“You’re terrible, Muriel.” Those three simple words were etched into everyday speech 30 years ago, when Gabby Millgate uttered the iconic line in the 1994 smash hit movie Muriel’s Wedding.
In the film, Gabby played Muriel’s seemingly slow and reclusive sister Joanie, who had very little to say. But what she had to say had such a lasting impact that Gabby, 54, still can’t go anywhere without being recognised and having her trademark phrase recited back at her.
Even the likes of Madonna and Will Ferrell have uttered the quote in public!
“It’s fun,” happy-go-lucky Gabby smiles. “People also still come up to me and say, ‘I know you from somewhere.’ And I say, ‘Muriel’s Wedding?’ They say, ‘No!’ and then I get really embarrassed.
“I never tire of hearing the line, and it’s always done with so much love and goodwill.” But after turning her back on acting, Gabby is pouring her positive energy into a very different career.
Shy Joanie from Porpoise Spit is now a much-loved early-childhood educator based in suburban Canberra.
Gabby says it’s her dream job. “My sister Monica said to me, ‘You do great stuff with my children. Why don’t you look at that?’ So I did. I just thought I would reincarnate myself without actually dying. And so at the age of 40, I started all over again as a trainee in early-childhood education.”
Gabby’s official title is “nature pedagogy leader”, which simply means that it’s her job to connect kids to the wonders of nature, often by encouraging them to play with pet chickens.
“I noticed that chickens can work magic on an upset child,” she explains. “Just by seeing a chicken, a child can transition from feeling upset to being happy. They’ll want to love, look after and care for that chicken.”
She has since written a book about the connection between chickens and children, called The Book-Book Book.
Meanwhile, though decades have passed since the world fell in love with the movie Muriel’s Wedding, Gabby recalls her time on set as if it was just yesterday.
“I didn’t know at the time we were making a cult classic,” she laughs. “But the casting director said to me, ‘This is going to be a big movie.’
“I’d never made a movie before. I didn’t have an agent. I was at Sydney Uni. They were casting via schools and universities, and I was kindly approached to audition. It was just a random fluke. I had to read a bit from the script, then say my name to camera, say where I was from and say something spontaneous.
“I said, ‘Hi, my name is Gabby and I live in Balmain,’ then my mind went blank and I said something like, ‘It’s a nice day outside.’ It was so nothing and then they told me I had the part! I remember thinking my world had just turned completely upside down, but in a good way.”
Gabby adds, “I remember saying to Toni Collette [who played Muriel] on the first day that I hadn’t done any acting before and would she please tell me if I did anything wrong. She just looked at me and then said, ‘Oh, OK.’”
It comes as a great surprise to learn that Gabby, Toni and co-star Rachel Griffiths didn’t become best friends. “I was nothing special to Toni, but so what?” says Gabby. “That doesn’t matter.
“Toni and Rachel were the stars, and I was just a beginner. I haven’t heard from Toni in about 30 years. Oh, that’s right, it’s 30 years since we made Muriel’s Wedding!”
Gabby says she loved working with Aussie actress Jeanie Drynan, who played her timid and bullied mother Betty Heslop, and the late Bill Hunter, who portrayed her philandering dad Bill.
“Jeanie was incredible,” she remembers. “She was in character even when the cameras weren’t rolling. That was her Method.
“Bill was lovely too,” she adds. “He took me under his wing. We remained friends after the film and I did some babysitting for him. One day, I asked him whether I should go to drama school and he replied, ‘You’ve either got it or you don’t – and you’ve got it!’”
When asked whether she has any plans to return to acting, Gabby insists she’s currently enjoying the career of her dreams in childcare.
“I’m not really in that world any more,” she says.
But if talk of a sequel to Muriel’s Wedding turns out to be true, Gabby reveals she would return to the big screen.
“I would be very open to appearing in a sequel,” she admits. “It’d be good to find out where life took Joanie.”
And 30 years on, it would be interesting to see if Joanie still finds Muriel “terrible”!
Stream Muriel’s Wedding today on Prime Video.
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