “now people are staying here, making work here. And there’s a lot of good work being developed. It’s becoming more of a hothouse.” Although there are as many theatre opportunities around Australia as ever, a career in acting is still a game of survival. The only way to survive is to continually evolve and look for new creative opportunities. Falk has first hand experience in this. After spending three years at the Sydney Theatre company, he suddenly experienced the “shock” of a lull in acting jobs. As he found himself on hiatus, he discovered that “there comes a point where you have to make your own work. I applied for a grant and went to work with a European theatre company, and ended up touring around the UK…I loved
it. Partly because I had generated the work myself, it was really special.” Although the only reason Falk originally felt the need to look for new types of work was to stay in the game and “keep afloat”, he clearly thrives upon seeking out new avenues for creative expression. As well as acting, he is assistant directing on Death of a Salesman and has also “got short films in the works, directing work, trying to crossover… I keep coming up with more ideas.” He has also dabbled in music, playing in a band and having his own radio show. “You’ve got to keep creating,” he explains.
It’s becoming more of a hothouse Theatre is where Falk feels “most comfortable”, and he professes to be a huge Arthur Miller fan. He will play the character of Bernard in Salesman – the successful but humble lawyer whose achievements highlight the inadequacies of Willy Loman and his family. For all Miller’s politics, Falk insists the accessibility and audience enjoyment of this play is derived from the “family drama”. Although this is a play about unachieved American dreams, “people aren’t going to go out into the foyer afterwards and talk about the Global Financial Crisis. They’ll instead be looking at their own lives and relationships. That’s what resonates.” Expect a tragedy – the audience “should be in tears by the end.” But also expect some laughter. “There’s a lot of humour in the play. Some beautiful glimpses of comedy.” Theatre is evidently his first love, but Falk has also sought out work in film and television. He was successful in obtaining the part of Mr McKee in Baz Luhrmann’s upcoming adaptation of Great Gatsby. Fears of his scene ending up on Luhrmann’s notoriously over-crowded cutting room floor aside, Falk clearly enjoyed the experience. He describes the process as an exhaustively steep learning curve for a theatre actor used to having “weeks of rehearsals…weeks of sucking, and simply hoping that by opening night things will fall in place.“ For Salesman there will be weeks of rehearsals, “but for film you’re lucky if you get one. It’s a skill I’m still developing, to nail things quicker.” Working with
Luhrmann was evidently a career highlight. “The auditions were really weird, some of the weirdest I’ve ever done…he has definitely got the passion and the vision. Even from the first read he was jumping out of his chair.” The film also gave opportunity to work with Tobey Maguire and Isla Fischer, as well as Australian Joel Edgerton who is “doing amazing work now.” Falk’s career so far has followed a trajectory that would be envied by any young WAAPA wannabe. His success is clearly a product of both talent and hard work, as well as a knack for seeking out opportunity. A charming interviewee, when I ask him about advice for keen Perth actors he demurely worries that he will “sound like a wanker” in dispensing it. Like his Salesman character, he is reluctant to own his success. Still, I manage to extract something out of him. “Perth is a negative and a positive. It can be a cocoon and can be a hotbed, but you need to remember the rest of the world is there…you can fall into a trap of not exploring. So keep exploring.” Eden Falk will appear in Death of A Salesman from the 8th-19th May, presented by Black Swan State Theatre Company.
Death of a Salesman was based on Miller’s bragging, unravelling salesman uncle Manny, who, like Salesman‘s Willy Loman, killed himself. 30