Isla In
CHARGE The Hollywood star on turning her talent for acting – and love of kids – into a series of smash-hit stories Wo r d s H E L E N B A R O N
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sla Fisher has come a long way – literally. Born in Oman and raised in Oz, she’s now a Hollywood fi xture, living with her family (she has two children by her husband, the comedian Sacha Baron Cohen) in Los Angeles. Isla has also covered a lot of ground professionally, starting out as a child actor, moving on to portray classic character Shannon Reed in Australian soap Home and Away, and fi nally making the jump to bona fide fi lm star with roles in hits from Wedding Crashers (her performance gained rave reviews for her comedic skills) to The Great Gatsby. In recent years, she has pushed herself still further, moonlighting as a children’s author with her acclaimed Marge series. Launching in 2016 with Marge in Charge – three anarchic tales about rainbow-haired babysitter Marge, whose innate unorthodoxy and talent for chaos causes no end of adventure for her charges, Jemima and Jakey – the books have been lauded by comic figures of no less standing than Davids Baddiel and Walliams. More importantly, they’re loved by kids across the world. We spoke to her about the latest instalment – released this month – Marge and the Secret Tunnel, and ask why she moved into children’s writing in the fi rst place... “I felt that for emerging or reluctant readers, there weren’t that many comedic books for kids who were just beginning to read. And then once they get a little older, there are all these really sophisticated authors, like Roald Dahl or Jeff Kinney or Francesca Simon. So I wanted to just make kids read more. It felt like a lost opportunity during that transitional phase, so I created material that I hoped would engage young readers and not push them beyond their years socially.” She’s referring, in one sense, to the character of Marge – any child’s dream babysitter; the type who cooks chocolate soup for dinner and eats too much cake at a birthday party. She’s essentially a child in adult form, able to get away with all the things children are routinely forbidden to do. We ask her if this idea – that children should worry less about being “good” and simply enjoy being children – is reflective of how she raises her own children. “Yes,” she says. “Even older children… are so risk averse. They’re taking a certain job or study a certain subject because that’s going to help them get on
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