Meet detective Larry Hard… and web TV.
“May my father’s erection be straight, hard and strong. And may my mother’s vagina possess a tight wetness.”
And thus Detective Larry Hard announced his arrival to an unsuspecting internet in the debut webisode of Cop Hard. It’s safe to say anyone who’d been hoping for more of the same from Jonathan auf der Heide and Oscar Redding, makers of 2009’s metaphysical colonial cannibal drama Van Diemen’s Land, had their expectations pinned to the pavement and stomped into soup in that instant. Which is precisely why the pair of Melburnians agreed to produce Cop Hard in the first place.
The web series is the brainchild of Texan footballer-cum-filmmaker Charles C. Custer, who approached the duo with the idea for Cop Hard while they were promoting Van Diemen’s Land on the foreign festival circuit in 2009. Impressed by their film and, more importantly, their obvious ability to wring quality work from a shoestring budget, Custer agreed to relocate to Melbourne for the duration of Cop Hard’s production, on the condition that American accents be used by its all-local cast. The result is what one Twitter punter called a “new cop web tv series shot through an 80’s [sic] porn-tinted lens.” Can’t argue with that.
I met with auf der Heide and Redding to get the low-down on their latest low-budget endeavour. Here, in their words, are ten things Beat readers need to know to get up to snuff with Cop Hard.
1. IT’S WEB TV: “We’re heading into a world where web is now becoming television,” tells Redding. “There’s a generation of people [who are] watching just web. No-one really knows how to cope with this yet, and I don’t think the audience does either. They’re probably just going to find it a year after the thing has been made and come out. It seems the technology is moving much faster than anyone can keep up with.”
2. FAIR COP: “There’s something unapologetically democratic about the idea of the web,” says Redding when quizzed on the appeal of online distribution. “It’s going to be as cruel and as nice as it’s going to be to you.”
3. IT’S REALLY WEB TV: “There’s a target audience who want to see kids get shot in the head, who want to see everyone pashing and shagging each other, want to see a bit of dick, want to see a bit of nudity. So that’s kind of why we made it. It’s something they can’t get on the networks,” auf der Heide explains.
4. SPEAKING OF DICK…: “It’s an amazing thing that they might pull it,” Redding grins re. the small matter of slipping Episode 2’s unclothed cock past the YouTube police. “Because it’s so inoffensive. It doesn’t do anything. It’s like a static image. If you were in highschool they would show you that picture: ‘That’s what a dick looks like.’” Auf der Heide agrees. “The way it’s presented is like [Michelangelo’s] David. It’s a statue. It’s not there flopping around or about to jump into bed with someone. There’s nothing sexy about it.”
5. GIVING AUSSIE AUDS WHAT THEY WANT: “It’s hard to convince [Australians] to go and see Australian films,” sighs auf der Heide. “There’s always this thing where people go ‘Australian films are shithouse,’” offers Redding. “And if you say to them ‘Yeah, like Animal Kingdom?’ they’ll go, ‘Oh, no, that’s great.’ And if you go, ‘And I suppose The Piano’s pretty shit?’ they’ll go, ‘Oh, no, that’s pretty good too.’ If you give them a list and make them actually think about it, there have been some fuckin’ corkers!” But in Custer’s insistence on American accents, they saw an opportunity to meet their home audience midway. “I suppose that’s where the attraction came: that he was bringing the Americanism that we’ve always wanted to [explore],” Redding explains. “And that’s clearly what Australian audiences want!”
6. IT’S AS LONG AS IT NEEDS TO BE: “There are fifteen episodes for no other reason than fifteen good episodes [were written]. There’s nothing thought-out about it,” Redding explains. “It’s pretty chaotic, just like the show itself.”
7. BIG BANG: “We did nine episodes in six days and then spent nine days doing six,” Redding tells. So does that mean we can expect a big finale? “There is!,” auf der Heide enthuses. “It was the most expensive thing. It’s gotta go out with a bang!”
8. SO WHO’S CHARLES C.?: Redding sums up his director: “The love that he has for Mike Tyson’s poetry is second to none.”
9. REALLY THOUGH: “Meeting him, we thought ‘This is going to be our in [to the US].’,” Redding explains. “He’s very convincing,” says auf der Heide. “Very, very convincing. He’s a man that you can’t really say no to.” “The crew and actors loved working with him,” Redding continues. “He just didn’t like us much,” deadpans auf der Heide.
10. SO WHY MAKE COP HARD?: “This is just fun,” says Redding. “This is just stupid fun. And it’s about making people laugh and smile for three minutes of their day and just moving on. That’s kind of a cool thing.”
Watch Cop Hard at CopHard.tv . New webisodes are posted on Fridays.