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Martin Henderson welcome to my podcast thanks Dominic I appreciate it mate mate I I appreciate you being here and [ __ ]
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you you're just as handsome in real life as what you are on Virgin River oh that's not true there's a lot of makeup
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and lighting that goes into that um I was watching an episode of it last night geez the arms do you you do look smaller
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now than what you look in Virgin River do you do you have like a workout regime that you yeah I do to get jacked up for
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that jacked up for Jack um yeah I do tend to just been um I've actually been
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unwell recently so that's part of yeah I haven't really been exercising the way
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they normally do I had to go into a hospital for an emergency procedure about two months ago so oh you okay I'm
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fine now yeah thankfully thanks to good doctors yeah yeah so um but normally yeah I try I try to work out I think for
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my mental health as much as anything it's super important jeez and you're
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you're turning 50 in October you're looking good you you're feeling good I
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just about spat my I water out when you said that number I was feeling good until you
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brought that up man I'm I'm envious I'm I'm just about to turn 51 oh you look
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good come on thank you I feel like I have got um better looking with age but you look you look at shots of you you've
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never had an ugly face it's it's not like you've grown into being 50 you've
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just been handsome a handsome [ __ ] the whole way through [ __ ] it you're very
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kind that makes me nervous what are you really going to ask me I feel like you're buttering me up here
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no no absolutely not I'm just I'm honored that you're here um I do I do do
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quite a bit of research from my guests that come on the podcast um a lot of that research involves like seeing
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what's on YouTube uh seeing what other podcasts they been on have you is this
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your first podcast I did one podcast with Kim Crossman in La pretty depressed yes a
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few years ago um I'd known Kim from sort of shorten Street circles for years and
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i' actually come across it uh separate to her and I just heard sort of the I
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felt what she was trying to put out there was really important and then she said would I come on and so yes I did
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that so I'm not a virgin I'm not this is from Virgin River but not not a podcast
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virin um okay gez there's so much to unpe with you it's been um it's been a
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hell of a life and a hell of a career and I feel like you just sort of hitting your straps now at middle age
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um but you know it's quite funny like when you're when you're living New
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Zealand and you watch your career it feels like Greatest Hits it's like oh yeah Martin's on sh Street Martin's in
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Australia Martin's on a Nicholas Cage [ __ ] movie Martin's doing a thing
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with Naomi wats but when you when you dig beneath the surface there's a lot of
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a lot of downtime in between these things so I'm guessing there's a hell of
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a backstory and a lot of adversity and a lot of struggle for the artist yeah there is um and I don't want it to be a
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poor me story cuz I it's a happy ending yeah I do I uh I I do feel fortunate in a way because I felt
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like some things went my way uh I don't I don't believe in luck per se I think you create your luck by
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creating opportunity and seizing opportunity and withstanding the inevitable adversity um and that's not
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luck that's probably more about perseverance and and believing in yourself and tenacity and all those sort
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of character things things that you've got to build up um and I definitely had
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a huge amount of challenges around just sticking it out but at the same time I do feel lucky you know I kind of I felt
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like when I arrived into Cal into La originally um I I got an agent and a manager overnight you know and I know a
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lot of people that just just that little step towards their Hollywood dream can take a long time and there's a lot of
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rejection just trying to get representation but because I'd had a pretty substantial body of work both in
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Australia and New Zealand prior to going there that certainly was a nice calling
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card you know and I think rep representatives were like oh okay this kid's worked in New Zealand Australia
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he's got some chops so let's sign him and hopefully you know something happens
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um but then once you've got the the agent and the manager you know there's all the the auditioning and the
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the setbacks and the rejection and the politics within Hollywood and who knows who
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yeah that's part of what I'm intrigued about you though because um there there
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are so many so many so many Crossroads in the Martin Henderson story where you could have taken the easy Road and you
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didn't you took the other one like you could have and and this is this is no
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discredit to him whatsoever because it's been a hell of a career but um Michael
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galin who's Dr Chris Warner on shortland Street started at the same time as you
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he had a wonderful career just remaining on on shortland Street you could have done that you could have stayed on home
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and away or one of the shows in Australia but instead you made life difficult for yourself many many times
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yeah I I guess I did um my dad out no no I think that's a fair assessment my dad
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brought that up when I was in LA um and I you know it was rough and I was struggling to get sort of my career
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really started and and he suggested that I come home you know he's like mate he
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said I understand you want to be like Russell Crow and I get that I I can but but you've got a career in New Zealand
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you know and Australia you could just come home and he was sort of trying to open the door um to me to take that
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easier option um but it's not what I wanted you know I think I think from a really I did from a
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really early age and and I saw that possibility and I think it would have been hard for me to ignore that
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potential CU then I feel like I would have been letting myself down because they were it was about what I had seen
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and what I thought I would like to achieve and um also I got yeah I remember on shorton street I was getting
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ready to negotiate my last year on that and uh I'm not going to say his name but
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anyway the producer um during the negotiations I sort of said well you know I think I'll
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do one more year and then I'm going to go and he's like and he said where you
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going to go and I'm like I don't know I want to go I want to do film and and he
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laughed at me and he just and he said you can't do film you can't do fil and I
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think when someone tells me I can't do something the [ __ ] I can I was like yeah
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so I think that that one conversation was uh probably the very opposite of what he
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was angling for cuz I think he wanted me to stay and I was like but when he said
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I couldn't I was like all right [ __ ] you I will um I'll prove you yeah so yeah
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haters are your motivators sometimes yeah there's um there's a saying I really like and I feel like it applies
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to you it goes something like um a ship is safe in the harbor but that's not
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what ships are for yeah yeah I like that saying a lot yeah so okay and You' got
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to Lo lose sight of the shore for a long time before you find a new land and it's
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a terrifying thing oh it is it's it's yeah it's challenging and it's scary and
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then of course all the demons come up the self-doubt the insecurity you know am I enough have I done the right thing
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you know all that just that mental chatter that can kind of limit your your own ambition and belief in yourself and
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then that then then the real work starts you know it's not about having acting
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chops you know figuring out who you are as as a person yeah it's that deep sort
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of Dark Night of the Soul stuff where you're confronted with how much you believe in yourself how much you love
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yourself um what you value you know what your dreams really are because it can I
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think it's very easy to listen to what everybody else wants for you um and I
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actually was very fortunate uh just before doing the ring you mentioned Army Watts before that
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movie I've been living in Paris for a while I was with a French girl and loving my life it was incredible um but
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I was sort of my career was on I was very distracted by all the art galleries and the Fantastic nature of Paris um and
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her of course and I was like man I've really got to get back to myself and someone had mentioned the artist's way I
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don't know if you're familiar with this book I've got that c says to get up
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every morning and write for 90 minutes exactly yeah and then each week you've
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got these different uh activities and you take yourself on an artist date where you do something that is
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Meaningful to you or inspiring somehow and and and a lot of the exercises in the book were really
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examining whose ideas and and um commentary on you are still playing out in your own mind you know what limiting
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beliefs are actually just inherited from somebody that's passed comment or judgment on you and that you've sort of
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taken to heart and it can obviously be your parents or School teachers mates the church society as a whole you know
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whatever the collective Consciousness thinks is right you know you you kind of take on these I ideas as truths but
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they're not they're just what someone else said um or or believed for their
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own subjective reasons but and that book was really helpful in just sort of examining that it was almost like a form
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of self therapy and then realizing like that is utter [ __ ] what I'm carrying
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in my head that's not what I believe about myself you know and that was a really instrumental moment I think in my
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life and my career too where I I felt very Unshackled by ideas that weren't really mine yeah yeah
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that's interesting yeah that's really interesting I love it I love that book
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yeah do oh I love it and I think it's fascinating the Genesis of the book you
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know was a woman Julia Cameron she was married to Martin scolesi who was a genius filmmaker and and in order to
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accomplish his genius results a lot of energy had to be poured into him and Julia who was a a talent in her own
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right she was a writer and a screenwriter and a poet uh her career kind of fell by the way Wayside and that
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book actually came about from her after divorcing Martin Scorsese she had to she
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had to reinvent herself and she had writers block she didn't believe in herself anymore so a lot of the
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exercises in there were things that she developed for herself to kind of get back to her true self as an artist and
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and reclaim her talent and so has a very deep personal Genesis to it that I found
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really compelling and yeah I I tell a lot of young actors or artists or kids that are sort of starting out and I'm
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like just do that do that book I really believe in it I've literally got a copy
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of it out there I've I think I bought it on the recommendation of someone fli
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through it and never stuck to it but I'm going to get back to it well it's
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challenging because it it's it requires a discipline and I homor I think I might
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have had one or two false starts yeah you know and there's always some excuse
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that you got to do something but um yeah when I finally committed to doing it you
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write a little contract at the beginning you know sort of saying that I will uphold this commitment and and do it and
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and and make it a priority and uh I I found it was hugely beneficial yeah okay so you're from the North Shore of
