A lot of really cool things happen when you write a quirky little TV show and it becomes a global sensation. First, as Harriet Dyer will tell you, your DMs blow up with mates congratulating you on your success. Then you find yourself jetting back to Australia from your home in Los Angeles to pick up an armful of the nation’s most sought-after awards. Next, the BAFTAs call to ask you to present one of their awards and, in the meantime, everyone wants to either: a) interview you; b) hire you; or c) photograph you in designer dresses.
OK, that last one is us.
As Dyer reclines on a sofa in a shimmering green Armani ensemble for our shoot and surveys our style and photography team, she says she can’t quite believe that Colin from Accounts – the hit show she co-wrote and stars in with husband Patrick Brammall – has so comprehensively transformed her life. Its second season is now streaming on Binge (the first season was the Foxtel Group’s most-watched original scripted series of all time), but Dyer wryly notes that it doesn’t seem so long ago that her childhood amateur dramatics were getting little write-ups in the Townsville Bulletin in Queensland.
She goes on to say that for all the apparent signs of success, there’s been characters, Ashley and Gordon. “I now feel like I can go toe to toe. I can hold my own in a room filled with creatives or executives or heads of department, and I can stand there next to him and my voice is as valid as his.” Dyer has thought about this a lot. She references a Michael Leunig cartoon captioned “The invention of the pedestal” where one person has dug out the earth from underneath themselves to make the pedestal for the other person. “I definitely feel like there’s no pedestal now, which is great because I think pedestals and relationships are no good,” she says.
