Collette keeping it real with Tara

Playing four characters at once was the drawcard for Toni Collette to make a change to television – and she's so excited about the role(s) she's signed on for seven years. Julie Jacobson reports.

Toni Collette is wearing her concerned mum hat.

Her 2-year-old is teething and she's inconsolable. Sage Florence's dad – musician Dave Galafassi – has had a go at calming her down, but it's mum she wants.

"She's getting her molars, poor little baby, and she's very out of sorts today," says Collette with an Australian twang. "Thank God we forget going through that."

Empathy. It's just one of the emotions the Sydney-based actress is having to conjure up at the drop of a hat in The United States of Tara, a dram/com in which Collette plays four people – the eponymously named Tara Gregson, a housewife with dissociative identity disorder (DID); rebellious teenager T; the hard-drinking, redneck Vietnam vet Buck; and model homemaker Alice.

"You know," she says, "I wasn't looking for TV at all but the material was just so damned good, I couldn't say no."

So damned good, in fact, Collette has signed up to play the part for seven years.

She reckons it's the perfect actor's role. "It's bloody awesome. Not just being one character, knowing that all those people are part of the same person, gives it so much more depth, and there's potential to grow. That's one of the reasons I wanted to do it. I had been approached to do some television in the past but none [of the scripts] seemed like they would go anywhere. Tara has so much potential. I mean, you can be typecast in television. Hopefully [there's a loud laugh] I should escape that with this show.

"And the job came along at the right time for me. It was perfect. I had my daughter, and I had time with her, and then it was into this.

"There weren't a lot of films being made and it was a really good toe back into the water of work.

"You just feel so vulnerable as a new parent and I didn't know how anything was going to work – the hormones were rife – but it's just been the most positive experience."

So which character is closest to the 37-year-old? Collette neatly sidesteps that question with a mumbled, "ah, yes, exactly", then explains she plays each with equal conviction.

"I wanted to make them all as whole and complete and as relatable as each other. They're all really fun, but T, I guess, ultimately represents escapism and freedom and irresponsibility, and who doesn't like dabbling in that area?"

Written by Diablo Cody, of Juno fame, USOT tackles some pretty meaty issues aside from mental illness – there's sexuality (Tara's young son is gay, her teenage daughter has just started taking the pill, T is, er, promiscuous), drugs, bullying and alcohol.

"Yeah," agrees Collette, "the Gregsons are one very, very dysfunctional family. But I'm drawn to stories like that, that you can't pigeonhole, and that traverse different emotional veins.

"In the wrong hands, it could have been completely sensationalised, but it's about a family and how they live together and all their crap. I think that is far more recognisable than that straight-out `oh, that's crazy' [scenario]. This show has you laughing one minute and sort of tearing up the next. Life is like that, and I prefer to work with stories that represent the real world."

Keeping it real means several doctors and a DID sufferer work as consultants on the show. Collette's research pre-shoot included viewing some "eye-opening documentaries" and much reading.

"There was a fair amount of trepidation before the show. When it [premiered], I think the DID community all went `phew' at the same time, with relief that it didn't misrepresent them all."

Collette, who shot to fame as the overweight bride in Muriel's Wedding and is currently "appearing" as the voice of Mary in box office hit Mary and Max, lives in Los Angeles when filming, and Australia the rest of the time. The less frenetic pace of Sydney suits her just fine. She is, she admits, not great at putting on a public face.

Here she is on the Emmys, where she pulled off one of the biggest upsets of the night by beating Tina Fey for best actress in a comedy: "You know, I had a 20 per cent chance [of winning it]. I got dressed up. I turned up thinking that it might happen. It did.

"The thing is, a lot of people I know sign on to television shows and have to move [permanently] to LA. You kind of lose your life, so living in Sydney I don't have to walk that path. I get the best of both worlds. At the end of the three and a half months that we were filming, I'd become pretty entrenched. It does take a little while to shake [the character] off and land back in my own life."

She's a little concerned, however, that Tara, with all her personalities, may spoil future roles for her. "The frightening thing is you get so used to it, it feels normal. Now I'm worried I'll do a film and I'll be like `sigh ... the same old boring character'."  – Dominion Post