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Oakland like born and raised at all your education there um there was something I
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read about you so your parents an and Ian and Veronica um they they broke up when you were five and yeah I'm I'm
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intrigued about that because um you're 49 I'm 50 my parents had a separation
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when I was about eight and I I'm sorry oh I'm dealing it's not fun they got back
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together and actually that was the worst thing anyway okay oh yeah that that would have been terrible on but it was
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interesting at the at the time because um I remember the the only other kid in my class at school in palis North was my
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mate Craig and his parents had broken up and so my experience of like being from
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the split home was seeing Craig getting presents every Friday and Saturday with his dad so I was quite excited by it
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what was your exper what do you remember being five in your appearance breaking up I think I had the opposite experience
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to you and that it it it was it was hugely traumatic for me I think because at that
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age five you know you haven't developed any form of an identity outside of the
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family unit you know my mom my dad my sister the family cat Sammy which my dog was
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actually named after um was was my everything you know and our little backyard and I just started
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primary school and walking to car lands Primary School in in tiangi and everything about the the insula nature
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of that family was was my world and everything outside of that world was was exciting but it was the unknown which
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can be terrifying and I think when the when my family imploded and it was quite um I mean and there was a lot of arguing
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between my parent you know it was a horrible leadup to the actual split uh which was equally traumatic to to
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witness your parents sort of spewing that kind of hatred back at each other and overhearing things that that you just
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shouldn't because your your sense of security is so rattled that the people that you love and depend on are
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clearly not enjoying each other you you start well who's looking after me and
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then when it split we we then left tiangi we moved to the NorthShore and I you know I was the new kid at biren head
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primary and I was the opposite no one that I knew had parents that were divorced you know it just wasn't a thing
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was it not the late 1970s not much no and you know we if if they did they'd probably been together longer than my
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parents had and by then you know maybe the kids had developed some sense of self outside of the family and they can
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maybe better equipped to deal with it uh even my sister who was two years older she she did better than me I think with
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handling it but I yeah I I just really struggled and I felt a huge sense of shame because I felt what's wrong with
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me what's you know and like am I not enough or something why yeah or just my
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family if they're my family's not together what's wrong with us like we're
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the family's broken and sort of thinking well then I'm must be broken somehow and
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and I didn't see any evidence that it was normal it was so abnormal I felt like an outsider and so I nursed a lot
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of that really quietly um yeah I just sort of silently struggle with all those feelings and and Har this deep hope that
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my parents would get back to together and I think for a couple years I felt like I was brokering the piece and if
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you know if I could somehow you know convince them you know and obviously it was all futile um and quite
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heartbreaking um yeah that's a lot so that was yeah was been thinking about it
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like five six s yeah it was was it was a lot to to take on and and I don't know
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you know I think I've obviously examined it a lot over the years and therapy and
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um one thing though i' I've come to find to be true is often the thing that's the
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most the most challenging or the the darkest also within that is the opportunity for the most light meaning
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that it's in those things that we're we're called upon to find out our deeper
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selves and our our self-reliance you know and so I think at quite a young age uh for me nature was a huge sense of
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solid you know I spent a lot of time on my own in nature and in the New Zealand Bush and and establishing a really
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profound relationship with the natural world CU it it was a safe place for me and and a truly inspiring place I
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derived a lot of joy and and I I saw a lot of mysticism of creation within nature
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and it it sort of spoke to me of something much bigger than all of us and so in a way as yeah I was forced through
00:16:00
the hardship of that to also develop sides of myself at a really young age that I probably wouldn't never have been
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inclined to do if if I didn't have that yeah it's a lot I feel like for kids
00:16:10
going through that now there's like a lot better tools and a lot better resources and things like that but back
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then it's like your parents didn't know what the [ __ ] they were doing either no
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no and they didn't even I mean we didn't know that was the thing you know
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I we we weren't even we weren't consulted let alone really briefed on the matter it just sort of happened and
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so as a child you're you're just in the slipstream of this chaos kind of trying
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to make sense of it all and having to accept what's happening um with with very huge amount of powerlessness you
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know whereas I think now there's a lot of research on on people like me uh ex
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showing that you know it's important to to really talk to the children and and
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nurture them through that and support them in a way that uh they they requ choire so I think you know we've come a
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long way since then and and they're all good now you mentioned your dad earlier
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in the conversation they both married out the people yeah yeah yeah they both in fact my dad's celebrating his 40th
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wedding anniversary in two weeks so we're going down to Raglin to celebrate that yeah which is where he got married
00:17:16
back then in 1980 or whatever it was yeah8 83 they must they must be proud of proud of you not not in terms of an
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acting perspective in your successful career but just of um yeah the man you are yeah I think so um we're not really
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a family that talk openly about that though is mine no it's funny I mean but
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do you tell each other you you love each other often oh yeah yeah we do but we don't sort of my my dad told me he was
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proud of me once um yeah what was that the Britney video I think it was around that time
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but I don't I don't think that was the reason um yeah no we just yeah just not
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that kind of overtly so you tell each other you love each other but you just don't show a lot of like vulnerability
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or no not a huge amount no maybe it's a generation an ER thing or I think it's
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generational yeah uh my my mom more so um although she I think my mom gets so overwhelmed with with her feelings if
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things are really triggering for her and she feels vulnerable and you she sort of
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really tries you know to not cry which is quite sweet she can't help herself
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and it all sort of comes yeah yeah um and then so when you're like 12 or 13 um
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that's when there's a casting call at your school for a TV show called strangers oh there I am look at that
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cute little kid look at that kid oh so happy so did you you you wanted to do acting before then what was your I read
00:18:49
somewhere that you saw um a couple of movies like a Harrison Ford movie which I'm guessing
00:18:53
was RA the last St yeah maybe or Star Wars perhaps or and a movie as well which must have been Superman Superman
00:19:01
yeah no I watched all those growing up my dad would take us yeah Superman Star Wars um I think I was always enamored
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with with movies and and going into the theater and being taken on this journey and and the story and
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and I I don't know if it's so much the escapism of it or just just relishing
00:19:23
the world and I Lov the score swelling and especially back then you know like the Civic actually I wed pass the Civic
00:19:28
Theater the other day with a friend of mine and I was just remembering how much reverence I had for that with the stars
00:19:34
on the ceiling and I had a very very romantic notion of of film and and I think yeah I I thought it would be
00:19:42
fun um but it's a really hard thing when back then too you know there was no
00:19:47
Russell Crow I mean Sam Neil hadn't done Jurassic Park yet so there was sort of
00:19:53
it was such a world away that the dream of of being an actor just felt like it belong to other people in another in
00:20:00
another part of the world um well the world the world was so disconnected back then like uh you Los
00:20:08
Angeles may as well have been the moon yeah you know like similar age to you all over wanted growing up was um some
00:20:15
of those sea monkeys that were advertised on the B of comics yeah but you couldn't buy stuff
00:20:20
online no no yeah we were so far away yeah yeah so then so then so so strangers so there's a casting call at
00:20:27
your school or something uh yes so I had done a school play at the end of standard 4 which is now grade
00:20:35
six I think whatever they call it year six um the end of primary school a m of mine's dad had written an adaptation of
00:20:42
Cinderella and it was sort of a musical with with punks in it uh it was really awesome and uh we put it on as a school
00:20:52
play and I just I thought that would be so fun I put my hand up so that was my first acting job
00:20:59
um and then I started writing the speeches I really liked being on stage I liked I like the idea of
00:21:08
conveying important things I felt like there was something really great and I saw I'd write speeches about animal
00:21:15
cruelty you know and and animal rights and stuff but with humor and I really like the idea that you could stand in
00:21:20
front of people and hold their attention and and make them laugh but maybe maybe
00:21:25
make them feel something or think about something important so that was all I thought that was
00:21:29
cool uh and then at the end of uh form two at Intermediate School TV and Z were going around all the the schools in
00:21:37
ockland asking schools to submit four or five kids that would be right for these
00:21:42
roles and my mate actually was going I was going to play uh football uh American football we're playing grid
00:21:51
iron and my mate who plays every day was going the other way and I said Michael I
00:21:56
said M where you going and he said I'm going to the library I'm like why are
00:21:59
you going to the library at lunchtime he said oh they're auditioning for a TV
00:22:02
show for TV and z and I was like no way I want to go so I went along with him and still today he gives me a bit of
00:22:09
beef because I got I got the butt and he yeah and he didn't but he was he was a
00:22:15
really good skateboarder and my character in that show strangers was supposed to be a skateboarder and I
00:22:19
couldn't skate so I got him a job as as my skate double St double oh you look
00:22:24
you look you hooked him up yeah yeah he's doing fine he I don't think he
00:22:28
matters anymore but it is quite funny yeah he yeah so anyway that's he's
00:22:32
forgiven you but every every time he um go goes on Netflix and virgin That Could
00:22:36
Have Been Me it that was my destiny so um yeah then you go to West Lake and um I I believe you play rugby
00:22:45
and you're quite a good flanker I was all right yeah yeah I mean I was really
00:22:49
fit I think I was I just I started doing a lot of Athletics when I was young I was quite a good long distance runers a
00:22:55
lot of CR cross country 1500 m 800 M um yeah and I just did a lot I just play I just loved being outside so
00:23:04
I grew up um I was fortunate you know I I just did a lot of sport anything I could so when I got to play rugby I
00:23:12
think I was just super fit so I could just go and get it to the breakdown pretty pretty quick for the whole game
00:23:18
you know I didn't need much of a so I think that was my superpower did you have have like a no face roll like guys
00:23:24
no knees in the face no no I took I took some knees man I broke my nose couple of
00:23:29
times um I'd get blood noses almost every game cuz yeah some of those boys were pretty big but you know it was
00:23:35
weight restricted at high school so it was never yeah and then um so uh 1992 uh your 17 shortland Street comes along um
00:23:44
sh stre still still going now but it's um you the landscape of freedare TV has
00:23:50
has changed so much that it doesn't have the sort of like cultural yeah all the
00:23:54
reach it does now but back then uh what are your Recollections of that time I'm
00:23:59
guessing you were like propelled to like Nationwide stom almost immediately yeah
00:24:04
I have very mixed memories of that time because it was hugely exciting to you know this was the first time New Zealand
00:24:14
had ever attempted to produce anything like this you know we'd had neighbors
00:24:18
we' had home and away and of course there was Coronation Street and these sort of things Sons and Daughters yeah
00:24:25
yeah yeah but New Zealand had never attempted to do it and so when I got cast and it was a big deal cuz I got
00:24:31
cast at the end of my six form year I I uh so I had to decide whether I was going to um do this or not uh and Miss A
00:24:40
year of school um and the intention was to do one year save some money and then I'd go and continue my school at
00:24:47
University and put myself the university and um so it seemed like a good one-year
00:24:51
plan and then when when we started we were so terrible I mean you look at those early the makeups horrific the
00:24:59
