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Geoffrey Rush in Starstruck
Title:
Geoffrey Rush in Starstruck
NFSA ID
34987
Year
1982
Courtesy
Palm Beach Pictures
In a blink-and-you'll-miss-it appearance, Geoffrey Rush plays the stage manager during the Sydney Opera House finale of Gillian Armstrong's Starstruck. He even gets to dance with Jackie (Jo Kennedy) as she hijacks the stage during the live national talent contest; look for the man in the blue t-shirt, on the right-hand side of the stage!
In August 2016, Rush visited the NFSA and referred to this role during a Q&A celebrating Shine (1996):
'All I'd done on film was Hoodwink (1981) and Starstruck. In the former I played a cop from the Gold Coast, opposite John Hargreaves and Wendy Hughes. I look like a turkey embryo. And then in Starstruck, I had a role the size of the third rat on the coach in Cinderella. So film was not really where I was heading, so I waited for Shine.'
This clip is from the 2015 NFSA digital restoration of Starstruck.
Director
Gillian Armstrong
Producer
David Elfick
Jackie Mullens
Jo Kennedy
Stage Manager
Geoffrey Rush
The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia acknowledges Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we work and live and gives respect to their Elders both past and present.