{"id":628,"date":"2009-09-22T16:15:14","date_gmt":"2009-09-22T06:15:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sandralee.com.au\/?p=628"},"modified":"2009-09-23T00:26:49","modified_gmt":"2009-09-22T14:26:49","slug":"aden-young-stars-in-maos-last-dancer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/2009\/09\/aden-young-stars-in-maos-last-dancer\/","title":{"rendered":"Aden Young stars in Mao’s Last Dancer"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Aden<\/a>

Aden Young, one of the stars of Bruce Beresford's new epic, Mao's Last Dancer. Picture by Marco del Grande @ The Sydney Morning Herald<\/p><\/div>\n

The incredibly talented Aden Young<\/strong>, one of this country\u2019s most under-utilised and under-rated actors, was on the red carpet last night at the Australian premiere of Mao\u2019s Last Dancer<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n

The 37-year-old Canadian-born Sydney transplant has a small but strong role in the Bruce Beresford epic based on the best-selling autobiography of the same name by Chinese ballet dancer Li Cunxin<\/a><\/strong>, who defected to the United States in 1981, and is played by another incredible dancer Chi Cao<\/strong> in the film.<\/p>\n

Young was worried that his characterisation of the Texan oil tycoon Dilworth \u2013 who helped Cunxin defect – was \u201ctoo big\u201d.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s not. Young recently told me it was the first time he had played a real life character in his two-decade long career that includes 30 films not to mention work behind-the-scenes.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe great bonus of being involved in something like this is being face to face with Li and meeting him and being able to, I guess, come face to face with somebody of such exquisite talent,\u201d Young told me.<\/p>\n

I met Young at the 1991 Toronto Film Festival<\/a><\/em><\/strong> <\/a>when he made his feature film debut in another Beresford epic, Black Robe<\/a><\/strong><\/em>. Back then, Young was touted as \u201cthe next big thing\u201d but he determinedly took a low-key route and by-passed Hollywood where he was dubbed \u201cDr No\u201d because he turned down roles that didn\u2019t appeal to him.<\/p>\n

He admitted the decision had taken a financial toll.<\/p>\n

But after his partner of seven-year, Loene Carmen<\/strong>, fell pregnant with their son Dutch <\/strong>\u2013 who is now almost three years old – he threw himself back into the picture, so to speak.<\/p>\n

Mao\u2019s Last Dancer <\/em>– which I loved \u00a0–\u00a0is the third film in which he has teamed up with Beresford.\"Mao's<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWhat I like about him [Beresford] is that his irreverence to the craft is married to such a wealth of cinematic language. He knows what he wants and allows you to find it. I am always quite amazed,\u201d Young says of working on the $25 million film<\/a> with the director. \u201cHe [says] essentially \u2018what would you do?\u2019 and you might suggest a particular range of objectives and actions and he\u2019ll say, \u2018can it fit within this physical structure?\u2019 and away you go.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s not an extraordinary lot of discussion, at least there wasn\u2019t from my point of view. Whereas with other directors you really nut [the role] down to every single word and syllable. What I love about acting is how every single project is completely different. You meet a first time director who is absolutely assured it\u2019s going to work this way, whereas you\u2019ve worked in five different processes where it\u2019s never worked that way and then you\u2019re amazed that it does work that way because he\u2019s coming at it from a different perspective.\u201d<\/p>\n

Young is about to embark on another Australian-made film, Beneath Hill 60<\/a><\/em><\/strong> and has just finished working with Charlotte Gainsborough<\/strong> in Queensland on a film helmed by Julie Bertucelli<\/strong> (Since Otar Left<\/em>).<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Stars<\/a>

Stars of Mao's Last Dancer Chi Cao and Amanda Schull at Australian premiere in Sydney. Picture by Gay Gerard\/Getty Images AsiaPac<\/p><\/div>\n

Also at the premiere were fellow actors Jack Thompson <\/strong>(who also has a small role as a judge in the film), Michael Caton<\/strong> (The Castle<\/em>), and a chorus line of ballet stars including the debonair artistic director of the Australian Ballet<\/strong><\/em> David McAllister<\/a><\/strong> and Graham Murphy<\/strong>. Sarah Murdoch<\/strong> was a towering presence, The Today<\/a><\/strong><\/em> show co-host\u00a0Karl Stefanovic <\/strong>worked the mezzanine with aplomb, Ros Packer<\/strong> was spied chatting to friends, and John and Caroline Laws<\/strong> held court. Other guests included magazine maven and Australian Women’s Weekly <\/strong><\/em>heavyweight\u00a0Deborah Thomas <\/strong>and her husband, Vitek, former sports reporter Mary-Anne Dibbs <\/strong>(who now looks after media and communications for the luxury resort Pinctada at Cable Beach<\/a> in Western Australia), Sydney businesswoman Glenn-Marie Frost<\/strong>, and Jane Fraser<\/strong>, one of the smartest columnists at The Australian<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The incredibly talented Aden Young, one of this country\u2019s most under-utilised and under-rated actors, was on the red carpet last night at the Australian premiere of Mao\u2019s Last Dancer. The 37-year-old Canadian-born Sydney transplant has a small but strong role in the Bruce Beresford epic based on the best-selling autobiography of the same name by […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,14,18,10,3,6,7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-628","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-celebrity","category-film","category-finance","category-pop-culture","category-reviews","category-society"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=628"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":643,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/628\/revisions\/643"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=628"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=628"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sandralee.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=628"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}