hairstyles bad I mean everything's bad the you know the scripts weren't great
00:25:03
the acting was worse um actually I did want to Prett bad I'll just pause you
00:25:08
there I wanted to ask you about that because you watch it now and it does look it looks pretty clumsy and pretty
00:25:13
bad but was was it good at the time and it's just now that the the lighting's
00:25:18
got better and the do you know what I mean was it good for the time or was it still [ __ ] at the time I my I I haven't
00:25:25
actually admittedly watched any of it since it came to a but my memory of it was those first 6 months particularly we
00:25:33
were all scrambling to learn our jobs cuz no one had there wasn't no one had
00:25:37
done it before um and it was a huge demand I mean you're shooting so quickly
00:25:42
so you're you got to know your stuff as an actor and get in there do scene after
00:25:46
scene after scene very little break very few attempts it takes you know if something goes wrong so you've got to be
00:25:52
on your game in a way that I think caught me by surprise and I think most of us but we just we just just were
00:25:58
committed to it and it got better and it got a little bit better and then before
00:26:01
you knew it it it was decent and I think we all learned our jobs really quickly and and it was the first time new
00:26:08
zealanders got to see what is it 7:00 every night every weekday saw themselves reflected in the characters you know was
00:26:15
New Zealand accents and New Zealand locations social and political and cultural issues that were very unique to
00:26:22
New Zealand and I think that was a huge part why people were so enamored with it
00:26:28
is cuz it was like watching ourselves and but then with that of course came this
00:26:34
massive uh popularity and and success and visibility and you know New Zealand's a small I mean Oakland's a
00:26:41
small place um and as a young what was I 17year old I think having that level of
00:26:49
attention I found really difficult and I didn't the first few months I loved it I thought it was
00:26:55
kind of cool intoxicating initi it was like oh oh yeah you you know and very easy to meet girls and all that so it
00:27:02
felt like it was great but it very quickly became something that I just was not comfortable with because I realized
00:27:10
I like I love living my life with a sense of Freedom I've always felt that and when you're that sort of much in a
00:27:18
goldfish where you're the one that's being viewed and and and looked at you
00:27:23
you start to feel quite constricted and restricted and I and I hate it I didn't
00:27:28
like going out I didn't like people looking at me while I ate my meal I didn't like sitting at the traffic and
00:27:33
people looking at me in my car I just like oh my God so I started riding a motorbike so I just wore a helmet and I
00:27:39
F you know I just I really I really rebelled against the that side of it and yeah it wasn't fun yeah but you did you
00:27:49
have people like just yelling out um Stuart your character's name m Martin yeah yeah yeah and I like to go out you
00:27:55
know I was young and I I I loved going out and so most of the people I I would see out were were probably half drunk
00:28:03
and you know it was just a lot it was just a lot of energy that came your way everywhere you went it was just and it
00:28:09
was a it was I found it was too much to have to be constantly then putting out too you know I kind of in in some ways
00:28:17
I'm quite an introvert um I get tired from sort of having to your social battery yeah I kind of yeah I get really
00:28:25
uh wound down yeah yeah was the um was the money okay at the time do you remember how much you were
00:28:30
getting paid straight out of school I don't remember the figures but it was really good for a 17y old kid that was
00:28:37
sort of finishing High School yeah so your parents okay with that like obviously you're a smart kid like you
00:28:41
had aspirations to go to university and get a like a business degree or whatever
00:28:45
yeah were they were they like okay you can do this for a year sort of thing was that the I think so that was yeah that
00:28:50
was the original plan and it made a lot of sense and I I had a really good six form year so I I got into University
00:28:58
early I could have I could have actually gone in my last year of high school but
00:29:02
that wasn't appealing because all my mates were were still at high school I didn't like the idea of going there on
00:29:07
my own so it made sense to do a year save some money it's really good money for that age and then I would yeah I'd
00:29:15
start University with all my mates you know and have a good time and get back to to real life but I think it was
00:29:21
during that because before then I'd always had this dream or maybe fantasy of being an
00:29:29
actor and I remember being like maybe eight years old and someone had given me I got a um a poster of Porsches you know
00:29:38
it had all the Porsches models at that time in the sort of early 80s and I put on my wall and I'd go to bed and I I
00:29:45
remember even then before I'd even acted like oh one day I'd love to go to
00:29:48
Hollywood and have a Porsche you know which I never I never I never got the Porsche by the way but I it was just
00:29:54
this young kind of fantasy thing you know that's what success looks like yeah
00:29:59
when when I was that age it did and um but I think when doing it every day and then and I started well first of all
00:30:09
I wanted to get good at it I wasn't happy enough with my performance and I would I would go and I would ask the
00:30:15
editors to give me the reals of all of the footage of the previous Day stuff and between my breaks of filming I would
00:30:23
just watch and watch and I would I would watch to see where I felt like I was doing a good job where I felt like I was
00:30:28
falling short and and I would analyze it and I pretty I'd start to okay that's
00:30:33
good that's not good and so I sort of self-educated myself and I just had this
00:30:37
drive I wanted to be better I didn't think what I was doing was good enough wow and and that and that then fueled
00:30:45
this this that's when I started thinking about it I was like okay I think I could
00:30:49
do this and then I won an award and I think that was definitely the moment um it was the New Zealand film and
00:30:55
television awards at the end of that year year and I was shocked I was shocked I was nominated I thought they'd
00:31:01
made a mistake and then I was in the final three which felt a huge Triumph and then to win it was just this
00:31:08
overwhelming sense of I think it was oh I I can do this someone on the right TR someone else
00:31:15
said I I'm doing a good enough job so therefore my dreams they don't have to
00:31:20
be dreams anymore this is this is real and it was from that moment that I just went okay I think this is what I'm going
00:31:26
to do and I just quite started to Fig forget about the idea of a different career that's that's amazing the thing
00:31:33
that you said before about going through the I had um Andrew Webster who's the
00:31:37
coach of the NL te the Warriors sitting at here the other day and he introduced he's only been the Warriors coach for
00:31:42
the past year and he introduced a thing called Extreme ownership which is a like
00:31:45
a Navy sales SAS sort of thing and it's he said in the past um you kill anyone
00:31:50
that's in your way yeah that's one in the past the the coaches have like isolated video clips of all the
00:31:57
players and then giving them like a you know a video file to watch but he said extreme ownership is the players going
00:32:03
through the video files themselves and then working out what they need to work on which sounds like you didn't have a
00:32:07
label but that's exactly what you were doing back in Shand Street yeah yeah yeah it's
00:32:13
remarkable just just a quest for self-improvement yeah and I think the only way I can get better is to sort
00:32:19
of objectively look at it and say okay well I you know and i' I'd grown up
00:32:24
watching a lot of TV man I I was a TV addict I would get up on a Sunday if my parents were sleeping in I you know I'd
00:32:33
go in there and try to wake them up and then roll so I'd go and I'd turn on the
00:32:37
TV I would watch the test pattern remember the test I seriously would I would watch I would just look at the
00:32:43
lines and the colors and the and the crisscross and you know I mean I just love TV and then to the man of born
00:32:50
would come on and praise be on a Sunday in a dog show I just consumed everything
00:32:56
that that was on the TV all of it British stuff American stuff comedy dramas you know and I so i' I think I'd
00:33:04
grown up watching so much that I I think I was a pretty good judge then I when I
00:33:07
watch myself and I'd be like N I don't really believe myself in that moment
00:33:11
that didn't really work you know um so it was probably just an extension of this this sort of little addiction I had
00:33:19
as a kid that I just I watched films my granddad he was a you know he was in World War II and he flew in Lancaster
00:33:26
bomb and we would watch the Battle of Britain and um The Bouncing bomb movie and I mean just all sorts of the multi
00:33:35
Falcon and Bridge over River choai just watched a lot of World War II he'd never
00:33:39
talk about the war but we would watch War films together and um and of course all the Blockbusters and so yeah I had a
00:33:47
voracious appetite for for watching stuff as a kid so how long did you say short streate was it two years three
00:33:54
three years I think it was it was maybe a month or two shy of the of three yeah something like that why did you decide
00:33:59
to leave it that was it your point to leave was it your decision to leave yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah why you just etchy
00:34:04
feet I just had enough I think I'd had enough um I'd just put everything I
00:34:11
could into that at that age and also the other the the the public stuff like I said like that I found that really
00:34:19
demanding and draining and I and I got sick of it um would have been so easy to stay the way like go golden handcuffs in
00:34:25
a way you know security you've got an acting job you're doing what you love
00:34:29
you're getting paid good money just the security of it that would have in the
00:34:32
path of least resistance yeah but I I just had enough of it I just I think it was mainly the
00:34:40
the fame part of it I just I just got bored with it and and it just it just I don't know it wasn't fun anymore um I
00:34:49
didn't want to be on on that show and be so front and center and so well known
00:34:55
and um it started to deplete my joy for the acting and then and when I first left shorton street I was like okay
00:35:01
that's it I'm done I'm going to I didn't know what I was going to do for a moment
00:35:05
I mean I love sailing I'd grown up sailing and I was like I'm going to work
00:35:09
on sailboats and I sort of started researching how I might start getting into that industry and then my agent
00:35:15
called me and said look I know you don't want to do any acting but uh there's the
00:35:19
show in in Australia uh called Echo point that they're being that's being produced and
00:35:25
I've spoken to the producers about you and if you're interested they'd love to
00:35:29
meet you and blah so so I was like okay and I got you know I was yeah I was 20 and it meant leaving New Zealand and
00:35:37
moving to Sydney which was sort of really exciting at that age uh and so then that that was what then sent me to
00:35:44
Australia and kept doing it and so you did it yeah Echo Point home in away a show called sweat was sweat the one in I
00:35:54
saw some some of that on YouTube the other day yeah is that it's not a great
00:35:58
I don't think it was great great show no I don't think I don't think you're like a it's like a you're
00:36:03
in like a swim squad or something yeah it was a bunch of sort of young adults that were vying for their Olympian you
00:36:10
know shot and slot in the Olympic teams it was about a a sports academy that was
00:36:16
training these these these talented potentials and and the interpersonal relationships and the politics and the
00:36:23
setbacks and you know who had the whatever it wasn't very good probably making you sound better than it really
00:36:28
was I on YouTube it was like that it felt like a step down from shortland straighted away but I I don't know I
00:36:34
don't what the [ __ ] do I know yeah and I I was I actually took that job because
00:36:38
my girlfriend at the time uh I started dating someone who was working and when I went to Sydney to work on Echo point I
00:36:46
started dating a woman that worked in the production uh office and then and she was from Perth and she said to me oh
00:36:54
I'm going to Perth to do the show blah blah you should look into it and I was like oh well I thought oh it's a way
00:37:00
for us to stay together for a little bit and um so that's actually that was my
00:37:06
algebra for why I I I took that job but yeah that's where I met Heath Ledger he
00:37:11
was Perth resident he was 16 and um we became Good Buds and you know a lot of good things came out of that yeah yeah
00:37:20
what are your Recollections of that of like like meeting Heath for the first time did you guys just like sort of bond
00:37:25
and bur down straight away yeah we did the first time I met him he walked into the room he was late it was the cast
00:37:32
read through and he walked in the door and I instantly knew the guy was going to be a star he hadn't even opened his
00:37:38
mouth he hadn't I hadn't heard him read a line of dialogue or anything it was
00:37:43
just what he carried as as as a well he was a kid he was 16 um this this presence and this Charisma that he that
00:37:53
he had and I was like wow that guy is going to be somebody and so so you were you more seasoned
00:37:59
actor than he was at that stage with your three years of shortland Street yeah was that his first job yeah well no
00:38:05
he I think he had done one other little job maybe a year prior I think it was his second job but yeah um yeah I guess
00:38:13
I was like the older wise and experienced this is what season veteran yeah yeah yeah no I never gave him
00:38:20
acting tips I never gave him acting tips and and you you guys um you were you were flat mates we
00:38:27
yeah when that show ended I moved back to syney and I called him up and I just said mate you you're you're going to do
00:38:34
so well trust me on this just come to Sydney you need to you know you need to get out of Perth you need to be kind of
00:38:41
where the where the big Market is and and um and he did him and his best mate jumped in a car and they drove across
00:38:48
Australia and they arrived in Sydney and uh then we yeah we got a house in Bondi
00:38:53
with another kiwi made of mine and and M Madness ued yeah is there any any Tales of
00:39:01
[Laughter] Madness you've been um I can't remember them that well I don't know if this is
00:39:07
still still accurate or if you drink now at all but you you've been sober since
00:39:11
27 uh 27 years old so these were some loose years oh yeah yeah they were everything Bond they
00:39:18
were the they were the years that that made me realize I probably need to get sober is that
00:39:25
so yeah no they were fun um they were definitely fun but they were they were good good memories to
00:39:32
look look back on now from the perspective of a a middle-aged man of an older dude yeah I mean look it it's I
00:39:37
think it's a a ride of Passage you know you're you're way from home you're young
00:39:42
we were working we were earning good money we were having fun which is the only thing
00:39:48
you were seriously interested in outside to work was just how can you have the most fun and and Sydney's a very fun
00:39:54
town um you it was awesome I mean your early 20s and flatting with with good mates and doing work you love and yeah
00:40:05
just it was great down at Bondi and um yeah but it was UN un uh untenable could keep going on time a
00:40:16
moment a moment in time but but you you guys were like really good mates right like you you went to Prague to to hang
00:40:23
out with him when he was filming a nights tale yeah yeah over well my girlfriend was in the movie too
00:40:29
so um yeah so yeah it was weird our lives were just sort of always quite entwined and uh I stayed at his house in
00:40:39
La he bought a really lovely house after he did the Patriot I think it was um and
00:40:45
he was traveling so much because you know then he was working on different stuff so and I was I was still sort of
00:40:52
quite new to La at that point and just sort of trying to start my my own career over there and um so yeah but there were
00:41:00
a lot of people that stayed in that house it was kind of like a flop house for wannabe Australian New Zealand
00:41:05
actors that were coming through town really like hemsworths or is this preh himsworth I think it was pre Hemsworth
00:41:11
they hadn't even sort of arrived on the scene but um every everybody everybody
00:41:16
else yeah at that time in the sort of the early early 2000s yeah yeah that's
