Chloe Lattanzi down by the billabong
Olivia Newton-John’s teenage daughter is forging a singing career of her own in a very Aussie film. In the stark corporate boardroom of a Melbourne film company, a pretty teenage girl fidgets anxiously beside a pair of adult minders. Her eyes wide and body tense, she has the look of someone trying to find comfort in a dentist’s chair.
Just minutes before, her mother fled the room, leaving the apprehensive 13-year-old to her fate. Bravely, she turns and faces her inquisitor.
“I’m really nervous about doing this interview… I’m really sorry,” Chloe Lattanzi giggles. “It’s just that I’ve never really had to do this before.”
Without her famous mother, Olivia Newton-John, for support. Chloe is taking her first tentative steps towards stardom. She’s giving her first celebrity interview, to discuss her voice role in the new animated movie The Enchanted Billabong.
Olivia did not want to hang around and detract from her daughter’s moment. Chloe only seems to feel her absence briefly, the talented teen soon proving she’s a natural. She was raised in the media spotlight surrounding her mum and dad - her father s Olivia’s ex-husband, actor Matt Lattanzi.
“America’s my home because I was born and have been raised there, but I love Australia a lot,” she says, with a slight American accent and a gift for diplomacy. “Australia’s a great place to work, because you don’t have the same media trash as in the US and people are so down-to-earth. They don’t have that ‘let’s do lunch, baby’ attitude you get in the US.”
Chloe’s acting debut is every little girl’s dream. She’s tooth fairy Tia in The Enchanted Billabong, a story exploring the power of imagination in a uniquely Australian setting, And to make the fairytale complete, in the film Chloe sings a song, Beloved, that’s tipped to launch her musical and recording career and plunge her into the beady showbiz world her parents have so far shielded her from.
“They’ve been very supportive of me doing this,” Chloe explains. “They know there are going to be things I do and don’t like about this business, but they also know how much I love writing songs and singing.”
“That’s always been my big thing, though it’s hard to explain why it appeals to me so much. It seems a natural thing for me to do. Everyone has a connection to something and I just feel being a singer is something that’s meant to be.”
Although she’s also auditioned for a role in the Australian movie Hating Alison Ashley, she adds, “I do like acting, but I’ve never said, ‘Mum. I want to be in the movies’.”
Chloe, whose voice co-star in The Enchanted Billabong is singer Jimmy Barnes as the bunyip, has spent much of the past eight weeks toiling in a recording studio. She’s loved playing Tia, who befriends a city boy, Greg, when he moves to the country. Tia helps him enter her world of magic and mystery.
And her performance is pure magic, according to the film’s producer and director, David Waddington.
“I can’t tell you how many we auditioned for Chloe’s role.” David says. “We couldn’t have found better. It’s not easy for someone to walk into a studio and give voice and emotion to an animated character. She’s exactly what we were looking for and I believe the song she performs, Beloved, will be a hit.”
Chloe has exacting standards for someone so young, hut having spent so much time around film, TV and music studios with her parents, she’s aware of the effort required for career success.
The budding singer says she would plead with the film team to let her to re-record anything she didn’t think was perfect.
“It drives me mad if I think I’ve bouts even a fraction off tune with a note,” she says. “We’ve all worked our butts off to get it right, but I just hope the people listening to me sing are tone deaf,” she adds with a laugh. The Enchanted Billabong is the first step in Chloe’s career, but she’s pacing herself slowly for success.
“Where would I like to be in five years? Most of all I want to be a happy teenager having a good time with my friends, but I would love to have some sort of recording deal in place,” she admits.
As production winds up, Chloe is looking forward to returning to the US. After more than two months here, she’s pining for her friends, her pets and especially her dad, Matt, who’s based in Los Angeles.
“I miss him very much when I’m away,” she says, sounding more like a little girl at last. “And when I’m in America, there’s so much I miss about Australia.”
Story by Darren Devlyn