Val Kopasz, Friend

If there are two important hinges in Ange & The Boss, two jigsaw pieces that make the film work, two linchpins that connect Ferenc Puskas, the Hungarian footballer who is in the conversation to being the greatest of all time to an unlikely and heartwarming championship season as the manager of a Greek club in Australia’s National Soccer League, then one of those hinges is Val Kopasz.

The other is provided by our South Melbourne players, led by Paul Trimboli, Miki Petersen, Ange Postecoglou, Kimon Taliadoris and Gus Tsolakis, who I think deliver the most natural and naturally hilarious collection of footballer anecdotes ever set to film. They tell the story of Puskas and Hellas, Puskas and football in Australia, and they do the job brilliantly.

But the hinge provided by Val is perhaps even more important. Over the course of researching the story, we heard various explanations for how it came to be that Puskas was even in Australia in the late eighties. It wasn’t until we met Val that the story fell into place, that Puskas had been brought out to coach junior clinics, that he’d fallen out with the organiser over not being paid, but by then fallen in love with Australia and its Hungarian community and the relative peace and anonymity and quality goulash he and his wife Elizabeth could enjoy here. By then they wanted to stay.

This is when Val and her husband Arpi stepped forward. They’d become friends with the Puskases in Budapest through George Kárpáti, Hungary’s three time Olympic water polo champion.

I remember Val telling us for the camera in her flat in South Yarra, the words firing from her mouth and the stories jumbling and colliding into one another, in a way that would challenge us in the edit but which delighted us in the moment — and that is a Val trademark, delighting in the moment. She told us about offering their friends Ferenc and Elizabeth a place to stay:

We had a business, a garden supply at 2 Farmer Street Ashwood, and there was sort of like an office. So we said straight away, both of you are welcome to stay in the house for as long as you want to …

This is how Puskas ended up in Ashwood. Val’s photos in the film are absolutely priceless. Garden trucks and piles of mulch. Pots for sale from the front-of-house nursery. Puskas poised for home cooked pasta with napkin tucked in. There’s a Real Madrid winners pennant on the wall behind him, just stuck there like kids artwork pinned to the fridge. It’s bonkers stuff. Even if you can imagine Puskas plying his trade in a backwater of the football world, you at least expect that the man who is the last statue you see as you walk down the avenue of champions at the Bernabéu will be in a snazzy inner city apartment, or a stately East Melbourne terrace, or maybe a permanent guest at the Hilton? But Val and Arpi offered the garden supply, and the Puskases took it up. There’s a beautiful humility to it all, and it reflected the humility of Ferenc and Elizabeth, and the loving friendship they shared with the Kopaszes. Ange & The Boss needed Getty images of Puskas scoring his famous pull back goal at Wembley and coaching Panathinaikos to a European Cup final. But it needed even more the amateur, roughly framed photos of Val, Arpi, Elizabeth and Ferenc eating at Jim’s Tavern three times a week, finding joy in a corner of the world that many Hungarians still don’t know their most famous countryman visited.

It needed Val’s photos.

It needed Val.

Val is one of the two hinges in the film, and is probably the most irreplaceable of any interviewee.

Over the long and often intensely frustrating seven years it took to make Ange & The Boss, Val checked in with Cam, Rob and myself on occasion, asked us how it was going, offered to help in any way she could. We were often rattling a tin to raise money for copyright clearances, and Val would help out within her modest means. She tried to find Hungarian backers, and constantly sent us articles about Puskas. She never stopped believing. I remember saying to her during COVID that we had a rough cut, and that I wanted her to see it, because I was worried that we’d never get there. ‘You’ll get there,' she said. ‘I’ll just see it when it comes out.’

She did too. The film’s finest hour was at the Astor in October 2024, when a thousand people laughed and cheered and marvelled at the Puskas in Australia story. Val was there, of course, and when she came up to me afterwards, sobbing, I couldn’t help but cry too. ‘You did it,’ she said. ‘You told it.’

Her name was Val Kopasz, and she died yesterday. She was a friend of Puskas’, a friend of our film and a friend of mine.

I’ll miss her regular messages, her shower of hearts whenever I post anything about my kids, her stories, her warmth. She lost her beloved Arpi long ago, and I know she believed she’d see him again. Condolences to her daughter Kristie, her nieces and nephews, and to Kath and others in the friendship circle.

Vale Val. Our film needed you so much. I’m so glad you got to see it.

Share

My co-director Cam Fink wrote his own reflection today:

Something strange happens when you interview someone for a film. You meet them once, but then spend months getting to know them.

For them, the relationship begins and ends on the day of the interview. For the person doing the editing, that’s when it really starts.

You watch and re-watch their interview. You place their words in the edit, move them around, and build the story around them. You start to understand their personality, their motivations, and the influence they have on the narrative. You learn their expressions and mannerisms. In a strange way, you get to know them quite well.

Or at least, it feels that way. Because they have no idea.

Val Kopasz died yesterday.

She wasn’t famous, and I only met her a few times. Yet I’m feeling a bit emotional today. I knew Val
…

Val came to several screenings of our film. She was always a radiant presence, laughing and sharing stories, joining the Q&As, smiling the bright smile of someone reliving their halcyon days. She was quick with a comment on our Facebook posts, and hugely supportive of the film.

It felt like she knew us almost as well as we knew her. She had a generous and positive energy. She died yesterday after two strokes and a short hospital stay.

My co-director Tony called to share the news, with softness in his voice. A friend of Val’s reached out to all the recent contacts on her phone after she died. I’m glad Tony was one of them.

I’m glad I got to meet you Val.

Thank you

Ange & The Boss is screening on SBS On Demand and Docplay.

The first is my son Jack’s new podcast, Do Meet Your Heroes. Ep 1 is now out. First hero is Aussie rules YouTuber Caden Macdonald.

The second is my upcoming picture book, The Elephant in the Room, which is about the world’s biggest idiom, and has an idiom hidden in every illustration. If you want your kids name inked into the thank you page, just commit to two copies (commit now, pay later). Goes to print August 20th.