00:41:22
amazing and and what about um um news of his death like we do you remember where
00:41:27
you were what you were doing yeah yeah no I remember it very very well what did he die of it was like just some a
00:41:32
cocktail of like Pharmaceuticals like sleeping pills and yeah accidental right 100% accidental yeah no that man had so
00:41:40
much to live for um his da his daughter just one giant thing I think that alone um he would never ever have chosen um to
00:41:50
not be around for her um but also his work you know the he was oh the Joker was exceptional oh yeah and he said to me I
00:42:00
remember we spoke on the phone he was in London he said Mario I think I finally figured out the acting thing F this is I
00:42:07
finally figured out how to do it you know and until that point he really didn't believe that he knew what he was
00:42:11
doing he was just trying to figure it out and clearly when he he created that role he it was just such beautiful
00:42:20
profound work you know scary good and scary in that it was so dark you what he allowed himself to access you know um
00:42:29
and have the courage to to live in that own part of his psyche um was phenomenal uh you know
00:42:37
he's a true artist and yeah he was an inspiration even before that he was an
00:42:42
inspiration to me even though he was younger than me he was such a beautiful friend he was so generous you know and
00:42:50
and so passionate and uh yeah it's he's do you remember your last conversation I do I do um yep and we
00:43:03
yeah we were getting closer and closer and that's why it was really sad you know I I um our friendship was actually
00:43:10
starting to really build again because when I got sober I kind of distanced myself from a lot of people in that
00:43:17
scene because they they were definitely not sober uh you just have to don't you
00:43:23
you have to like Shar your old friend group for a while yeah too much temptation to and just yeah you can't do
00:43:29
two things at once so um but yeah it'll be it's there was a real real big loss
00:43:36
you know personally but just for the world that he would have gone on to do I believe so much more incredible work you
00:43:43
know not not just as an actor but I think as a director too you know he he was just dipping his toe into that and
00:43:49
he had a script that he was really passionate he was developing that he wanted to direct and um he was an
00:43:54
amazing photographer and just yeah well it was just going from strength to strength even the the I
00:44:00
suppose the cute movies early on like two hands or a nights tail they just great 10 Things I had about you just
00:44:06
great just great movies and Brokeback Mountain just phenomenal yeah brilliant incredible yeah you actually um this is
00:44:11
after Heath's death you worked um on a movie called Everest with Jake Gyllenhaal did you guys s did you know
00:44:17
Jake before that did do you bond with him over your Mutual connection with Heath um no not really
00:44:26
no um no Jake Jake he sort of came into that movie for a very short time you know he works a lot I think it was one
00:44:37
of those things where his agent managed to get him he finished one movie and then he slipped in to shoot most of that
00:44:45
stuff was I think up in the mountains right um so he wasn't really around as
00:44:51
much as the entire cast and I think he was getting ready to do Southpaw because I remember he was training and we spent
00:44:59
some time actually in Italy we were up at this um in the Dolomite mountains and it was you know very high up and he was
00:45:07
getting ready to train and I was like I'll train with you and and he had a whole little routine that we were doing
00:45:12
but it was really hard because there was no oxygen you know it's really really
00:45:15
hard to work out at that at that yeah it was brutal yeah and the two of us we didn't even get through it but um yes I
00:45:23
think he was going off to shoot that movie so didn't see didn't spend that
00:45:26
much time with them yeah yeah yeah it's funny I suppose you have this perception
00:45:29
as like a movie Watcher that oh they must be like bowing out on the mountain or yeah no some other people though that
00:45:35
was a beautiful experience um Jason Clark who you know was an Aussie actor who actually my very first film role was
00:45:43
in a film in Sydney right before I left Australia to go to the states and Jason played sort of the nasty mean guy um and
00:45:53
I just but I just remember him being on set I such a fan of his I watched him work and he just had this kind of this
00:45:59
Brando esque quality to him I remember as a really young actor just going that guy's going to do great and you know and
00:46:06
he he's done amazing so that was a real joy to be back with him years later and
00:46:10
we did a lot of our training for that movie we went to Ben Nevis in Scotland and climbed that uh but we also went
00:46:17
down to uh the Tasman glacia here and stayed in a Hut on the glacier and did some climbing and different training
00:46:24
here in New Zealand which was and yeah how good and then so then um after your um stun in how many years in
00:46:31
Australia how many years were you in Australia doing the the Soaps and whatnot I think it was three years total
00:46:37
yeah and then you decide to make life really difficult for yourself and you go to New York to become like a struggling
00:46:42
student yeah yeah you're right I I am taking the the the Hard Road aren't I
00:46:47
it's like when things start to get good you're like n this is too easy yeah from
00:46:52
what I've read about your time in New York two twoe twoe course stud studying
00:46:56
like the fundamentals of acting it sounds Grim like you're sleeping on a sleeping on a floor on a tiny mattress
00:47:02
uh you bartending job at a like a swingers club or a strip club or yeah an ory club or something like that yeah
00:47:09
yeah yeah no I it was definitely a challenging time again um yeah your appearance along the way
00:47:19
must been like mad what the [ __ ] doing you're self sabotaging yeah I I when you when you
00:47:27
say it like that I guess in hindsight it sounds like but in the moment you know I had I had started
00:47:34
acting really young I I kind of fell into it because it was something I just enjoyed doing so any opportunity I'd put
00:47:41
my hand up it created opportunities and then from those opportunities I was able
00:47:46
to build on it but I had never really studied acting like I said I'd studied
00:47:51
myself I'd selftaught um and a lot of the people that I was with working with had just
00:47:56
come out of drama school like Nida in Australia or or here in New Zealand and and I and I felt like there was some
00:48:03
part of my training that I was missing and um and I wasn't really I mean I was
00:48:11
successful that I kept getting work but I didn't feel like sweat and Echo point
00:48:15
and a lot of the jobs I was doing were I didn't feel like I was doing work that I
00:48:19
was that proud of um so I wanted to I wanted to work on stuff that I felt would challenge me in a way and I could
00:48:28
see what I was made of and I decided that studying theater would be the best way to do that because arguably the best
00:48:35
writing is in a play you know a playright goes away and toils and sweats over that stuff for years
00:48:42
sometimes um and you really can only be as good as the writing and so I I wanted
00:48:46
to immerse myself in a in a in a situation where that was the stuff that was fueling my ideas of acting um so I
00:48:55
was like like well where would you do that I guess London or New York and I was like well I don't love New York uh
00:49:00
London as much as I love New York so I'll go there um and then as soon as I made that decision I met uh my acting
00:49:06
teacher in Sydney uh Annie Swan um and she yeah just through a coincidence I I met this person and I started going to
00:49:16
her her house for acting classes and um and she really set me up for sort of leaving this part of the world and and
00:49:25
opening up my ideas and um and she educated me on Art and music and literature and plays and films and stuff
00:49:34
that you know as a Suburban kid from the NorthShore of ockland I hadn't really
00:49:38
come across you know and and I started getting this appetite for for other artists and and excellence and and what
00:49:45
is excellence and and developing some taste and kind of refining my own sense of what I want to do with my life you
00:49:53
know not just my work but my life and she was hugely instrumental in um making me grow up and get a get an education
00:50:02
and and so my idea of going to New York it it it wasn't to make it hard uh it
00:50:10
was to I guess find out what I was made of and and find out what I what I needed
00:50:15
to learn to be to be better um so and it was really really hard I had I known it was going to be as hard
00:50:24
as it was cuz of course then the new Zealand dollar was 36 oh yeah 36 um cents in the dollar you get it so it was
00:50:33
brutal three New Zealand dollars to one grand yeah yeah yeah so just that you know and I was like oh okay I've got to
00:50:39
go to work here just to pay my rent and as you know New York's so expensive and
00:50:43
were were you just chipping into savings you had some savings from I I had some savings yeah um but the extra yeah I
00:50:50
just I hadn't really budgeted as well as I could and I'd gone to Europe the
00:50:54
summer before with some mates and tow it around on a van and I bought this van and it blew up in Spain caught on fire
00:51:01
so I was like oh man okay the money's going down I'm going to school um but
00:51:07
yeah whatever I just but you do what you do you get your hustle right and that was cool I hadn't been in that position
00:51:13
before either um from a very early age I'd always had a pretty healthy paycheck
00:51:17
and now I was working yeah two two jobs you know double shifts on weekends restaurants bars
00:51:26
whatever it was um to just make in meet and even that was kind of cool in a way it was it was different
00:51:33
it was new and it was New York City and so did you did you kind of like maybe deep down the uh the concept of being
00:51:40
like a struggling artist yeah in a way I no I don't think I wore it as a badge because I I still
00:51:47
wanted to get back to being an artist that did actually wasn't struggling and
00:51:51
got paid for it a be yeah I didn't romanticize it to that extent but it was just the situation that I was in um and
00:51:59
I knew I was growing I was growing by being in that environment with other artists that were also passionate and
00:52:05
struggling and and I loved New York I loved the architecture and I loved I love the diversity and the the energy
00:52:14
and and the honesty of the people and um I just I just thrived in that and I felt Anonymous you know I mean I've been
00:52:22
in front of the camera for so long I've been everyone go places people knew who
00:52:26
I was no one knew who I was in New York I was free I could just go there and and
00:52:31
be inspired and um and I really yeah and I formed some great friendships and but I was very
00:52:39
quick once yeah I I to get back on the work train and get out to LA when the Pres opportunity presented itself yeah
00:52:46
yeah cuz so you were sleeping on like a like a like a camp mattress like a foam roll I slep mattress or something like
00:52:52
you didn't even have a bedroom or anything no when you put your head down on the pillow at night there must have
00:52:57
been nights where you're like what the [ __ ] are you doing um yeah there were there definitely were
00:53:04
moments um but I knew what I was doing I was I was um but there's no guarantee
00:53:09
like it's not like okay everything's going to be fine in a couple of years
00:53:13
it's it's on a like a hope really isn't it hope that everything's going to be
00:53:17
fine yeah but I didn't I didn't all I all I knew was that this was going to make me better better as a
00:53:25
man better as a artist you know I I knew it was challenging it was it was forcing
00:53:32
me to develop parts of my character that I'd never had before and that felt like
00:53:36
a really good thing um CU you never ever go if you never never go and I learned that I can struggle that I can fight you
00:53:47
know and that I won't roll over and I will do whatever has to be done sort of
00:53:50
built resilience yeah and I think that's important and and it probably did help
00:53:55
in in a way with the The Next Period of going to La and the rejection and and the struggle there you know and the
00:54:03
setbacks and um because you've you've touched that part of yourself that will
00:54:08
fight that won't give up you know and you don't take yourself you're not
00:54:12
precious about things and well you won't take the easy route you know cuz um and
00:54:17
I I think intuitively I I knew that it was building those parts of myself and that was a good thing that's a lot of
00:54:24
wisdom for a young fell I think and in hindsight like from the perspective of a 49y old man do you look back and think
00:54:30
[ __ ] I was I had my head screwed on the right way I don't think I would have had
00:54:35
the same sort of tenacity at that age I think if I was in your shoes at that age
00:54:38
after a couple of nights on a cockroach infested New York FL I would have been like I'm going to call up shortland
00:54:43
Street and see what's up yeah you know what I mean like there was yeah I suppose that's the thing you
00:54:49
did have like a a plan B back home like you know some doors would have opened for you but you'd have to come back with
00:54:54
your tail between leagues would agree yeah yeah and I did and I I I I believed in myself you know I backed myself and
00:55:01
that's and that's why I was there um I think if I didn't believe in myself then
00:55:05
I would have I wouldn't have taken that leap I would have just stay you know i'
00:55:09
just got into a film in Australia and that was a big deal back then you were either a TV actor or a film actor and I
00:55:14
managed to get cast in this film and that was that was huge um and there there was a moment I was like oh what am
00:55:20
I doing things are just starting to you know I'm on the right path here but um but i' I read a lot about the the
00:55:29
actor studio and that sort of that period of of of uh drama school in New York and the you know I was very curious
00:55:39
about that world and I want I wanted to be a part of it inspired me you know I started reading the plays and um I I
00:55:48
just I don't know I just found it attractive even it was hard it was still it was still inspiring it was still uh
00:55:55
you know and you're in New York City I mean yeah it's tough and you you you're
00:55:59
sleeping on a foam mattress on the floor and you've got a mate on the sofa and
00:56:02
another guy there and one guy's snoring and it's snowing outside and you know and you're worried about
00:56:08
how much money you've got at the end of the week for food but you're like well
00:56:11
if I do a double shift I guess I could get you know all my meals at the restaurant that night and um yeah it's
00:56:18
it's probably worth noting as well just um for anyone that's listening or
00:56:21
watching to this like this was a time where you couldn't just pick up your iPhone and FaceTime your family back
00:56:26
home and it cost nothing like no you had the calling cards you have the calling cards you scratch the code yeah or a
00:56:33
landline and or or even letter writing perhaps yeah there were no letters there were emails weren't there this was 2000
00:56:40
yeah yeah may this was 90 98 this was 98 to 99 so got to make it sound like ye olden
00:56:49
days yeah but it was the call cards how definitely felt like a long long way away compared to how us now though I
00:56:55
guess yeah yeah yeah totally yeah so then and then you drop out of that it's
00:56:59
a two-year course you drop out after one year I drop out after one year um voluntarily
00:57:07
um I I I decided I wanted to do some private uh tutoring um some other teachers just privately also because the
00:57:16
school took that was just just pragmatically I mean from 8 in the morning till 4 in the afternoon you're
00:57:23
at school and then I I get on my 10-speed bike and I'd cycle down town to the
00:57:29
restaurant um and clock in and then put on the thing and then work there and do a whole shift then cycle back up to my
00:57:36
apartment at night and come in the door and crash out then wake up to school and
00:57:41
I just felt like I I needed to have less time a more focused time of work of of my school rather um and a lot of the
00:57:51
stuff within the school I felt wasn't necessarily that important um so I wanted to do the second year just do
00:57:59
private study with an acting coach and then I just have more time to have a little more of a relaxed lifestyle but
00:58:07
uh a producer had seen that movie that I did in Australia just before I left and
00:58:12
it's quite a funny story it was I think it was a Tuesday morning it was Winter I
00:58:18
was not sober I was really hung over and my mates had gone to school and I was like I could hardly lift my my head off
