Mike Johnson (Tim Balme) in The Almighty Johnsons. Photo copyright of South Pacific Pictures.
In life, we sometimes have to pick up the slack and take on certain responsibilities that are not necessarily ours. In the popular New Zealand-made TV series The Almighty Johnsons, Mike, the oldest son in the Johnson family, had to step into the breach made by his parents when they walked out on him and his three younger brothers, Anders, Ty and Axl. One day, their father Johan once again gave into the call of the ocean and his wandering nature, but this time he abandoned his family for good. Their mother Elizabet later followed, leaving her sons and transforming herself into a tree.
If all this sounds more than a little bit odd, it actually isn’t, at least if you happen to be a family of reincarnated Norse gods. That describes the Johnsons to a tee, and while Mike might have felt completely on his own when taking on such a daunting prospect as parenting, he never was. Veteran actor/writer Tim Balme, who plays the eldest Johnson brother, was there with Mike right from the very beginning and even prior to the cameras beginning to role.
“About 18 months before The Almighty Johnsons was commissioned as a series, a rehearsal reading was held,” recalls Balme. “We work-shopped episode one and ‘performed’ it for the network executives of TV3. I’d been working with [series co-creators and executive producers] Rachel Lang and James Griffin as a writer/storyliner on another show and they asked me if I would read the role of Mike. Dean O’Gorman [Anders] and Jared Turner [Ty] were part of that process, too. It was a lot of fun and it gave the network confidence to commission more scripts and development.
“When the network finally gave the green light for a TV series and the casting process was happening, Rachel and James asked if I would take on Mike. It was a little tricky because by then I had just accepted a management role at the production company as Head of Development. Fortunately, Head Office and Production came to an arrangement and we somehow pulled off my juggling of both roles. It was hectic and, in hindsight, ridiculous at times, but that’s another story,” he jokes.
(L-R): The Johnson brothers: Anders (Dean O'Gorman), Axl (Emmett Skilton), Ty (Jared Turner) and Mike (Tim Balme). Photo copyright of South Pacific Pictures.
At the age of 21, Mike – with the help of his mother – made the transition from ordinary human being to reincarnated Norse god, in his case, Ullr, the god of the hunt and of games. Elizabet had no desire to repeat this experience with her other three sons, which is why she ultimately left. As the surrogate parent, Mike had to assume that duty, which he did for Anders and Ty. In the season one opener of The Almighty Johnsons, It’s a Kind of a Birthday Present, Axl (Emmett Skilton), the youngest Johnson, turns 21 and learns the family secret. Mike, Anders, Ty and their grandfather Olaf (Ben Barrington) take Axl into the forest to “usher” him into the world of Norse gods. It was quite the memorable experience for Balme’s character as well as the actor himself.
“I had worked a great deal as an actor over the years, but in 2005 I stepped away from it to focus on writing,” says Balme. “I was only going to be enticed back to acting by something really interesting. The Almighty Johnsons was what called me back, and I was excited about being part of a new show.
“The first episode of anything is always going to be tricky, and with this show, in particular, it was going to be one helluva’ concept to set up and then entertain audiences within the first hour. Fortunately, we were in the hands of a maestro in terms of directors with Mark Beesley. He helmed that episode with great finesse. My biggest concern was about selling the line, ‘Your mother went into the forest and became a tree.’ I was worried that viewers weren’t going to buy it, but to the credit of James Griffin, he stuck to his guns. As it turned out we didn’t jump the shark, just dodged a stingray, perhaps.”
Taking over the running of the Johnsons household as well as making the leap into “godhood” had quite an impact on Mike. He is the most serious of all his brothers and the most responsible. A self-employed carpenter, Mike puts his clients’ needs above his own, including financial. As far as coming from a family of gods, he insists that is kept a secret amongst them. When Axl becomes a god, it puts the Johnsons in a precarious position. For them to attain their full powers as gods, Axl must find his soul mate, the Goddess Frigg. If, however, he dies or is killed before doing so, then they all die, too. This, of course, weighs heavily on Mike’s already over-burdened shoulders, but acting-wise, Balme took this and the rest of his character’s problems all in stride.
Mike (Tim Balme) in the season one opener, "It's a Kind of a Birthday Present." Photo copyright of South Pacific Pictures.
“Mike is, to coin a phrase from down under, ‘a tricky bugger,’” notes the actor. “He’s troubled and serious and often seen as a killjoy. Over my acting career, I’ve tended to play more playful/comedic characters, so taking on the eldest brother/Alpha male role was not a natural fit, but I enjoyed the challenge. As the youngest of three brothers in real life, perhaps I was subconsciously getting my own back.
“My character is dad to his brothers. It’s a mantle that was thrust upon Mike when his own father walked out, and it’s a mantle that Mike shouldered without question, up until the series starts, that is. He is particularly paternal to Axl. There is a 15-year age gap, so it’s pretty easy to see how that happened. Mike is protective to a fault, and that father/brother/son dynamic is seriously challenged over the course of The Almighty Johnsons’ run. Story-wise we had fun with that. Oh, not to forget Olaf. Although Mike is his grandson, he tends to play the parent to Olaf, but hey, Olaf needs it, right?
“I think Mike did tend to loosen up a bit as we went on. My character’s journey was about going from denial to embracing his godliness and letting go of his controlling side as he went from father back to brother. I feel that we gave Mike a good run throughout the show’s three seasons. In the end, I think it’s fair to use the old saying, ‘He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother,’ as an appropriate adage. As far as Mike’s mother and father go, well, we’re lucky to meet the two of them in the series. Mike felt abandoned by both and resentful that they left him to bring up their children. Not only did he have to do that, but he was also left to induct them into being gods when they turned 21. That’s a big deal.”
