Through the lens: Aussie Goes Bolly, and a swamy to boot

He is a celebrity of sorts back home since this AAGB is a sequel to another AAGB — An Aussie Goes Barmy — that got record breaking television ratings in Australia during England’s Ashes losing tour last year. And sticking to the success formula, AAGB II too aspires to elevate the fan on the couch at home to the stadium terraces, besides giving an idea of the adventures of a cricket-tourist.

As the show’s executive producer of Granada Productions Pvt Ltd Mathew Weiss put it: “It is entertainment. The show is a combination of a daily soap and cricket. Something that can be watched by a cricket fan and those not interested in the game but into television drama.”

If the 38-year-old Worland was fearless enough to sit in the middle of the famously noisy English travelling fans during the games and later dine/drink with them too after every day of Aussie domination last year, the present assignment too hasn’t been one for the faint-hearted.

“The Englishmen are actually quite used to being beaten by the Aussies. But here after the Twenty20 win, there are huge expectations. So at times I have been caught in a situation when I am the only one smiling and waving the flag in the middle of a crowd of disappointed faces,” says the man whose first brush with defeat, since being on this reality-television kind of show with constant camera focus, was in Chandigarh.

But there are times in India when mere courage has been found inadequate. The weak-in-the-knees feeling during the first encounter with a squatting toilet at the Bangalore Youth Hostel and the knock-out punch courtesy Delhi belly might provide the documentary’s lighter moments, but when Worland narrates they don’t seem funny.

With the production unit keeping the lodging and boarding details away from Worland, the surprise element to the show gives it an extempore and informal look. “I was received in a stretch limo in Bangalore but I landed in a room that I had to share with eight others at the youth hostel,” says the Aussie fan. He mockingly puts a hand across to his producer and adds, “since we are friends, I know he wouldn’t put me in a place where I would die.”

Weiss gets a naughty grin on his face and winks when he says: “Actually, at times we are not sure.”

Though Worland, who is a father of three kids and an Aussie cricket addict for over three decades, says there have been several happy memories on this Indian journey. Riding a camel to reach the stadium in Vadodara, driving an auto-rickshaw in Hyderabad and going with a broom in hand in Bangalore happen to be just a few of them.

“The broom for the first game was showing the Aussie intentions of a clean sweep on the series,” he explains. Besides, a production unit fixer arranged for his name on the scoreboard as 12th man and Adam Gilchrist presented him with an Aussie cap.

Ask Worland what’s a story with ‘Bolly’ in the name without a song and he breaks into one. “Good day it’s Gus, I went Barmy, the Poms have gone now, I’ve gone swamy, I’m not going mental, just sub-continental”.

That’s the title track of the documentary that is expected to be on Indian television later this year.