00:58:25
the pillow and the school was very strict that you you would not miss a day of school even if you were sick
00:58:32
certainly if you were hung over um and they were like come on man you should come I'm like no I can't just go just
00:58:38
tell them I'm really sick so they go and about I don't know I fell back asleep
00:58:43
and the phone rings and I answer and I I'm like hello my head hurts you know and it's and this
00:58:50
guy's like oh yeah get a Martin I'm you know Lance I'm a producer in Hollywood
00:58:56
and I saw this movie that you did before you left Sydney and oh you're great and
00:59:00
I reckon you know and I said oh [ __ ] off and I thought it was my matate calling
00:59:05
from school so I hung up on him and then he Rings back again he's like why'd you
00:59:09
hang up on me like are you for real and then he's like yeah I'm actually a
00:59:13
producer and I was like oh I'm so sorry um anyway and that guy yeah Lance Reynolds um hooked me up man he came out
00:59:22
to New York and he took me to lunch and he said Hey look I just I saw this movie
00:59:26
I think you're really talented I think you have uh a future in Hollywood and if
00:59:32
I can help I'd i' be more than happy to introduce you to people and so then I
00:59:36
was like all right I'm not going back to school I think I'm going to go back and
00:59:39
do you know go back to work and and to his word um I finished the year and then I flew out to LA and he introduced me to
00:59:48
an agent see and a manager and and then that was sort of the start of being in LA
00:59:55
yeah I feel like you were about to say in the rest is is history but it's like
00:59:59
you got to LA and things things got even Grimmer than New York right like there was um yeah like just but I I I was
01:00:07
thinking about this I suppose this builds even more resilience like um you know getting told no is is hard but if
01:00:13
you hear no over and over again or you go to auditions and you you know don't
01:00:17
get the rooll over and over again again it builds more resilience doesn't it in
01:00:20
character in a way it does um it does and look and I I feel like I was that's
01:00:28
why I say I feel lucky because although I you know I got that agent the manager like straight
01:00:34
away so that part of the puzzle was done I'm like okay now I have an opportunity
01:00:38
people are going to send me out and I have a chance to get in a room and actually you know get a
01:00:45
job excuse me um and I and within that I remember in a very short period of time that's a whole the story but I I I
01:00:56
I went in an audition for a movie um that Jason bigs ended up doing I think um it was called Loser it was a
01:01:04
Sony film oh you read about the same sort of era as what he was doing American P yeah yeah around there yeah
01:01:09
it would have been this would have been 99 maybe the the the the summer of 99 um and I flew back to New York because
01:01:19
by then my manager my my now you know fancy Hollywood manager and agent were saying you've got to be
01:01:27
in nla and I'm like oh no I'm a I'm a I'm a New York actor you know I'm really
01:01:31
serious I'm I'm not like these other people you represent out there and they're like it's that that may be true
01:01:39
but it's going to be a lot harder for us to get you work if you're not here so I
01:01:43
very begrudgingly went back to New York packed up my little suitcase got my Mac pack backpack and uh and on the and I
01:01:52
when I was in New York they called and they said hey remember that audition you did for loser and I'm like yeah like
01:01:57
they love you I'm like oh cool like yeah they want to screen test you um oh man I'm not going to go into that
01:02:06
there's a whole story right oh listen can you edit this because this could go
01:02:10
on I'm I'm I'm fully engaged but we're on we're on your clock but I'm loving
01:02:14
these stories this is a great Deep dive into not just into into your your amazing career but also um there's some
01:02:21
really good lessons in here about like resilience and persistence and hard work I love that okay well this is probably
01:02:26
more akin to a story about not being an idiot and well not that it was all my fault so I fly out to LA um Heath's
01:02:35
living with his girlfriend in the hills in Laurel Canyon uh he's like come and
01:02:41
stay with me I'm like oh so I'm in this spare room we're like cruising around La
01:02:45
it's so much fun he's about to go off and do the Patriot so he's working out
01:02:50
with the trainer on the beach and getting ready for that and learning his American accent and and uh and during
01:02:57
that time um I had a rental car no he had a rental car and he said oh mate and I had to get a haircut cuz i' been a
01:03:03
student in New York I had no money my hair was just ridiculous and the manager's like you got to get a haircut
01:03:09
and I we'll get you free haircut I mean that's how poor I was there's there's
01:03:12
someone that'll cut your hair in West Hollywood tomorrow at 3: and he's like
01:03:16
oh take my rental car I'm like oh thanks bro so I drive down to the hair place I
01:03:21
go and I get my haircut and while I'm getting my haircut someone breaks into
01:03:25
the car and steals remember filofaxes remember F yeah yeah yeah there's huge
01:03:32
thing with things anyway and I have my passport in it my New Zealand passport so I come back from getting my my
01:03:38
haircut and and it's gone don't think it's a big big deal because I have no plans to really go
01:03:44
anywhere so then I I do these few auditions and then they're like you've
01:03:48
got to live in LA so I go back to New York to pack up my stuff to permanently move to LA much to my hatred
01:03:55
um and while I'm in New York they call me up and they say Hey you know you've
01:03:59
got this screen test I'm like oh it's amazing like I'm I'm in the final two or
01:04:04
three guys they're like yeah it's in um Toronto tomorrow and I'm like oh oh [ __ ]
01:04:13
well about that uh I don't have a passport what do you mean you don't have
01:04:16
a passport so I tell that story you got you must have seem chaotic oh yeah I'm
01:04:21
sure um yeah even though it wasn't your fault but no it wasn't my it wasn't my fault
01:04:28
but but it so I fly I fly back early the next morning my manager picks me up in a
01:04:35
car drives me to the New Zealand consulate she con somehow convinces them to give me a emergency passport um which
01:04:43
they grant me so then I get that I go back to the airport I fly to Canada I go to bed I wake up the next morning I go
01:04:51
to the Sound Stage we do the dance and so Zoe desel is one of the girls who's
01:04:55
awesome by the way um really wanted the part I was so excited like oh my God it's all happening it's like just just
01:05:02
like that and then we finish the screen tests and then we all go back to the airport to to fly back to the to LA and
01:05:11
I um but my passport doesn't have my my Visa in it I don't actually have the
01:05:16
means to get back into America because the original Visa was in the passport that got stolen so when I get to the
01:05:22
immigration they're like so where are you and technically I wasn't supposed to
01:05:26
be trying to procure work because I was on a student visa and I so I was in this
01:05:31
sort of very anxious situation and and the studio people from Sony were like and the director were like are you okay
01:05:37
because they see me getting shuffled away into like the secondary inspection line of the American Immigration I'm
01:05:42
like yeah I'm fine anyway they give me the third degree and I and I and I said oh no they
01:05:48
said what are you doing I said oh it's just summer I'm just visiting friends in
01:05:51
LA and they're like well where's your Visa I'm like well well my passport sold
01:05:55
and anyway long I mean it was such an ordeal so they give me a an i 94 form that allows me to be in the country for
01:06:03
three months during which time they said I have to then go to the immigration department and get a new visa after
01:06:10
months of trying I it turns out you can't get a Visa in the country that you
01:06:15
want to visit you have to get the visa from an external consulate so anyway so I got kicked out of the country again uh
01:06:23
then the the Canadians wouldn't take me because they were worried I was going to
01:06:27
uh scr off their social system or something and I said look no offense I don't I I wouldn't want to live in
01:06:33
Canada but they didn't appreciate that either and so so they so I got I kind of
01:06:39
got stuck so they let me go in for the night but they took my passport and I stayed in a in a a hostel by a lake
01:06:46
somewhere in in in Vancouver and it happened to be my 25th birthday the next morning and I woke up and I go into the
01:06:52
kitchen there's all these you know Germans and whatnot and and there's a
01:06:56
guy that I played soccer with at Birkin hi from when I was like 8 years old he goes Martin Henderson and I'm like yeah
01:07:02
he's like what are you doing here bro I thought I thought you you're you're an
01:07:06
actor and I'm like well yeah I'm trying I'm trying um anyways oh it just went on
01:07:15
and on and on I had to go back to New York finally to get a special request to get the visa reinstated but I wasn't
01:07:20
supposed to be trying to procure work and um yeah there were a lot I just had a lot of things like that happen that
01:07:29
were um chaotic you know and what you look back now was it bad luck or or yeah I mean was it was it because of you're
01:07:38
drinking and I think some of it I I think some of it was definitely related to the lack of attention I was paying to
01:07:46
certain aspects of my life because I was sort of I don't think I was entirely
01:07:50
present as I could have been um I mean the breaking into the C that was sort of bad luck um I mean there were so many
01:07:59
stories like that though I mean that that time in LA was kind of kind of nuts and then when I finally so I I I long
01:08:07
story short I you know you go through the inevitable rejection and then you're
01:08:11
like oh man am I is this really you know should I be doing this you know but I always had the carrot of the screen test
01:08:18
you know I was getting so close on important projects enough of a sniff to keep you in there that it just felt like
01:08:26
why would you not I mean yes the rejection sucked and yes it was boring and and and there were moments where I
01:08:31
was like I don't want to do this anymore I don't like this identity you know but
01:08:36
I also had these very close calls so I knew it wasn't it wasn't a fantasy you
01:08:41
know I was that close and I just I just had to to stay the course and and suck up whatever I had to it's gambler's
01:08:48
mentality though isn't it it's like one more one more coin in the slot machine
01:08:52
yeah but I knew I knew but I did say I said i' give myself five years I said
01:08:55
look I'm not going to be cuz I don't want to be a struggling artist I'm not
01:08:59
I'm I don't actually find it that that that interesting I want to be an artist
01:09:04
but if for some reason I can't do it for reasons outside of my control um then I
01:09:10
will like the accent thing you know I I I got really close to some big films but
01:09:15
my accent was sort of it would come and go and it was in and out and I got so sick in so I was like right that is the
01:09:22
last time I will never I will never be refused from a job because of my accent because that is in my control you know
01:09:29
and so I just set to work and I every day for months bro I just got up had my breakfast I went back to my bedroom I
01:09:36
shut the door and I just drilled and drilled and drilled and drilled these sounds to the point where I could then
01:09:43
go out and get a packet of cigarettes from a 7-Eleven and the guy had no idea I wasn't from America and that was my
01:09:49
goal I was like I want to remove all of the reasons why someone else is saying no you know and if I remove all of those
01:09:55
and they're still saying no then okay maybe maybe it's a fate thing um but luckily you know I I I I started
01:10:04
getting work um I I did a pilot for ABC um just to pay the bills CU I was so out of money my mom had let me some
01:10:14
money i' bought the shitty truck that had three cylinders that that's got to
01:10:19
be that's got to be humbling like having to call home and say hey Mom yeah it was
01:10:23
that's admission of defeat in a way no it wasn't defeat man no no but that was
01:10:28
the thing it was it was yeah my mom my sweet mom you know bless her she she said absolutely if you know if you
01:10:35
because I said Mom I just I don't know when it's I can't tell you when it's
01:10:40
going to happen but it's going to happen so that's refusing defeat absolutely
01:10:44
absolutely def to yeah admitting defeat would have been to say oh I'm broke I'm
01:10:49
going to go home you know and if M had said oh look no or I don't have any money or sorry you know then I would
01:10:55
have I would have found another way you know I would have got a job I would have
01:10:58
got a job under the table I would have I would have figured it out and you your parents were still in your corner at
01:11:03
this point they weren't like come on come back home I think my dad yeah that
01:11:07
was around the time that my dad's like look I get it son I know why you'd want
01:11:10
to be there and You' want to be like Russell Crow and he's done so well but
01:11:15
um uh come back to the street yeah but no I I knew I think I knew down um and I could you know for
01:11:26
the first six months or so I pretty much refused to do TV because I just i' done
01:11:30
so much of it I didn't want to I didn't want to be stuck on a show for nine
01:11:34
months of the year where you're just playing the same character potentially for years and years and years
01:11:40
um but I eventually I I agreed to do a job on a pilot for an ABC TV show um just to get some money and pay
01:11:48
my mom back um what was it what was the show can you remember it was called the Beast um it never it never made it to
01:11:56
air I don't think although they did pick it up and I was lucky I didn't have to
01:12:00
go back and do it um but then I'd gotten a job on Wind Talkers the Nicholas Cage
01:12:04
movie so I was in Hawaii filming that yeah yeah and the casting woman who who has been incredible her name is Kelly
01:12:11
lee she's been a huge supporter of mine she put me in numerous jobs uh over the
01:12:17
years and she's like okay fine good for you do do your movie we'll we'll recast
01:12:21
Your Role you know with another guy um so I was like yes I'm not stuck on a TV
01:12:26
show so so that that pilot that you did for that show the Beast like what what do you earn for a
01:12:31
pilot is it enough money that you go thank God I'm I'm I'm okay for the next
01:12:35
few months yes yes it was I remember it was enough to pay my mom back which I felt really you know strongly
01:12:42
about um so I paid my mom and then I yeah I had some money to you know fly to Paris to see my girlfriend and live
01:12:50
there for a while and um byy cigarettes and drink coffee and go to museums and um live a live a life again um so it's
01:13:00
just like keep keeps the Wolves away from the door for a little bit longer yeah exactly and then it was like okay
01:13:05
now I've got a six-month visa from that show now I've got six months you know to
01:13:09
get the next job uh and that was a big part of what it was about too because my student visa was about to expire I was
01:13:15
out of money I owed my mom money uh so it was like okay fine get me a TV job I'll do a pilot um so
01:13:24
but then that job so I went to uh I think Heath might have been shooting the nights tale by then so and I went to
01:13:31
Prague and then I went back to Paris with my girlfriend and then I was like I had to come back for something in La
01:13:39
forget what it was and and this was just this is stupidity so when I got the pilot they gave me a letter from the
01:13:47
studio and a letter from I think an immigration agent sort of saying that I was legally allowed to perform these
01:13:54
services for for six months I could stay in the states um but what I didn't realize is when I left the country I
01:14:02
needed to take that paperwork to a cons US Consulate and get a Visa a work visa embossed in my passport but I stupidly
01:14:12
got on a plane really hung over from London I'd gone out my last night visited some mates from high school that
01:14:18
were flatting there ran into my step sister had a big night um got got on a plane on my my card I'm
01:14:28
standing in ATM in SoHo somewhere cuz I leave the bar and I'm like oh I'll get
01:14:33
some more money out I go I put my card in and then I guess it's a scam there
01:14:38
right right as the money's comes the door to the money opens up I I feel this
01:14:43
push and next I'm flying through the air this guy's side check me I've gone
01:14:48
flying he's grabbed my money and as I hit the ground I see him grab my money
01:14:52
so I chase him through the Streets of London finally get him tackle him to the ground uh grab my money he sort of
