June 28, 2016 — 11.04am.
The Letdown: Season 2 (Trailer) The Letdown (Trailer) Episodes The Letdown. "You know the type: mummy blog pieces about the "crazy" things kids say, the hilarity of spending all day in your pyjamas with a sick toddler, and the zany op-eds accompanied by a stock photo of a mum juggling a baby and a laptop. Australian actor Alison Bell was eight months’ pregnant with her first child when the ABC rang to deliver the news. ""It'll be nuts – the touring part, I mean – but fun." As season two of her parenting comedy premieres, Bell says the scene she’s proudest of is the show’s darkest – and its funniestThen the baby arrives. Instead it pushed the door “ajar” to opportunities in the United States; Bell says she has been recognised in playgrounds in Los Angeles, where she has since relocated her family.It’s not just her life that has changed drastically since conceiving the series, but the cultural conversation around motherhood as well. But I love the freedom and the risk that involves and you don't have that screen; you can do another take and that's a great luxury but it has so many other filters … you know, a lot can happen in the edit. But now I think we've got heaps of funny women leading the charge, playing different women. The joyful yet difficult, confronting, confusing in-between was rarely acknowledged.”Scheller’s husband Trent O’Donnell was the obvious choice as the director. Alison Bell as Audrey in Australian television comedy series The Letdown. "And it's also often just the way the work comes in. It neatly straddles the divide between wildly funny and poignant. "It's a boring thespian question, but which medium does she prefer? "But she's best known to TV viewers for her starring role in the 2011 ABC series And earlier this year Bell made her comedy writing debut with the pilot Co-written with actor and writer Sarah Scheller and starring Bell as the lead, The pair began writing the series several years ago, "even though I wasn't a breeder", says Bell.We've met for lunch at Lawyers, Guns and Money in the city, the newish restaurant from chef Victor Liong of Collingwood's modern Chinese eatery Lee Ho Fook (both restaurants are named for Warren Zevon songs).Predominantly a congee joint, it's open for breakfast and lunch, although once we peruse the menu, we realise too late it's probably more of a brekky venue. And it must be one of the few Melbourne restaurants where staff don't ask you if you know how the menu works – which would have been helpful as Bell and I clearly didn't.That's how we ended up eating side dishes – the duck livers and Chinese donut (so many livers) and the green beans topped with shaved salted, cured egg yolk – as "entrees".Bell sensibly orders the crab and barramundi congee with shiitake mushrooms and crispy wonton skins for a main; I have the (extremely) spicy mapo tofu and rice. Her daughter, Stevie, might be turning 1, but Audrey isn’t finding motherhood any easier to contend with in the second season of It’s not just child-rearing that is stressing her out – husband Jeremy (Duncan Fellows) is working in Adelaide, her mothers’ group friends still make her feel inadequate and there’s the small matter of that pregnancy test result from the final moments of Season 1. Australian Alison Bell is the co-creator and star (as frequently frazzled new mum Audrey) of The Letdown, an ABC/Netflix TV comedy which has hit a cultural nerve by showing the sometimes dark but frequently humorous reality of new parenthood.. Kim will ask her about the challenges of getting TV executives to greenlight a "mom-com", and the practical reality of on-set baby wrangling. As Australians I think we do that culturally a lot – trying to find the funny side of the darkest, darkest moments. By Kylie Northover.
Ultimately, I’m very proud that the stories of these women are in the hands of us: two female writers.“The story seemed to resonate strongly with so many women – those with and without children, and I knew (as did the ABC) that we had more stories to tell.