Speaker 1: It's in the news today, but it was actually on
Speaker 1: TV Reload the podcast a week They're.
Speaker 2: Right, Hey, guys, welcome back to TV Reload. I want
Speaker 2: to thank you for clicking and downloading on today's episode
Speaker 2: with Jesse Spencer and Ruder Mitchell to very iconic Australian
Speaker 2: actors who are currently featured in the Disney Plus series
Speaker 2: The Last Days of the Space Age. Jesse is actually
Speaker 2: an old friend of mine that I've lost touch with,
Speaker 2: so I don't think he knew that I was going
Speaker 2: to be chatting with him today, So it was kind
Speaker 2: of nice that he remembered me and didn't think, oh god,
Speaker 2: this guy you know what I mean, or forgotten who
Speaker 2: I was. You know, with these big press junkets, they
Speaker 2: do so many of them and you only get allocated
Speaker 2: like eight minutes, so you start off by sort of
Speaker 2: saying your name and where you're from, and that's sort
Speaker 2: of where you can hear Jesse realize that it's weird
Speaker 2: old me again on the other end of the microphone.
Speaker 2: But today we are talking about this new series set
Speaker 2: in Australia in nineteen seventy nine, where a power strike
Speaker 2: threatens to plunge a western Australian town into Darkness, where
Speaker 2: the city is also hosting the Miss Universe pageant and
Speaker 2: a US space station, Skylab, also crashes just beyond the
Speaker 2: city suburbs. It's a tapestry of characters and I really
Speaker 2: do hope you guys check it out because it's actually,
Speaker 2: you know, very Disney and very fun to watch with
Speaker 2: the family. I will ask about Writer and Jesse's relationship
Speaker 2: with Disney and what it's like to actually make a
Speaker 2: Disney show. You will hear a little bit about their
Speaker 2: upbringing as well, and if their parents ever encourage them
Speaker 2: to go to space or have very ambitious dreams. Rather,
Speaker 2: we'll talk about how far we've come in terms of
Speaker 2: equality between men and women. Plus you will even find
Speaker 2: out about their accents and if their time spent overseas,
Speaker 2: particularly in the case for Jesse, who's been in the
Speaker 2: US now for twenty years, did that make it hard
Speaker 2: to sound authentically Australian? Again, There is so much to
Speaker 2: unpack with these guys. It's very short and sweet, but
Speaker 2: there's still some fantastic secrets along the way. So sit
Speaker 2: back and relax as we unpack the last days of
Speaker 2: the space Age. Amazing Benjamin Norris and Hi Jesse, how
Speaker 2: so how are you? I didn't even like about fifteen
Speaker 2: years so.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think we had a friend in common or something.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Brett blewet Bred.
Speaker 3: Blow down the line.
Speaker 4: Serious, Yeah, yeah, it's like a movie.
Speaker 3: No, he was, he was on Neighbors for a while.
Speaker 4: Yeah right right, okay, yeah, so it was.
Speaker 3: Back back in the day.
Speaker 2: Yeah. All I remember, Jesse was that you used to
Speaker 2: I went for like a roast. You used to do
Speaker 2: like a Sunday roast at your place and have lamb
Speaker 2: because did I?
Speaker 3: I did lamb for Americans with Americans?
Speaker 2: Yeah, because Americans didn't want to eat the lamb like.
Speaker 3: I was trying to introduce them to week Classic.
Speaker 1: No, it's just that lamb is not They're like Turkey
Speaker 1: and Lamb's a little exotic.
Speaker 3: Yeah. It was went down like a yeah, a sack
Speaker 3: of bricks, didn't it.
Speaker 2: Well, it depended because there was often sort of Aussie
Speaker 2: expats in Australia there that you'd sort of into your house. Anyway,
Speaker 2: we're going off on a answership. People listening to this podcast,
Speaker 2: they're going to be like, I don't care that is.
Speaker 3: About Jesse's lamb roast.
Speaker 2: Anyways, you know, guys, I loved the character of your
Speaker 2: daughter Tilly and her ambition to be an astronaut in this,
Speaker 2: and I wondered about the two of you, if your
Speaker 2: parents encourage you both to have ambitious dreams growing up
Speaker 2: in you know, late seventies, early eighties.
Speaker 1: Well, I've got a daughter now who's three, and I
Speaker 1: sort of really relate to this because, you know, thinking ahead,
Speaker 1: and you know humanities, you know, wants to go the
Speaker 1: space races are back on to some degree, and you know,
Speaker 1: we want to go to Mars and can we go beyond?
Speaker 3: And I was sort of like I told my wife,
Speaker 3: I was like, I would love my daughter to be
Speaker 3: the first woman on Mars. And she was like, you're
Speaker 3: not sending her to Mars.
Speaker 5: But I sort of really like understood that passion because
Speaker 5: you know, Tilly has you know, she believes.