01:15:01
shrugs out of a shirt and runs off shirtless but the friger in the card had been left in the machine right so then
01:15:07
the next morning I get on I I I get to the airport I get to Heathrow I buy a packet of cigarettes I have a coffee I'm
01:15:15
so I'm so hung over I get on the plane we fly to La I land I'm so dehydrated I
01:15:23
wait in that horrible line I get to the front I go I give him my passport I hand
01:15:27
over my paperwork from Disney Studios and the lawyer and I go yeah you go I'm
01:15:32
here you know I've got a Visa for the thing where's the Visa I'm like well no
01:15:36
that's the paperwork they gave me yeah but you've got to have a Visa in your
01:15:39
passport I'm like oh come on and he's like uh he said you have two choices you
01:15:44
either Deport you for not having the right paperwork or you refuse your right to entry and I'm like well of course
01:15:50
I'll refuse my right to entry then because if you Deport it goes on your thing so then I go down to secondary
01:15:55
inspection and they fingerprint me and they question me and all I'm like I'm
01:16:01
just just an actor I'm not doing anything illegal then they put me in a room with a bunch of other people for
01:16:06
hours and hours they give you a little sandwich in a box and then about I don't
01:16:11
know late that night they handcuffed me to these other dudes there was uh three Brazilian guys and five Chinese guys
01:16:20
they handcuffed me we're chained together they lead us out they lead this is true they lead us out of the
01:16:27
inspection Port into a baggage carousel to to identify where our bags have been you know and of course an Ann Ze flight
01:16:35
had just arrived and I'm I'm I'm like yeah I'm like oh my God I mean someone's
01:16:40
gonna go like that's St it from Scher Street what he's chained up I couldn't
01:16:46
believe it was happening and uh so I I go yep that's my Mac Pack there they they put it into a van
01:16:53
uh they put us in a van they drive us through the night they go to downtown like deep down down under the under the
01:16:59
ground into a cell they put me in a cell with these the Chinese guys who for some
01:17:04
reason think I can speak Chinese but the whole night they just keep talking to me
01:17:07
in Chinese and they clearly wanted me to call a number and there was something written in Chinese I'm like bro I can't
01:17:13
help you and then the next morning they they take me back they give me my bags they walk me or they drive me back to
01:17:21
the airport and then I had to get on a flight that I had to pay for to go back to London um and they walk me on the
01:17:29
plane and uh in handcuffs walk me on the plane with guys with guns like I look like over thep I look like a
01:17:37
serious Crim like can you not you just take the handcuffs off like what are the people on the plane going to think like
01:17:43
we don't know you won't run kid I'm like I'm like you've got you've got guns man
01:17:48
like what it was hysterical so this this is pre 911 right yes this was pre 911 so
01:17:56
this is when they were a little bit more lenient than what they this was yeah this was like treating me really nicely
01:18:01
oh my God now now they shoot you on the spot yeah so I had to go back to London and wait for my Visa thing and I a
01:18:09
friend of mine was living there with her new husband and he was a builder so I just worked building lofts in north of
01:18:15
London for a while until I got the Visa and uh how long how long is a while I was I feel like it was only 10 days it
01:18:23
was whenever the appointment happened at the yeah it was cool so I passed the time there and earned a bit of pocket
01:18:29
money and learned to yeah put dry wall up and stuff like that it seems like you've been really good at just not not
01:18:37
um sitting still or or like brooding or you're wallowing in self paty like you
01:18:42
me you know you keep yourself busy in London building Lofts or you put yourself in your room learn the American
01:18:47
accent so you're always sort of moving forward yeah yeah yeah yeah take action
01:18:52
right yeah yeah yeah absolutely but something it's not an instinct to a lot of people though to take
01:18:58
action but it seems like it just is for you just a logical yeah I think it's a
01:19:02
logical but I've always I've always been like that I think from from the earliest
01:19:08
age you know like when I started sailing I was terrible I was terrible I would last every time and I remember crying
01:19:15
because I I couldn't get over the start line and everyone else was sailing off
01:19:18
and I was I was doing everything they told me with the rudder and the main sheet and the which way is the wind
01:19:23
coming from and what side of the boat I'm going be on I could and my cender border got stuck around the the line
01:19:29
where the the the boy the start boy was and you know one of the parents came over with a little tiny and an outboard
01:19:35
and lifted my centerboard and off I went um so I but I was like right I'm going
01:19:40
to I don't know I just got to figure this out like there's got to be a reason
01:19:44
why something's not working and what is the reason once you figure out what the
01:19:47
reason is it's like okay well then how do you make it work what do you need to
01:19:51
do what what's required you know um so I think it's just it's it's it's a
01:19:55
logical thing yeah more than a personality it's just it's um yeah what what's what what can you
01:20:04
what can you actually do um and there's usually something you can do to progress yourself yeah yeah of
01:20:12
course um you mentioned Wind Talkers before and you said the ni Cage movie um hell of a castle say Christian Slater
01:20:18
Mark Ruffalo yeah yeah hell of a movie Brian vanal yeah yeah you have much to do with those guys like you're in a
01:20:24
trench hanging out with them yeah yeah that was a lot of fun it was was a lot of waiting around it was one of those
01:20:29
jobs you know John Woo is spectacular director and some of those sequences were so huge and sophisticated with all
01:20:37
the pyrot Technics and the special effects and the planes and the tanks and the TR massive massive um setups for
01:20:45
some of these shots um but the waiting the waiting around for that is is brutal you know as an actor
01:20:53
and then the weather might not be right or there'll be one bomb or the plane was
01:20:57
too low or too high or he didn't like the way some soldiers died you know so
01:21:02
then another half day setup to get it all set up again and so that movie was fun but it was also a lot of boring time
01:21:09
just waiting around but that you must have just been relieved to be on a set cuz I loved it this is like your first
01:21:14
sort of proper break yeah it was yeah it was [Music] um yes yes definitely and it was you
01:21:22
know we got to do boot camp they put us I think it was only a week but we did a week of proper boot camp in Hawaii at
01:21:28
the barracks and we had a proper drill sergeant and they treated us the way they treat soldiers and we did all the
01:21:35
physical routine and ate the chow and weapons training and all the confidence courses and you must been like this is
01:21:42
nothing I've been detained at LAX yeah yeah it made my New York days feel like
01:21:47
a yeah um and uh yeah you mentioned like the the T the the movie Loser before with um Zoe disel that you missed out on
01:21:56
did you also did you did you meet with Spielberg from Minority Report or no I met yeah man you have done your research
01:22:04
bro this is stuff that I don't even remember uh I met with spilberg oh gosh I don't know if they even told me
01:22:13
the project to be honest um so you you missed out on the role that Colin Ferrell got is that right possibly but I
01:22:21
don't I I don't know I never I never asked what it was for auditioning to
01:22:26
Steven Spielberg well I I just met him yeah I I came and someone told him that he should meet me and um he was getting
01:22:34
ready to do presumably that movie I actually don't know I never I never inquired as to what it was about
01:22:40
specifically um if it's a Spielberg movie you just want to be involved I don't give is Spielberg yeah or just the
01:22:46
opportunity to meet him too for me it was more about I get to sit down aside from will I get a job when I get a job
01:22:54
it was just an honor to sit in his office and and chitchat you know and and as you know he's got a a huge interest
01:23:02
in World War II and um like I said my grandfather flew for the the the Air Force and um he was in bombers and so I
01:23:12
shared with him my understanding of my grandfather's participation and and um
01:23:18
and he was quite curious about New Zealand he asked me a lot of questions about New Zealand and
01:23:23
um but yeah but it didn't it didn't eventuate to anything didn't lead to
01:23:28
anything but still but it was just awesome it was just great like okay this is yeah there been moments like that I
01:23:33
guess in in my life and my career where you're just in certain situations and
01:23:37
with people you're like wow this is it's insane this is exciting yeah yeah it's
01:23:42
cool it's cool it is yeah cuz you would have been like seven years old when ET
01:23:47
came out yeah I cried my eyes out when the little heartlight went out and then oh my God yeah um it's a graay Anatomy
01:23:56
as well you were Dr Nathan rigs yes um do you have quite a good relationship with um
01:24:02
Shonda yes rhy you've been in couple of his shows yeah she's been very very good
01:24:07
to me umit I've actually done gosh I've done at least two pilots that didn't even make the air and then I
01:24:16
did a short live show off the map that she produced uh and then yeah gry's Anatomy
01:24:22
so yeah yeah how is that sh it's an iconic TV show and you were Meredith Gray's boyfriend for a couple years yeah
01:24:32
yeah yeah well I think you know they they they Derek the character of Derek uh died um and so I think they they
01:24:42
desperately wanted to put someone in there to give Meredith some continuing love interest you know um so I and I
01:24:52
think partly because well I'd been traveling a lot too I remember I took that meeting she was do Shonda was doing
01:24:58
two shows at the time she was starting a new show that I think was being shot in
01:25:03
Vancouver uh which actually sounded pretty cool uh and they were wanted to cast a
01:25:09
doctor for graay and she just said to me what what do you want to do and I said honestly I've been on the road my whole
01:25:18
life I've spent years living out of a suitcase in a strange town trying to figure out where the good cafes
01:25:25
are you know I would love to just be in La for a while I just want to be at home
01:25:31
and so she's like okay you can do gry's Anatomy I was like okay um so that's
01:25:35
kind of how that went yeah and then I got in the car and I drove home and my manager called said how'd the meeting go
01:25:40
and I was like went great I think she just offered me the the role of uh on gr's anatomy and they're like really I'm
01:25:46
like yeah and they like oh cool and then I realized I don't know what the role is
01:25:50
so I called her back and I'm like hey just before I say yes what exactly am I
01:25:55
doing I don't we never discussed the creative here you just and she said I don't know you'll be a doctor we'll
01:26:00
figure it out you know I was like okay so that was that's amazing like she's
01:26:05
she's a queen she's the TV Queen she she is a juggernaut [ __ ] so no you know
01:26:12
you'd assume that they would potentially be work in the future from her as well
01:26:16
maybe yeah I mean you know I don't don't presume anything in this business ever
01:26:22
I mean I'd love to yeah obviously work with her she's incredible yeah she she
01:26:27
even wrote the Britney Spears movie Crossroads which I think oh I didn't know that didn't you oh no okay yeah
01:26:32
Crossroads graay Scandal how to get away with murder bridan inventing Anna the anadia Scandal I mean so much so much
01:26:39
it's incredible yeah speaking of that so the do do does it piss you off that um
01:26:44
like 20 years on or whatever it is that you know people still talk about the Britney thing I mean it's such a no I
01:26:51
find it funny I mean it's it's nothing it's a nothing roll though right it's
01:26:54
just like 30 seconds at the end of the Toxic music video yeah it doesn't piss
01:26:58
me I think I just find it confusing cuz the so the context of that which I I try
01:27:02
to share with people uh was not me going I want to be in a Britney Spears video or or this is an this is an interesting
01:27:09
role um it was purely promotional because I had done a movie for Warner Brothers called Talk which was sort of
01:27:18
around the time of fast the fur it's supposed to be sort of Fast and Furious
01:27:20
on Wheel two wheels you know um we Shot the movie the the guy who directed it was a firsttime feature
01:27:27
director by the name of Joseph khah and Joseph was Britney's main uh music video
01:27:33
director so he had done all of her cool and he's very very very talented so we
01:27:37
Shot the movie it was being edited or it had been edited and it was about to be released and I think Joseph went back to
01:27:45
doing toxic for for Britney and someone at Warner Brothers went hang on a second
01:27:50
so we've got the director of our movie who's directing the new Britney Spears
01:27:54
movie why don't we put Martin in the Britney Spears video and then we can do
01:27:59
a I think they did a MTV behind the scenes type thing making of the video and it'll be a promotion it'll be like a
01:28:06
cross promotion and we'll promote uh talk so I got a call and they said it was like a Thursday night and they're
01:28:14
like what are you doing this weekend I'm like nothing and they're like do you
01:28:17
want to come to Warner Brothers on Saturday to a sound stage and be in a Britney video to help promote the film
01:28:25
and so I was like sure um I mean that was my main goal was to promote the movie that I had done you know um and no
01:28:32
disrespect to Britney I was I was honored to be in it and it was a lot of fun and I got to say she I know she
01:28:38
interesting enough very shortly after we did that video her life took a a much darker rougher turn that she just seems
01:28:46
to be getting out of now with the conservative ship thing yeah but you know she was struggling right after that
01:28:51
there was yeah yeah poor thing went through so much but I I got to meet her right before all that happened and um
01:28:59
she she is the nicest sweetest most genuine just down to earth good old southern girl you know um so it was sort
01:29:08
of heartbreaking to to witness all of that other stuff unravel um cuz my experience with she was just delightful
01:29:15
yeah I just listened to um her book on AUD B last week it's been a [ __ ] it's a
01:29:19
hell of a life [ __ ] like the stuff her her dad and the people minding her have
01:29:24
got away with for like over a decade it's astonishing it's like a horror
01:29:27
movie it's like a it's like a yeah mate it's just outrageously bad but that's um
01:29:32
yeah that's a fun video but it's uh it's like it's not even really acting is it
01:29:36
no no no that's why I I'm like why are we talking about that um it was yeah but
01:29:42
yeah that's why I wonder if if it annoyed you I think you came on to my radio show like maybe 10 years ago and
01:29:46
we talked about it and I think we we joked about whether you got an erection during it or whatever and it's like I
01:29:52
look back now and it's like your body of work is so massive it seems like almost
01:29:56
like a disrespectful thing to bring up in a way CU it's just a nothing well yeah I think it's just it's was not
01:30:01
acting it wasn't intended to be acting it wasn't so I don't I never viewed it
01:30:06
as a part of my career so much as a promot publicity stint um but I think people because she's such a big star
01:30:14
people kind of saw it as sort of something that I consciously chose to be and maybe for the the I don't know the
01:30:21
credibility or the the exposure or something which hadn't occurred to me I just I just wanted the making of the
01:30:28
video to to to be able to promote the movie um which wasn't a great movie but
01:30:33
so I don't think any any promotional thing would have probably helped in hindsight when you when you're filming a
01:30:39
movie or a TV show do you know it's do you know it's bad at the time or do you
01:30:43
when you're doing it do you think this is going to be the best thing ever and
01:30:45
it's not till afterwards that you go you really you really don't know um
01:30:52
because there's so many so many factors that are outside of your control or that
01:30:58
you're just not privy to that you can't see so you're sort of you do your you do
01:31:04
your part to the best of your ability and then you have faith that everybody else involved is going to do their best
01:31:11
and then maybe the collectively you've produced a product that is the best version of what the script promised but
01:31:20
of course there's so many variables that come and go along the way that you're
