KATH & Kim producer and the husband of star Gina Riley, Rick McKenna, appreciated how "openly consultative" his Americans peers were when adapting the hit Australian sitcom.
"On day one, everyone's sitting around wide-eyed, asking Gina, Jane and me questions," McKenna says. "Day two there's more questions about why characters did this or that, but by week three it was 'Rick, have you been to the Napa Valley? It's wonderful -- you should all go there'."
Not that the Kath & Kim trio is complaining. A process that usually ends in disappointment, recriminations and dashed hopes for Australians pitching content to the Hollywood studio system has resulted in something tangible for them. Kath & Kim's American iteration airs for the first time in the US on Thursday before screening -- and being judged -- here on the Seven network on Sunday night.
McKenna says the process could not have gone any better. "From the cast we got and the production team, and the network's support to order 12 episodes -- if that's all they do, so be it, but I've got a feeling it will go longer," he says.
From afar, the adaptation has looked troubled, and there has been much commentary.
On one side of the Pacific, American television is trying to get its head around what looks to be a stylised, very foreign sitcom.
On this side of the Pacific, Australians appear unwilling to share their Fountain Lakes friends. Even worse, we fear this story will end up more Phar Lap than Crocodile Dundee.
Circumstances initially conspired against Kath & Kim before falling their way. Last year's US writers' strike was crucial, in that the NBC network didn't want a quick rush-to-a-pilot episode, hesitated to get it right and then committed to a run. US television doesn't work like that.
Even better, the producer who shepherded Kath & Kim to NBC, Ben Silverman, was soon made the co-chairman of NBC Entertainment and NBC Universal Television Studio on the strength of some of his company Revielle's other successful foreign adaptations, including The Office and Ugly Betty.
"I'd much rather have taken this long road to get where we are, be launching 12 episodes both in the US and in Australia that I didn't personally have to do the 5am (filming) starts," says McKenna.
"If we'd rushed to a pilot, it might still be sitting on the shelf and you'd be asking 'whatever happened to the Kath & Kim pilot'."
Comedy tends to be very parochial. Kath & Kim is that, yet it has dominated Australian ratings whenever screened, regularly topping two million viewers on the ABC and then Seven networks.
Consequently, there is deep interest here in how it fares. Perhaps even jealousy, given the relish with which the first American reviews have been reported here. McKenna says the Australian media reaction to US reports have been "surprising".
"It's like they want you to fail when all we've done is market Gina and Jane's creative skills and works," he says. "If it was the Sarich rotary engine we'd be celebrating it, but for some reason there is that desire to cut it down. It's frustrating but also understandable because the flip side is we've been blessed with such a wonderful experience here that people like to talk about it and there's this disbelief that it can be converted."
At least as McKenna tells it, the conversion has been smooth. Casting took some time until Saturday Night alumni Molly Shannon as Kath was teamed with Selma Blair as Kim. And as the show wasn't showcased in the normal pilot season parade earlier this year, scepticism grew.
Riley, Turner and McKenna were assured throughout though and thrilled when they saw episode four, which the US writers created from scratch. "That's when you know the writers are massive fans because they've nailed it," says McKenna.
Other changes weren't so smooth. The American Kel, or Phil, was first written as owning a sports store. There are few butchers in the US any more, you see -- Americans buy pre-packaged meat from the mall.
"We said we understand his occupation has to change but we want to debate with you what his occupation is," McKenna said. Over months, 'Phil' evolved back to a new age guy who's a foodie running a gourmet sandwich store.
The show's US producer, Michelle Nader, has distanced the US show from the original, noting Turner and Riley didn't write anything emotional. The American mother-daughter pair has a deeper relationship.
The US show has dropped the lower-class accents and concentrated on the foursome of Kath, Kel (Phil), Brett (now Craig) and Kim with a stronger relationship between mother and son-in-law in conspiring against Kim.
Kath also has a day job, a move that initially flummoxed the Aussies. Her hairdressing studio at the back of the house allows more comic characters to drift in and out of premises rather than rely on Sharon (Magda Szubanski). And Kim, described by McKenna as "an amalgam of Britney meets Paris meets Lindsay Lohan", is rougher than the Aussie Kim.Nevertheless, McKenna says the US program-making is not unlike Australia's, except for the host of executives.
"The 30 Rock model of how TV gets made replicates the Australian system," he says. "In truth there's more layers in the US, between Tina Fey and Jack (Alec Baldwin) there's 15 executives all with their point of view and experiences."
And money to spend. They weren't happy with scenes shot in a mall. So they built a new one on the Paramount lot.
"They weren't happy with the sound at the real mall whereas we took that as flavour (in Australia) -- we had no choice!" McKenna laughs.
Whatever happens, Turner, Riley and McKenna are content knowing this version was made for the US market. While that separates them from its performance, they remain on tenterhooks ahead of Thursday's screening.
"From a Kath & Kim brand perspective, scared's not the right word, (it's) apprehensive," McKenna admits.
"But for Gina and Jane as writer/creators, to have your work picked up by an American broadcaster, funded and produced to 12 episodes and the mass marketing campaign they put behind it, it's incredibly flattering and really satisfying.
"Ultimately Gina and Jane have had their work produced by an American network, which for Australian writers is an incredible outcome."
Michael Bodey
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