In the season one The Almighty Johnsons episode This is Where Duty Starts, there is a flashback to Mike’s younger days with his best friend Rob (Richard Knowles) and Rob’s fiancée Valerie (Roz Turnbull). When Mike uses his powers to win a game of pool, he and Rob get into a fight with the loser of the game and his friend. Rob suffers a severe head injury, which puts him in a coma. Mike and Valerie end up falling in love and eventually get married, but despite lying in a hospital bed, Rob is not ready to let go of Val just yet.
Mike (Tim Balme) doing something he rarely likes to do - tap into his god-like ability to win at all games. Photo copyright of South Pacific Pictures.
“Mike’s and Val’s marriage is a great example of a union built on shifting sands,” says Balme. “I think Mike entered that marriage for all the wrong reasons including guilt about what happened to Rob, and used the marriage as a sanctuary to hide from his big secret that he is a Norse god. The laws of drama would clearly state that that is never going to end well. I really liked the boyfriend-in-the-coma storyline. It was well set up and paid off in a great end to the first season.”
Besides playing Mike in The Almighty Johnsons, Balme also served as a writer on the show. How did that affect his work in front of the camera, and was it easy to write for his own character, or did it prove difficult for him? “It’s a funny thing, that dynamic,” he muses. “As writers, we work objectively (How is everyone creating the whole?), whereas with actors, it’s subjectively (How do ‘I’ fit into the whole?). It requires a totally different mindset, so where possible, we would finish writing storylines before filming started, and I would try to have my scripts completed by then, too.
“With regard to Mike, it’s definitely not a hindrance to write dialogue when you are the character. The tricky thing is taking the character into places that you might not want to go. That’s where the objective thing has to prevail.”
Born and brought up in New Zealand, Balme set his sights on a career in this industry at a young age. “I got hooked on the acting at the age of 13 through an inspirational teacher at high school,” he says, “and I’ve followed the bouncing ball ever since. I had nothing else in mind except music for a while, but I’m a much better actor than I am a musician.
(L-R): Axl (Emmett Skilton), Miike (Tim Balme), Anders (Dean O'Gorman) and Ty (Jared Turner). Photo copyright of South Pacific Pictures.
“I took a fairly traditional route insofar as breaking into the business. I studied drama at university and then headed to drama school. From there I went straight into theatre work and then had a big break working for [producer/director/screenwriter] Peter Jackson on [the 1992 feature film] Braindead, or Dead Alive. As a first film role it was a gift from above, or one might say, ‘the heavens opened up and rained zombie blood on me.’”
No Reason, The Tattooist, For Good, Jack Brown Genius, Tin Box and The Last Tattoo are among the actor’s other big screen credits. On TV, in addition to a variety of made-for-TV films, he has appeared in such series as The Legend of William Tell, Greenstone, P.E.T. Detectives and Maddigan’s Quest (as a series regular) as well as Outrageous Fortune and Nothing Trivial (playing recurring roles in both). Balme has especially fond memories of two TV roles he played, Greg Feeney in Shortland Street and Ken Wilder in Mercy Peak.
“I loved those two characters dearly,” enthuses the actor. “Greg was a likeable rogue/heartbreaker. I used to be contracted into Shortland Street in three month stints. In that 12-week block, my character would always take one of the core cast actresses out of the show on the back of his motorbike. For me it wasfun, but for the actress it was, ‘Damn, I just got written out [of the series].’
“Ken was an affable but somewhat lonely cop in a small town. We shot 60 episodes of Mercy Peak in the halcyon days when we still shot on 16mm film and the pace was slower. It’s not like that now. It’s rare to make 60 episodes of anything these days, but over those three years, Ken became a good friend of mine. I remember as we set up the show, I chose to get this short haircut (to be cop-like), but my hair tends to spike up when it’s short and veer towards the ‘hedgehog coiffure.’ I remember a review of the first episode that stated: ‘Tim Balme labors under a ludicrous haircut.’ See what we suffer for our art,” he says with a chuckle.
Tim Balme as Mike in The Almighty Johnsons. Photo copyright of South Pacific Pictures.
A talented theatrical actor, Balme has also performed onstage in such productions as Sky Blue Boys, Hamlet, Much Ado About Nothing and Horseplay, which was directed by The Almighty Johnsons’ producer Simon Bennett and co-starred John Leigh, who played Bryn on the series. As a writer, Balme penned the acclaimed one-man show The Ballad of Jimmy Costello and, along with The Almighty Johnsons and Outrageous Fortune, has also written for such TV series as Interrogation, Diplomatic Immunity, The Blue Rose and, currently, The Brokenwood Mysteries.
“The Brokenwood Mysteries is a murder mystery series set in a fictional region called Brokenwood,” he explains. “I’ve immensely enjoyed helming a brand new show; it has been a learning curve and a surprising and really satisfying one. We’re blessed to have Fern Sutherland [Dawn on The Almighty Johnsons] playing the female lead [Kristin Sims]. A great actress who is dexterous and subtle, she lights up the screen.”
Different things motivate people to get up every morning and take on another day at work, and with Balme, the desire to be creative is what drives him professionally. “I love telling stories with new shows, new people, new ideas, and having the public express to you how much they enjoy the work,” he says. “It’s entertainment, after all. That’s its only validity in this world, so when it works, it feels good, and social media has made the audience feel more connected, I guess. Also, I’ve been lucky to work with people who are talented and fun to work with. There aren’t too many distorted egos down this way. We keep it pretty real.”
Steve Eramo
As noted above, photos courtesy/copyright of South Pacific Pictures, so please no unauthorized copying or duplicating of any kind. Thanks!
