Greek studs and disco kings artefact Wednesday - Heartbreak Kid mementos

In the old Lakeside social club, there were many memorable framed jerseys, as well as many of less worthwhile calibre. And yet the two frames included in this week's artefact segment were found not on a wall in the social club, but hidden away in a drawer. The two frames are signed mementos from the Australian film The Heartbreak Kid, which starred Alex Dimitriades and Claudia Karvan. The film is fondly remembered by sections of the Greek-Australian community, if for no other reason that it included Dimitriades in the role of a young Greek Australian stud (as opposed to Dimitriades' turn as the hedonist bisexual Ari in Head On, sometimes derisively called 'that poofter film') as well as for its soccer scenes based out of South Melbourne Hellas, which was one of the film's key sub plots.

'Thanks for the use of your soccer field. Claudia Karvan'
'To everyone at Hellas, thanks! Alex. D.'

The Heartbreak Kid was of course not the first bit of Australian film or television to feature South Melbourne Hellas. The still popular sitcom Acropolis Now would occasionally feature references to South Melbourne Hellas and soccer, including a whole episode centred on a Hellas player played by Russell Crowe. West Adelaide Hellas and Adelaide City Juventus also featured briefly in the now long forgotten Garry McDonald film Struck by Lightning.

For those who recall The Heartbreak Kid (and to a much lesser extent its soapy spinoff Heartbreak High) many would be surprised to learn that the film was originally a play set in a Sydney high school, covering much the same territory, albeit in a far more chaste manner. In the play there's desire, but no sex; there are class issues, but they play second fiddle to the puppy love of a student for his teacher. The movie in that sense has a harder edge. Without wanting to wax philosophical (because the film deserves its own thorough analysis) the migrant issues are portrayed in a much more brutal manner, along with the working class aspect as one of the results of moving the film's setting from Sydney (where the main Greek characters were Sydney Olympic fans) to working class inner Melbourne (the film shot at Prahran High), where Dimitriades' character is a talented player whose ambition is to play for South Melbourne Hellas, as well as (notably) Australia.

The film had several soccer scenes, including extensive filming of Middle Park. Sydneysider Dimitrides is a fine actor, but he ain't no soccer player, and thus for those scenes where his character is required to perform some soccer sequences - especially one memorable late night scene after breaking into Middle Park - Con Boutsianis was hired to be the stunt double, which explains the framed photo below.

'To all the players and members of 'Hellas', thanks for all the help and support!
Special thanks to Barry and of course, the Disco King himself, Con Boutsianis!
Thanks once again, and good luck this season. From a friend. Alex D.'

Ben Hudson has noted on Facebook that "the producers wanted to hire Francis Awaritefe as a soccer consultant, but when they saw how poor Alex was as a player they decided the consultant also needed to be a body double - at which point they switched to Con Boutsianis because Francis couldn't manage it for some reason..."

All of which is, as usual, a very long winded way of saying when we do get the social club up and running, these would be a couple of very nice items to put on display.

Update 25/11/2018
Nice little insight by Leigh Tsoumerkas about the final scenes of the film.

We were in the last scenes when they were training at middle park.. the VIS team was the team training in the background with him  .. we were all in love Claudia karvin.

— Leigh T (@leighchookoo) November 25, 2018

Update 16/08/2019

Yes we were in the background when he was training and he had run away.. most of were between 15 and 17 and were in love with Claudia karvin... @StevePana and I loved it... Alex wasn’t very good... I think we got paid 80 bucks for the day

— Leigh T (@leighchookoo) August 15, 2019

Update 16/08/2019 (second update)

I auditioned for that film. Picked me out of a school assembly. Had to look Greek and play football. Couldn’t act for shit. They chose him. From a rival school! The rest is history 🤣

— Aussie Goona (@AussieGoona) August 16, 2019

Joe Gorman on Middle Park in The Guardian

Just in case you've missed it on its various Facebook and Twitter incarnations, Joe Gorman has recently written an excellent piece on Middle Park for the Guardian. It includes interviews and reminiscences from Mike Mandalis, Jimmy Armstrong, Kimon Taliadoros, Ange Postecoglou, Francis Awaritefe and friend of South of the Border Pavlaki. It also includes speculative commentary on the future by Tom Kalas.

Happy Birthday Franny!

Now I'm not much for birthdays and shit - what with them being largely a vain attempt to impose imaginary figments of our importance on the cosmos and all that, and I don't know, why don't you just get them a book voucher, but they don't read, well I'm out of ideas, big help you were, well at least I'm trying - but we're making an exception in the case of Francis Edgar Awaritefe (who turns 45 today), one of this reporters more favourite players to have gone through the South Melbourne Hellas smile factory. Franny cops a lot of flak these days from certain people - who claim they don't even watch SBS or The World Game - for his comments on various footbally things, but we choose to remember the good times, his bizarre ability to score belting goals and screw up easy ones as well as his willingness to call it as he sees it. But instead of rummaging through the video vault, I've decided to showcase the greatness of the man with this excerpt I found in a Roy Hay piece talking about the former National Youth League (Micky P also gets a mention). Did you also know that Francis is the last Hellas player to win league top goalscoring honours, all the way back in 1993? Long time between drinks. Have a good one Franny.

Though the NYL came in for much criticism, some of it deserved, one of my abiding memories of the competition was when Geelong City played a Melbourne Croatia (now Knights) team which included Francis Awaratife, who was coming back after injury. The big striker spent the whole game coaching and encouraging the players around him, not only his own team-mates but also the young Geelong centre-back who was trying to mark him as tightly as possible and subjecting him to some fairly physical tackling. Micky Petersen used to do exactly the same for the South Melbourne youth team. Playing with stars like that, who were aware of the wider role of the NYL, was an inspiration for youngsters starting out on a soccer career and for this reason alone the competition deserved wider recognition than it received. Let’s hope the new version is as fruitful.