01:31:27
just you just have to wait and see and sometimes it can be the editing can be terrible
01:31:34
sometimes um I mean as silly as it sounds even the sound is so important I tell the story
01:31:41
because it's really Illuminating I think for anyone who's working in in storytelling and and in audiovisual
01:31:48
medium is when I did the ring for for DreamWorks and I was actually shooting torque when the when uh the ring was
01:31:57
about to be premiered and they flew me out um to to watch the sort of the the Final Cut of the movie there was a
01:32:05
couple of scenes that they still had to shoot with like couple of re-shoot with Naomi and the horse or something um but
01:32:10
essentially it was the exact picture it was the same movie however the score was
01:32:17
was a temp score cuz they were still finalizing that in London or something so in in the meantime the director had
01:32:24
placed um adequate sound in order to give you a sense of what he wanted in each moment the movie I walked out of
01:32:32
that screening with my uh my publicist at the time and my agent and of course we were so excited because it was a
01:32:39
DreamWorks movie it was a cool script was Naomi wats who just won a a Golden Globe for mhand drive and this movie
01:32:48
could really be something and we were so depr we walked out of that screen we sat
01:32:52
down and we're like okay ironically we're like well at least we got talk
01:32:57
coming out soon which turned out to be not a very good movie um and this is true so about a month later the movie's
01:33:05
finally finished it's being premiered they helicoptered me in we were shooting
01:33:10
out in the Mojave Desert and in order to leave set and get to the premere and get
01:33:14
back they had to helicopter me which was so exciting and I'm and I'm in this
01:33:18
helicopter and you see the 10 freeway and the desert light and and we we land in LA and I get my suit and I go to the
01:33:26
premiere but I because I had seen the the the temp score version of the movie I was a bit embarrassed about the final
01:33:33
product and I didn't feel confident going on the red carpet and saying oh this movie is so great because I I just
01:33:39
I felt like I'd be lying so I I avoided some of the press when on the Press line went in sat
01:33:47
the sat down started watching the movie and about 15 minutes in my agent reaches
01:33:51
over and he grabs my arm he goes bro he was a kiwi he goes bro this movie is really good and I'm like you're right
01:33:59
and the only difference was the score wow and that goes to show you how imperative the right sound design and
01:34:07
music is to eliciting the right emotional yeah yeah it was a huge lesson and and that was a huge movie
01:34:15
right that was many it was huge turned out yeah I mean probably one of the most successful movies I've ever been in um
01:34:23
yeah so there you go awes I don't know what that means but I just to make sure
01:34:28
your score is really good if you make a movie yeah so why why the um sobriety was there a moment was there a pivotal
01:34:34
moment was there a night was it just like an an ongoing thing did you just get bored of getting wasted it it was a
01:34:43
long um when I was shooting a show for South Pacific pictures back in 1990 or 89 um I think it was
01:34:58
1990 Andy Anderson were played my dad and Andy uh had been sober quite a while and took that part of his life very
01:35:09
seriously and at the rap party hello hello KY hello buba hello hello beautiful boy boy sorry just is we're getting into
01:35:22
quite a serious story yeah no no no it's all good um my ex just dropped him off
01:35:26
she's been dog sitting oh you guys have got shared custody yeah we take it very
01:35:31
serious beautiful good hey buddy hey oh you're Friendly's it how you doing
01:35:45
just sorry hope I didn't interrupt anything whote I'll you should first no no I'm
01:35:53
good I've got I've got my water here thank you really sorry guys that's
01:35:57
what's amazing okay great you see love to meet you thanks for dropping by oh yeah so um Andy Anderson so Andy
01:36:05
Anderson pulled me aside at the rap party and he goes hey Martin do you want to you want to come outside and see my
01:36:11
motorbike he drove a big fancy 1100 CC motorbike and I was like oh yeah so I go out and we're you admiring the engine
01:36:18
and the mufflers and and then he just sort of says to me said listen I'm going
01:36:22
to tell you something now I was 15 at the time so I'm going to tell you something now and you're not going to
01:36:27
believe me and that's fine I don't need you to believe me right now but one day
01:36:33
you're going to you're going to remember this conversation and he said you have a
01:36:37
problem with alcohol and you were how old at the time I was 15 right and he had you even started drinking at that
01:36:44
yeah I started drinking yeah yeah yeah I mean yeah there was a reason he said it um yeah and and so of course true to
01:36:55
his word I didn't believe a word he said I thought he was out of his mind I mean
01:36:58
I thought this this guy was nuts a little you know I mean what's he talking about what made him single single you
01:37:04
out do you think so I'm guessing at the age of 15 you were drinking no differently to any of your
01:37:08
peers some of my peers yeah but I think I mean I was definitely displaying a uh a like for alcohol that went beyond what
01:37:20
he Okay saw as just a social interaction you know and so maybe he could see see himself as a young man in you yeah or
01:37:29
even himself as an older man you know I just just that those traits you know and
01:37:33
um so that that was the first time that it had been brought to my attention that
01:37:38
maybe my relationship with alcohol was not a healthy one and you kept going for oh mate did I ever I mean it it fell on
01:37:47
deaf ears I was I was not even I couldn't begin to accept that as anything other than hogwash you know it
01:37:55
stuck with you though didn't it that in hindsight it did yeah but I mean I was
01:38:00
like whatever Andy good on you um but there were there were other instances and people who also pointed out um that
01:38:11
maybe I needed to look at it um and I think the most effective one was when I was in Sydney before I left Australia to
01:38:20
move to New York and as I said I was working with this woman Annie Swan who became a mentor of mine really
01:38:28
um and she she also sort of said you know you have everything going for you whereby you can
01:38:37
create a really wonderful life she said you you're talented you you you're smart
01:38:42
you you you you literally can have a really great life she said but the one thing that could interfere with that or
01:38:50
limit the kind of life you can live is is your your your alcohol use and um I think
01:38:59
because I'd been working with her so intensely for for a couple of years by that point I had so much love for her
01:39:07
and I knew she had genuine love for me there was such mutual respect that that that hit me in a way that I knew that
01:39:14
that woman was would only ever say that because she truly thought it was was right
01:39:21
um and it and it just landed in a way uh and she she suggested I go with another
01:39:27
student of hers that would come who was studying Shakespeare and go to a meeting
01:39:31
and this guy he was an older actor and and he took me along to a meeting up at King's Cross or somewhere and um so I
01:39:39
went along kind of rolling my eyes like oh whatever I'll cynicism yeah I thought
01:39:44
I thought I'll I'll sort of appease Annie you know um but I you know I sat
01:39:51
in that meeting and and there was a woman funny enough who got up and that's
01:39:55
what kind of surprised me because I thought oh maybe there's a dude that gets up there that I relate to but this
01:39:59
was a a female woman older than me and she just spoke honestly about her true relationship with alcohol and um and her
01:40:09
life and and what her life had been before she got sober and what her life was now that she was sober and I just
01:40:16
this this this light went off and and it hit me it hit me in that deep part of myself that I knew that you know I
01:40:23
related and I went oh man damn it the part's going to be over was the party over immediately no
01:40:31
of course not no no I didn't want the party to end I love a party I love a party more than as much as anyone what
01:40:39
was it just alcohol or was it co a little bit of Co I was a little bit of drugs in Sydney um yeah over those years
01:40:46
um but it was yeah it was really just alcohol and it was part of it was oh like cocaine and drugs are sort of like
01:40:53
a supplement to help you drink more aren't they really yeah and it was just sort of yeah You' just keep going I
01:40:59
would I just didn't want the party to end that was it for me it wasn't um I
01:41:05
wasn't like an angry drunk or it was if anything no rock bottom or anything no
01:41:11
but there was there were definitely after that sort of moment of like o she might have a point I attempted sobriety
01:41:18
on my own I I I I think I clocked up 5 months actually after I left um I think yeah was it I think no just
01:41:27
before I left Australia I um I I think I did six five months of sobriety on my own um and it was quite amazing and even
01:41:36
those five months were sort of a revelation I'd wake up on a Saturday at like 8 you know instead of 11: and and
01:41:44
clear-headed and and I remember I went out for a walk and there was a someone was having a a garage sale and there was
01:41:51
all this kind of cool old furniture and I bought a couple of pieces for for 10 bucks and went home and sort of got to
01:42:00
started working on it and sanding it and painting it and kind of I got creative I
01:42:04
just found like instantly there was this relationship between me not drinking and
01:42:09
how much more of myself was available to to be creative or um so many more productive hours in the day yeah it's
01:42:17
funny yeah I've heard Bradley Cooper talk about the same thing and just yeah he's been sober for like 20 odd
01:42:22
years just just the impact it's had on his life and career and um I Heard a podcast with steo you know steo from
01:42:29
Jack sure he talked about how um addiction and alcoholism is the only illness where when you get rid of it
01:42:37
your life gets so much better he said if you have cancer all you want to do is get back to how you were before yeah but
01:42:43
he said alcoholism and drug addiction it's the only thing when you give it up
01:42:46
your life is going to get better oh yeah infinitely yeah do you miss it though at
01:42:50
all or not now it's been so long no I mean no I mean I I can kind of think back to some of the fun times you know
01:43:00
and sort of go oh that was that was fun but I think about the the times that I've had since
01:43:09
sobriety the quality of those you know I mean the the the the sort of the deeper
01:43:15
experience of myself and my relationships my career my work my health um everything Finance just the
01:43:25
way you make decisions I just feel like I would never give up that for uh a bit of a laugh you know and I can still have
01:43:33
a laugh anyway so no there's no like kind of like oh man that was those were
01:43:37
the days no I mean it was fun it was definitely fun and and I think I'm fortunate that I got to have some of
01:43:45
those fun crazy you know debed moments at an age where you know I didn't have
01:43:52
too much to lose and I didn't continue that on into you know a broken marriage
01:43:57
or a failed career or failing Health yeah yeah you criminal all those things that that are sometimes a consequence of
01:44:05
it so um yeah but I feel lucky that I just had people in my life that I loved that loved me enough that I was that
01:44:16
they were able to tell me that truth and I was open to it um and I'll ever forever be grateful for that cuz um I
01:44:23
think I on my own I was in Deni I just thought I was having a good time and I didn't want anyone to take away my toys
01:44:29
you know um of course you didn't yeah um I know you're you're um a reasonably
01:44:35
private guy but you my private I guess I'm private about yeah that that part of my life I
01:44:41
don't know why I think maybe because I got famous so young in New Zealand and I
01:44:46
felt like by the time I was 17 I I just felt so exposed that and and by virtue of what I do there's always
01:44:55
going to be that public element um that some of that stuff feels like it should be some of your private life should be
01:45:04
sacred somehow 100% otherwise it's all for I don't know like it's up for gossip
01:45:10
or titilation or not that I'm hiding anything it's just sometimes you want
01:45:14
that to be between you and and and the people that that you're really close to
01:45:21
and priv private not secret I guess is see yeah oh that makes perfect sense from my years of um like doing breakfast
01:45:30
radio you find the more of yourself you give away you form more of a connection with the audience um but JJ who just
01:45:37
before we gave away so much of ourselves you know you talk about your infertility
01:45:41
struggles and things like that and once you've given it away you can't take it
01:45:44
back again yeah and I think I mean we live in a weird time too with social media where now it's it's sort of it's
01:45:52
rude to go to just unburden every aspect of your life either through images or video or commentary or or comments or
01:46:02
you know people getting into argument you know I just find it it really odd maybe because I spent my most of my life
01:46:12
in the public view to me it just it just seems odd to share everything but but but but but the Counterpoint is too
01:46:22
there's this wonderful uh access that we have to people like one of the things I
01:46:27
hated about being a young actor was the idea that You' you'd go to work You' put
01:46:32
the costume on you'd perform you'd help create a product hopefully people
01:46:38
enjoyed and then you had to go and promote it and the way you had to promote it just felt so false that you
01:46:45
know you wear these clothes that are stylist has bought that you'd never [ __ ] wear and they do your hair in a
01:46:50
way that you never and then you're you're sort of and it's it was all this
01:46:53
sort of [ __ ] that I hated I hated it with a passion it just felt so fake uh and I was like but my job is to be real
01:47:01
my job is to get in front of a camera and try to pretend the camera's not there and be as real as I can about the
01:47:06
human condition that this particular character is experiencing and now I've got to got to kind of be full of [ __ ] to
01:47:13
sell it and I I hated that so much and I actually quite like that with social media now there's this immediate
01:47:20
connection to your fans where it's just you being you and they actually want you
01:47:24
you they'd be more interested in seeing you roll out of bed you know and have a
01:47:30
have a bowl of porridge and talk about what you're doing that day and be very
01:47:33
candid and real than the sort of over manufactured glamorized version of yourself yeah and you you're very good
01:47:40
at that you've got um like over 1 million followers on Instagram um you've
01:47:43
just you're back here in New Zealand working on a couple of New Zealand shows
01:47:46
including um one that my ex-girlfriend uh works on my life is murder and and she was telling me just how she the one
01:47:52
that dropped the dog off oh no no no no this is Liz she's um oh walks I don't
01:47:58
know what she does walks around with a like a like a belt with a walkie-talkie on ad ad yeah um but she she talked
01:48:04
about just how how gregorious and wonderful you were on the set and how on day one you know you you ask if you're
01:48:10
allowed to film and what you're allowed to share and you share it on social media and for a little New Zealand
01:48:14
production with some New Zealand on air funding I think they would have been froing about that oh good good I I hope
01:48:21
so I mean I felt important for me as a kiwi you know growing up here it's and
01:48:27
my most of my my career obviously has been in in the States since well since leaving Australia but I think yeah being
01:48:36
from here and being still being connected to the local industry and trying to support that is important
01:48:42
because I feel like that as I've talked about all day today has been a big part
01:48:46
of my sort of Journey and and and and where I've ended up is is is because I've come from here you know and what I
01:48:53
learned here and the way the opportuni as I was given at a really young age and how I was supported so yeah I'm glad and
01:49:02
what are you up to after this not this podcast specifically but when you leave New Zealand again are you season six of
01:49:08
of Virgin River yeah we Wen you reluctant to do that in the beginning you got off at Virgin River I guess this
01:49:13
was five years ago and you you were dragging your heels uh yeah I there was there was a version of it you know it it
01:49:20
was no secret that it was it was derived from um a romance novel um and not being
