Ed Kavalee’s Cop This is a chaotic comedy free-for-all

As far as rarities go, an Australian comedy telemovie is up there with thrilling celebrity game shows or ABC prime time series aimed at anyone under 50. And yet somehow, Cop This has made it to air on Channel 10.

The third in an extremely drawn-out trilogy of law-enforcement-themed comedy movies from writer and now co-director Ed Kavalee – the police comedy Scumbus aired on 10 in 2012, while Border Protection Squad went direct to iTunes in 2015 – it’s the kind of ensemble piece where the plot comes a distant second to spotting the literally dozens of comedians and television types turning up out of nowhere.

Well, not quite out of nowhere, as Kavalee – best known for his radio work, alongside being a core cast member of Have You Been Paying Attention? and turning up in a lot of ads – is an old hand at this kind of thing.

Cut-price policing

For a no-budget telemovie (it was filmed in less than a fortnight entirely inside the Como building that houses 10’s Melbourne HQ) the story is epic in scale, reaching from the highest echelons of power to wherever Ryan Moloney’s knife-wielding maniac lives.

It’s the AFL Grand Final, and there’s a lot going on. When a drug bust goes bad – well, it’s more of a drug handover, as the drug squad led by the extremely hard-boiled Ben (Anthony ‘Lehmo’ Lehmann) are corrupt from top to bottom – the only surviving crim Jayden (Gary Sweet) is somewhat surprisingly not executed on the spot.

With orders to keep Jayden alive, Ben stashes him away at a suburban police station that’s about to be closed down and replaced by an AI Terminal (basically a cut-price Robocop but considering it was invented by Dave Hughes, what can you expect).

Left guarding him is too-honest-for-her-own-good cop Jo (Nicolette Minster) and proud New Zealander Matt (Ray O’Leary), who is constantly spelling his name out loud just to make sure everyone gets it, alongside ‘storyteller’ Peter King (Toby Truslove), an actor researching an upcoming role.

Cameos and chaos

The AI Terminal is part of a power grab by Deputy Commissioner Silva (Rob Carlton). He and his sidekick Alec Hydel (Tony Martin) are hoping to move up in the world once the current commish (Claire Hooper) steps aside. Unfortunately rival Deputy Commissioner Kennedy (Celia Pacquola) also wants the top job and she seems to know what she’s doing, which means Silva’s scheme becomes increasingly more complicated.

What does all this have to do with a breakfast radio show (hosted by Rob Sitch and Ed Kavalee) running a secret sound competition? Or an extremely blokie footie show hosted by AJ Fraiser (Josh Lawson) and Big Johnno (Dane Simpson) with special guest appearance by gambling spokesman Kerry Thornley (Glenn Robbins)? Or the string of people (Bron Lewis, Julia Morris, Ryan Shelton) wanting to use a podcasting space? Hey, it’s a busy day in a big city, it’ll all link up eventually.

The story does generally make sense, but it’s probably not what you should be focusing on. There are a couple of twist developments and some sub-plots wrap up nicely, but for the most part it’s really just an excuse to bring in as many people as possible for as many funny scenes as possible. Which is exactly what you want from this kind of project.

Watch the trailer

Rough and ready with the jokes

While Mick Molloy’s single scene as a police dispatcher is reasonably funny on its own, what puts it over the top is the way it was clearly filmed during a spare 20 minutes in a room with no other cast members required. On the flip side, there are a number of roles that turn out to be larger than you might think: Gary Sweet clearly decided to go all in, while both Lehmo and Carlton display surprisingly strong acting chops as dodgy cops.

Comedy-wise, the script often returns to a handful of worthy targets. Sports gambling takes a real beating. (You wouldn’t get jokes like ‘The Sportsbet Children’s Channel’ on a network with broadcast rights to the AFL or NRL.) Commercial radio banter doesn’t get off lightly either – there’s a sign on the studio wall that says ‘No Accents’ for a reason.

Not all the gags are winners, but much like the cameos, there’s enough that work to get this over the line. A half-empty press conference is because ‘it’s grand final day – all the real journos are working for betting companies’, while there’s a swipe at the existence of a real street in Melbourne (still) named Prince Andrew Avenue. A number of dubious investments Dave Hughes may have made in real life are also mentioned, though presumably the mystery rash his character has is fictional.

Being a ramshackle mess made for pocket change is a big part of the appeal here, which means that if you’re looking for something with even the slightest amount of polish this may not be for you. It’s the kind of comedy that puts being funny first; it may not be pretty, but it gets results.

Cop This aired on Channel 10 on 5 October and is now available to stream. It’s also slated to stream on Paramount+ later in the year.

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