Politics & Power Quote by Bryan Brown

Brown is doing something quietly radical here: he frames belonging as a moral ledger, not a vibe. Living somewhere isn’t consumption with a nicer label; it’s an exchange, and he’s judging himself by whether he can pay back. That’s why the line lands. It’s not anti-American chest-thumping, it’s a confession about where his energy would and wouldn’t translate into civic usefulness.

The subtext is a blunt refusal of the immigrant-success fantasy in reverse. Instead of “I made it in America,” he’s saying America would have made him smaller, more passive, more spectator than participant. “Make myself a person” hints at identity as a practical craft: the self is built by institutions, work, and the daily frictions of culture. If the surrounding society doesn’t invite your particular skills, temperament, or class instincts into the mix, you can feel like you’re only extracting - taking roles, money, attention - without ever becoming woven in.

As an actor, Brown’s also talking about the machinery of cultural production. Hollywood can turn performers into portable commodities; Australia (or “this society”) can make them legible as citizens with stakes. His distinction between “that society” and “this society” is pointedly intimate: not “a society” but the one he actually wants to argue with, invest in, be shaped by.

It’s a loyalty statement, but with teeth. He’s rejecting prestige as a substitute for contribution, and admitting that aspiration without identification feels like a kind of ethical homelessness.