01:49:29
a one who reads romance novels or watches shows that are like that I I wasn't that aware but I I knew enough
01:49:37
that there could be a really bad version of this um so I had some reservations about how how the show would be
01:49:45
presented and how the characters would be be presented and I felt it was imp erative that at least my role is the
01:49:52
only thing I could control felt uh that it had some substance to it and some depth and some believability so yeah I
01:50:00
had some I definitely had some reservations about it um but you know but the writers and I called them and
01:50:06
I'm like yeah I'm not really not sure and they they said look we we understand
01:50:10
but we we really do want to make this character as interesting as we can and and they sort of put some of my fears to
01:50:17
bed and then you know then you roll the dice man you still don't know if they're
01:50:21
they're just telling you what you want to hear to get you involved um but yeah
01:50:26
I mean it's been wildly successful you must feel that yourself but also Netflix
01:50:30
don't [ __ ] around like if a Show's not working it's not going to get another
01:50:33
season simple as that yeah so you can't argue with um five seasons going into
01:50:37
number six it's phenomenal it's nuts super successful yeah yeah which um so
01:50:42
your grace Anatomy that was probably you know huge for your fan base as well you
01:50:46
must have noticed like a like a you know new sort of demograph new sort of fan base you find the same thing again with
01:50:55
Virgin River yeah different demographic yeah um I mean what's interesting about
01:51:00
graay is that it's been around for so long that the huge amount of its Resurgence is due
01:51:07
to the fact that it was released on Netflix and it found all these teenagers so that's part of why you know i' I've
01:51:15
got younger audience like that but the audience for Virgin River I think skewes you know old way older than that um but
01:51:24
at first I thought Virgin River was going to I understood why you know a lot of the fan bases older women um
01:51:32
grandmothers and all that and you know there's a wholesome sweetness to it and
01:51:37
I understood its appeal uh so that wasn't really a shock um but more and more was just how many younger people
01:51:45
like the show and dudes like what's surprising to me I don't really have
01:51:48
them reaching out on Instagram there's not a lot of dudes you know sliding into
01:51:52
your D no but but out and about you know you'll be somewhere and you'll check
01:51:56
into an Airbnb and and and the owners might be there like oh wow you and the husband are like oh we love your show
01:52:03
man we love watching your show and I'm always really pleasantly surprised that
01:52:07
it has that wider appeal cuz I just didn't really foresee it having having quite the attraction that it that it
01:52:16
that it does so yeah yeah and you never know man I mean that's the thing hey you know
01:52:23
um yeah you're always sort of rolling the dice with what what what the show you know will end up being and if it'll
01:52:30
do well and what that means for your life so there you're always improvising
01:52:34
with your own life like now Vancouver's become this huge part of my life for
01:52:38
could be wor a decade yeah Vancouver's not bad yeah yeah um yeah um the money
01:52:45
must be Sensational After Five Seasons it's getting better getting better yeah
01:52:50
it's getting better they um yeah yeah we're it's not friends money yet but no
01:52:56
and I don't well I think given that Netflix is not a network show it can't
01:53:02
be syndicated in the way that those shows were and and are yeah although I think part of that discrepancy is being
01:53:10
addressed with the latest round of the Union negotiation so I think there is now a provision for sort of a res
01:53:17
residual type um compens ation to actors that are in shows that are proven to be
01:53:24
of a certain level of success but how the how the equation works out and how they actually
01:53:31
quantify a whether you meet a threshold and then how you get paid accordingly I don't I haven't understood that math yet
01:53:38
but I think there may be an opportunity now with the new contracts that we because we don't see a scent even though
01:53:44
the show's wildly popular in Israel and the UK and France and Belgium in Brazil
01:53:50
and the Netherlands and New Zealand you don't see a scent of that you like a
01:53:54
flat rate you're acting money and that's it yes yeah yeah which you know
01:53:58
obviously is not uh as as good as what it was it's not how David Hasselhoff made his money on bayw no no exactly and
01:54:06
that's just because we're in this new era of streaming and and and it's a
01:54:10
different uh business model so um hopefully you know if the show continues to to keep its appeal then we may get
01:54:18
some something from that though from the international success yeah God it's been
01:54:22
a blast sitting down with you today you it feels like you're in such a good place you're so comfortable in your own
01:54:28
skin you know who you are you know what you are you're not trying to prove anything to anyone it seems like Life's
01:54:34
good and it seems like life's been good for you for a long time thanks man um
01:54:39
yeah life I mean I I I fun fundamentally have always believe that life itself is
01:54:45
good and I've sort of tried to orientate myself to that belief um and yeah and it has been good good to
01:54:57
me and again you know talking about the sobriety thing too I think um that was also a huge Turning Point too where I
01:55:06
think I started being good to myself in a really real real sense and able to look at myself and you know I I went
01:55:15
into therapy too there was a lot of stuff we we talked about the divorce things and
01:55:20
a lot of these issues that I think I had growing up that um unexamined were sort
01:55:27
of fears of mine around relationships and um just you know the the the classic sort of stuff that when it's hidden in
01:55:37
the dark and I was drinking to sort of try to avoid facing it yeah yeah and then and then when I stopped that kind
01:55:45
of ripped the Band-Aid off and through the help of you know a therapist was able to really look at some of these
01:55:51
things that were plaguing me that were deep down that I was terrified to look at and then you you're bringing them to
01:55:55
the light of the day and they're most of the time they're just your your your
01:56:00
feelings or your thoughts you know and sometimes they're based on on fear and
01:56:04
they're not real and and to be able to sort of shed light into that part of my
01:56:09
life I think has allowed me to yeah grow into the person you are toight yeah and accept myself and and
01:56:15
love myself and be comfortable and um and sort of also think realize that it's
01:56:22
not all about you I think I I I work in a in in an industry and a and a particular job that is can be very much
01:56:31
all about you and I I kind of work to sort of not make that a reality because I think you know there's so much more at
01:56:40
play and looking at the bigger picture spiritually and and um within a community and sort of sort of trying to
01:56:48
get out of yourself more I think helps me keep a really good perspective on on it all yeah so when was the therapy was
01:56:56
that late 20s was that after the sobriety yes it was I'm trying to think if I went I
01:57:03
think I did I go to therapist before I got sober I might have sat down no it was actually when I
01:57:12
got sober I was in a relationship we were arguing a lot and we both both wanted it to work but we didn't seem to
01:57:21
be able to make it work and she suggested that I go with her to her therapist and see if we could figure it
01:57:27
out which I thought was really unfair I'm like I don't want to go to your
01:57:30
therapist she's going to be on your side and you know what about why we choose my
01:57:34
therapist or a neutral one but anyway I put my ego aside I went along and um uh and that was yeah that was the
01:57:43
sort of the start um we ended up breaking up but I actually kept going to see the therapist um
01:57:50
because she helped me see that I was just shooting myself in the foot you know I wasn't self sabotaging yeah yeah
01:57:57
and and I had a lot to learn I I mean man I had a lot to learn and I had to grow up and um and face stuff and and um
01:58:08
yeah so it's that was that was sort of the beginning around 27 yeah has your
01:58:12
mental health mostly been good over the years it has since then yeah yeah really
01:58:16
yeah but like like I said with support you know um and I've struggled you know
01:58:22
I definitely have had periods where I felt I struggled with anxiety for a while and some depression and
01:58:32
um and I had to really do a lot of lot of self-work you know and really examine what what was going on and was that
01:58:40
anxiety and depression that was sort of understandable like when you're going
01:58:43
for two two to three years without any work or was it sort of unexplained I think some of it was was was sort of
01:58:50
existential sort of just um maybe related to that maybe being in relationships that weren't healthy and
01:58:59
sort of like feeling like oh I got to make it work and being in denial about them and um and but then sort of and
01:59:06
then it's easy to say well well clearly it's didn't work because she this or but
01:59:11
it's like why was I choosing that you know what is it in me that is not being
01:59:15
examined why I thought that was a good idea in the first place what level of denial you know um and why would I CH
01:59:22
why would I think that I I would why would I choose that for myself you know if I was really taking care of myself
01:59:29
I'd actually make a much wiser decision so what are what are the things that are
01:59:33
operating in in me that are still holding me back from actually treating myself in the best possible way and why
01:59:41
don't I love myself enough you know so what am I holding on to what what sort
01:59:45
of self- flatulating judgments am I carrying on and and and where did they come from and that's where therapy for
01:59:51
me helped me go like maybe it was something you know a parent said or did or didn't do or didn't say that I felt
01:59:58
like should have happened or didn't and and then realizing how how as a as a man
02:00:03
I'm still carrying on with sort of seven-year-old Mar's wounds and I'm
02:00:09
carrying that out into adult relationships and thinking they're going to be healthy and you know so there I
02:00:13
mean that yeah there's been it's a lot it's like pulling a strand of cotton on
02:00:17
a t-shirt yeah yeah yeah yeah but and and I think and it always continues I'm
02:00:22
still challenged by some of my attitudes you know and relationships today where I'm like oh that's you know that's not
02:00:28
healthy I need to choose you know a healthier way of conducting myself or expressing myself and um and it takes
02:00:38
humility because then it's you know the ego gets involved and it's hard to admit
02:00:42
that you're you're you're wrong and um you have to grow up and but there's no
02:00:47
way around it right you just got to go through it and keep learning and keep working keep
02:00:53
grinding yeah totally yeah keep trying to be better than the day before absolutely yeah do you you've never been
02:00:57
married he no do you want you want to get married would you like to get married one day yeah yeah I'll get
02:01:01
married yeah yeah yeah do you think so yeah and what about um so your partner at the moment uh she's got got kids yeah
02:01:08
did you did you want your own biological kids or you're not fuss about it yeah
02:01:13
ship sailed for you or I don't know I think that's one of those things that
02:01:17
I'm sort of open to see what what life brings you know there's that famous
02:01:22
quote by I think it was John Lennon life's what happens when you're busy
02:01:26
making plans yeah and sometimes I find that really true um and I'm just that
02:01:33
stuff some of the big big stuff in life you know I I have a lot of faith and my work sorry my work my life works really
02:01:43
well when I find faith and I get out of the way of some of like feeling like I've got to
02:01:50
make things happen or I've got to control things just like trusting in the universe yeah yeah and I've sort of
02:01:56
that's definitely one of those things that I've said you know what if it's
02:01:59
meant to be it's going to be meant to be and as long as I approach whatever the
02:02:04
situation is with the most amount of love I can for myself and the other people involved in any of those
02:02:11
equations then it tends to work out for the best um so we'll see I like that
02:02:19
you're a good man you could be a real you could be a real dick and get away with it why
02:02:26
then know I know I know you could but it's like you've You' you know you've
02:02:30
done the work and you've you know you deserve the success that you're experiencing at the moment oh thanks and
02:02:36
you just seem like and and outside of work you just seem like a a [ __ ] good bastard as well oh thanks like a good
02:02:42
dude and it's been an absolute pleasure to sit down with you today thank you for
02:02:45
being so generous with your time yeah oh it's a pleasure and I know this has been
02:02:48
a long time trying to get us in the room but um I've listened to some of the work
02:02:53
you've done and conversely man I think you yeah you you seem to really want to
02:02:59
put out there you seem to have a genuine interest in the people you talk to and I
02:03:03
think that's some reflection of your own your curiosity about yourself and life
02:03:09
and yeah and I and I like that you promote you seem to talk a bit about me mental health and you're actually
02:03:14
interested in the the true Human Experience not just the the the story and the glitz and the glamour you know
02:03:20
and I think that's uh a testament to obviously who you are and I respect that
02:03:25
and so I feel like coming on a show like this feels um feels like the right thing
02:03:31
to do oh thank you I I think it's just an understanding as you get older you
02:03:34
realize that life for nobody is a highlight real no man yeah you know there's Life's a it's a messy existence
02:03:41
and um and we're all in it we're all dude we're all in it and I think that's
02:03:45
one of the most amazing things that I've found from from attending uh AA meetings and sitting in the room
02:03:51
and and just hearing people talk and it could be an 80-year-old uh you know Egyptian woman
02:04:00
who's an immigrant talking about something going on in her life or her family or in her heart and I realized oh
02:04:07
my God I'm we're exactly the same and we really are it's just the clothing or the
02:04:12
accent or the The Tint of your skin or what you do for a job or you know who you vote for or what church you go to or
02:04:23
we've all got more in common than what we don't have in common without doubt
02:04:27
you know without a doubt so I think yeah if you if you can feel comfortable enough to to be honest
02:04:34
about your journey then then maybe there's one person out there because there's been a lot of people like I've
02:04:39
[ __ ] about today that have been honest with me or I've gleaned something from
02:04:44
at a young age and and been inspired by or or educated by so I think it's it's
02:04:50
so it's so important that we're transparent about our experience so that
02:04:54
someone else out there might develop some health or or get get inspired to do something or find the courage to do
02:05:01
something or um or not or just just just delete move on to something they find more interesting
02:05:09
which is cool too 100% hey Maron thank you so much for your time it's been over
02:05:14
two hours and uh I I can't I can't thank you enough and I hope it's been an
02:05:19
joyable and even cathartic experience for you to you reminisce on yeah it has you brought up You' brought up a lot of
02:05:25
things that I've totally forgotten about and it's nice to yeah remember the
02:05:29
journey you know yeah it's cool and long may your success continue it's quite
02:05:33
funny when um you know when I was like 25 27 the same age as you got sober um I would have thought 50 was old as [ __ ]
02:05:41
like life is over sort of thing and then when you get here you realize actually it's not no and there's still so much to
02:05:46
learn and and and get rid of and move and yeah I um I I really same thing I was out yesterday with a I was at work
02:05:56
actually finish your work and the makeup artist was turning 40 and we were laughing about how when you're a little
02:06:02
kid and your mom turned 40 how old that felt then you get there and you're like
02:06:07
it's it's not the Doom and Gloom that you think it's no no just got to take
02:06:11
care of the body I think that's yeah otherwise if that starts to go then you
02:06:16
you your joy can dimin greatly you know absolutely yeah hey thank you so much for your time an
02:06:23
absolute pleasure y yep yeah I appreciate likewise thank you