After previewing the first two episodes of Austin on Wednesday night with a local crowd at the National Film and Sound Archive in Acton, the answer to that question has to be a resounding "yes". Lots of laughs to be had.
The fun of Austin, not least, is another chance to play Canberra spotto.
Oh look, there's famous British actors Sally Phillips (Veep, Shazza in Bridget Jones' Diary) and Ben Miller (Johnny English, Lord Featherington in Bridgerton) in our city.
Look, their hotel room is really the Hyatt Hotel!
And there's a Canberra cab! And Austin is riding an ACTION bus!
And, oh, Sally - aka Ingrid - is trying to pick up a barman at the Marion function centre on Lake Burley Griffin. Don't those pink velvet chairs come up well on screen?
And, oh, there's Book Lore in Lyneham! And the graffitied walls behind the Lyneham shops!
And that space that's meant to be a book publisher's office in England? Well, that's really the National Library!
I mean, it can be exhausting feeling so much pride.
Austin, an eight-episode comedy, premieres on ABC-TV and ABC iview next Sunday, June 9, at 8pm.
It's about a British couple, children's author Julian (Ben Miller) and artist Ingrid (Sally Phillips), who are at first trying to quell a social media storm - of his making. But that's just the start of the complications.
Enter Austin (Michael Theo from Love on the Spectrum) who is the son Julian never knew he had. Austin also happens to have autism. Gia Carides plays Austin's mother Mel and Roy Bill his grandfather, Bill. Both legendary Aussie actors.
Austin becomes a fascinating and hilarious collision between the dithering, ever-so-polite, never-say-what-you-actually-mean Brits and the always direct, completely unvarnished Austin (played wonderfully by Michael Theo in his first acting role) and, to a lesser extent, the droll, laconic, down-to-earth Aussies Mel and Bill.
Throw in a bit of a light-hearted exploration of cancel culture and quite a bit of heart without being treacly, and it looks like being a very enjoyable series.
Austin was filmed in Canberra over six weeks with the support of the ACT government and Screen Canberra.
Creator and writer Darren Ashton told the audience at the preview screening that he loved filming in Canberra.
"[Fellow Austin writer and creator] Ben Miller said to me, 'This [Canberra] is like the biggest studio lot I've ever been on because you're only 15 minutes away from anywhere," Ashton said.
"I felt a bit guilty in a way - some of the great locations, we actually treated them as London... [including the National Library]
"Everybody comes to Canberra because of the political arena, so I thought, 'We're not going to show Parliament House, we're going to show another side of Canberra. So, of course, we ended up doing a scene right at the front of Parliament House - and it looks fantastic, I've got to say.
"But Canberra is fantastic, literally 15 minutes from anywhere. It was a real joy in terms of the logistics. But there's so many great things about Canberra. We had a great time in the restaurants and going out for breakfast. And actually seeing something on scene that was not Sydney or Melbourne was something we set out to do."
Ashton recruited Michael Theo for Austin after seeing him in the ABC-TV doco-series Love on the Spectrum about neuro-diverse people on their journey to find love.
He found Michael "incredibly charismatic" and approached him back in early 2020 to be in Austin, the series taking four years to wrap.
Ashton said the series wouldn't have happened without the support of the ABC and Screen Canberra.
"I can't tell you how many people passed on the show, who now want the show," he said, with a certain amount of satisfaction.
- Austin starts on ABC-TV and ABC iview at 8pm on Sunday, June 9.
