Friday TV Choice: Austin (BBC1, 9.30pm)
Ben Miller and Sally Phillips star in the new Australian comedy drama Austin, but neither of them plays the title character.
Instead, the role goes to Michael Theo, which is only fitting as he inspired the entire series.
Ben explains: “Darren Ashton, the director, is an old friend of mine. We worked on a film in Australia called Razzle Dazzle in 2007 and we’d been looking for something to do ever since. A few years ago, he was staying with me in the UK, and he showed me [dating show] Love on the Spectrum, which I absolutely loved, and I was completely blown away by Michael Theo in it. I thought he was extraordinary and such a fascinating person in the show and on screen.
“After bingeing the entire series, I asked Darren ‘Do you think Michael could act? I get the feeling he could’ and Darren agreed. We said, ‘Do you think we could try and come up with some kind of show where Michael was the central character?’ and that was the beginning of it.”
The premise Ben and Darren came up with (along with their co-creators Joe Tucker and Lloyd Woolf) involves successful British children’s author Julian Hartswood, who is on a book tour of Australia with his illustrator wife Ingrid (Phillips) when he discovers he’s reposted a tweet from a white supremacist.
The resulting social-media storm threatens to end his career and bring down his empire, so it may seem like a bad time for Austin (Theo), a neurodivergent 20-something, to approach him at a Canberra book signing, claiming to be his son.
Julian certainly thinks so and tries to give him the brush-off, until his agent suggests that going public with a long-lost autistic son may be the way back from cancellation.
However, while it may save his career, it could end his marriage as Ingrid does the maths and realises that Austin was conceived when she and Julian were already dating…
As well as being an actor and comedian (he was the original leading man in Death in Paradise and more recently took the title role in Professor T), Ben is a children’s author himself, but it seems the series was more inspired by his co-star’s life.
He says: “The stories that we have in the show mostly come from Michael’s own experiences. Michael is looking to become independent in the world and that’s kind of really what our first season is about; it’s about Austin moving towards independent living, so that’s been a big journey for Michael as well.”
He hopes that other viewers may also be able to relate to the series: “I don’t know if [Austin] has a message, but it feels very refreshing to watch and that is partly because neurodiversity is underrepresented on camera. It’s really fun to see a neurodivergent character who’s not Sheldon from The Big Bang Theory and who in some ways is the opposite of that character.
He adds: “One of the typical images of autistic people is that they’re not very empathetic and they’re not very good at human connection, but Michael’s special gift is empathy and human connection.”
Can Michael’s on-screen alter ego also use those gifts to help his new family?