Speaker 1: In it, you know, and it's such a i mean,
Speaker 1: big crazy dream, but why not?
Speaker 3: And I understand that.
Speaker 1: You know, to sort of validate and encourage someone's dream
Speaker 1: like that.
Speaker 3: So yeah, I loved it too.
Speaker 6: A friend of mine he actually was raising his daughter
Speaker 6: to go to Mars, but turns out she just wants
Speaker 6: to be a dentist.
Speaker 4: So I'm big dreams for your kids. Yeah, but it
Speaker 4: doesn't seem that like impossible actually these days. I mean,
Speaker 4: that's going to be one way you're heading.
Speaker 2: I don't want to go to space. That's like terrified.
Speaker 2: Like I wouldn't even have a friend Elon Musk because
Speaker 2: I'd be afraid he'd ask me.
Speaker 4: On the ground us we'll going, mate, you have to, can't.
Speaker 2: What I thought was compelling about this series was the
Speaker 2: way in which it addresses the power dynamics between men
Speaker 2: and women in Australia. Was surprising to play this role
Speaker 2: and notice how far we've come with equality in this country.
Speaker 6: I think there were women in the seventies who were
Speaker 6: a little in advance of where Judy's at when the
Speaker 6: story begins, in terms of working in the workforce. But
Speaker 6: that seems to be a journey that we're all on culturally,
Speaker 6: and we're all in different chapters and different parts of that,
Speaker 6: but ultimately it's about emancipation and people being able to
Speaker 6: take control of their own lives, and certainly that's the
Speaker 6: journey for Judy, and then the sort of things you
Speaker 6: lose in that and the conflict around that and in
Speaker 6: the dynamic of a relationship, the sort of sense of
Speaker 6: betrayal about it and the confusion about it was really
Speaker 6: interesting to track and really to understand the perspective of
Speaker 6: both parties.
Speaker 4: I think the show really kind of demonstrated that.
Speaker 2: I mean, I think it was surprising to me because
Speaker 2: whilst it is a long time ago, it's just still
Speaker 2: a short period to see how far we've come in
Speaker 2: so many different ways. And I thought some of the
Speaker 2: conversations between you and Jesse and your characters was just
Speaker 2: so fascinating.
Speaker 4: In those terms of like the gender roles and yeah.
Speaker 2: Just filling into those gender roles.
Speaker 6: They felt very traditional, you know, very traditional even for
Speaker 6: the seventies.
Speaker 4: And I think it's because that's the perth reality as well.
Speaker 6: That things were very traditional, traditional to what I guess
Speaker 6: to kind of you know, the culture of our ancestors.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was interesting to sit of tract that personally.
Speaker 6: I was reading this book that my grandmother had given
Speaker 6: me in the eighties that I'd never read, called Women's
Speaker 6: Power Handbook, and it was written by Joan Kerner, who
Speaker 6: obviously was you know, in politics in that era and
Speaker 6: had this sort of experience of you know, battling men
Speaker 6: and you know, trying to move things forward as an activist,
Speaker 6: as a politician.
Speaker 4: So it was interesting just to.
Speaker 6: Read that book as a kind of a legacy that
Speaker 6: my grandmother had left to me that I'd never paid
Speaker 6: attention to, and look at that in relationship to say
Speaker 6: Judy's Journey and just the kind of issues that women
Speaker 6: were facing in that era and you know to today.
Speaker 2: As you say, I was interested because you know, the Disney,
Speaker 2: the House of Mouse is just such a recognizable company
Speaker 2: and we all grew up with it here in Australia,
Speaker 2: you know, watching Sunday Night Disney or Saturday Morning Disney.
Speaker 2: Did you both grow up watching a lot of Disney
Speaker 2: as it's strange to now be making a series.
Speaker 4: Well Disney is like what's Disney? Disney is this huge thing.
Speaker 3: A whole bunch of Yeah, I mean the Disney I
Speaker 3: think we watched was.
Speaker 4: We started with Mickey Mouse.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Well, I was watching like Mary Poppins and the
Speaker 3: Sound of.
Speaker 5: Which I've gone back to watching now they have a daughter,
Speaker 5: so I'm going back and watching.
Speaker 3: Some of the classics that I've never seen. I don't
Speaker 3: think I've ever seen Pinocchio. I don't think like some of.
Speaker 1: These older ones, and it spans such a long time,
Speaker 1: you know, and I mean there's.
Speaker 3: Something very innocent about them. And yeah, I love.
Speaker 6: They have maintained that that sort of ethos and what
Speaker 6: they represent. You know, it's hard to do on such
Speaker 6: a grand scale, but they really do create quality content
Speaker 6: that's sort of family friendly, and I felt, I guess
Speaker 6: is a.
Speaker 4: Way to put it.
Speaker 2: I just hope that, you know, families watch this show together,
Speaker 2: you know, like we would have the TV rolled into
Speaker 2: the kitchen. I mean, obviously they don't do that anymore.
Speaker 2: They'll be on the tablet. But you know, when I
Speaker 2: grew up in the eighties, like Sunday night, we would
Speaker 2: get a good meal and they wheel the TV in
Speaker 2: and we could watch something as a family. I think
Speaker 2: when I was watching this show, my partner was watching Monsters,
Speaker 2: and I was like, I can't watch that show. But
Speaker 2: watching this is such a beautiful story and it's so
Speaker 2: well made. I just hope that families can watch it.
Speaker 6: Multi generational, like you could watch it with your grandma,
Speaker 6: you can watch it with your child, you know, and everybody.
Speaker 4: Everybody can relate to one of the characters in the story.
Speaker 6: There's something very very broad about the possible audience for sure.
Speaker 5: Yeah, universal themes and like a variety of characters from
Speaker 5: all walks of life that create this wonderful tapestry in
Speaker 5: a neat, quirky time in Perth. You know, it's sort
Speaker 5: of it's a strange little ethereal vignette that that was
Speaker 5: just really fun to make and a great cast of
Speaker 5: characters and really fun writing.
Speaker 3: So we had a great time making it.
Speaker 4: It's a good task start out for a family.
Speaker 2: You guys are global actors and it's quite amazing because
Speaker 2: you guys have made so much content all around the world.
Speaker 2: Just you know, you lived in the UK and been
Speaker 2: in America and I just think coming home and making
Speaker 2: something like this, I was curious about whether all the
Speaker 2: other accents that you've been having to do over the
Speaker 2: years would sneak back in.
Speaker 4: So that was the we had to do, sort of
Speaker 4: like how do we speak because.
Speaker 6: Obviously we're married, so we must have had something from
Speaker 6: the same place and we've.
Speaker 4: So many places, Like what is it to be Australian?
Speaker 4: And that was that was a conversation. Bizarre conversation, it was.
Speaker 5: And if you've been doing there are certain you know, dialect,
Speaker 5: and we've both been doing an American dialect for quite
Speaker 5: a long time, and you you know, you work so
Speaker 5: hard to sort of get to a certain place with
Speaker 5: that and needs to have to undo it, or it
Speaker 5: was more it felt more daunting.
Speaker 3: Than it actually was.
Speaker 7: I think it actually came pretty organically after being back
Speaker 7: in Australia, and it's such a good Aussie story. I
Speaker 7: think we didn't want to overthink it, but you do
Speaker 7: have to think about it a little bit.
Speaker 2: Well, guys, you know, with these junkets, you kind of
Speaker 2: just get quickly cut off, so I didn't get a
Speaker 2: chance to answer or ask my I should say my
Speaker 2: last question, which as everyone knows, is what is something
Speaker 2: from behind the scenes. I thought i'd give you something.
Speaker 2: There's a bit of a secret or fact about Jesse
Speaker 2: Spencer that you guys might find interesting. Did you know
Speaker 2: that in two thousand Jesse auditioned to play Anakin Skywalker
Speaker 2: in the Attack of the Clones. It was actually a
Speaker 2: role that went to Hayden Christensen. But pretty amazing that
Speaker 2: at the time, you know, Jesse had really only been
Speaker 2: known for being Billy Kennedy on Neighbors, so yes, he's
Speaker 2: gone on to do some amazing things with shows like
Speaker 2: House and Chicago Fire. But a little fun fact there. Actually,
Speaker 2: I will also tell you something quite interesting. Jesse was
Speaker 2: the person who taught me to not to tell people
Speaker 2: you don't know too much about yourself, which was actually
Speaker 2: because of this hilarious story that happened to us. One
Speaker 2: day while we were in the US. We had tickets
Speaker 2: to go and see Missy Higgins, who was playing in America,
Speaker 2: playing in la and we went to go and see
Speaker 2: this show. But I'd randomly told this cashier at Whole
Speaker 2: Foods that I was going out. And I guess, if
Speaker 2: you know me, and you know me well enough, do
Speaker 2: you know that this is something I would do. But
Speaker 2: I told this cashier that I'm friends with Jesse Spencer
Speaker 2: and we're going to see Missy Higgins. Anyway, this chick,
Speaker 2: this cashier ends up turning up at the gig and
Speaker 2: it was just really really awkward, and basically Jesse said
Speaker 2: to me, don't tell people anything because they will actually
Speaker 2: follow you. In the US, very common for people to
Speaker 2: do that kind of bonkers things. And Jesse was very
Speaker 2: famous at the time. He was shooting House and it
Speaker 2: was sort of in that, you know, the heyday of
Speaker 2: all of that. Anyway, I hope you've enjoyed the chat
Speaker 2: with the guys. Go and check out the Last Days
Speaker 2: of the Space Age. It's really fun and it's on
Speaker 2: Disney Class. I look forward to catching up with you
Speaker 2: guys soon