Rebecca Gibney has made a name for herself playing strong, much-loved characters on screen.
Her latest, a breezy Sydney socialite transplanted to New Zealand named Daisy, is something else – and even the actress admits she doesn’t have all that much in common with her.
”She starts off as shallow as a puddle, let’s face it,” Rebecca, 58, says of Under the Vines’ Daisy.
”There’s not a lot of depth. She’s just someone who has gone from party to party and has never had to work for anything.
”By the time she’s wearing the gumboots and denim shirt, then she’s feeling a lot like me.”
Rebecca is a staple on Aussie screens.
(IMAGE: TV WEEK)Always keen to roll up her sleeves – Rebecca’s also an executive producer on Under the Vines – the TV WEEK Gold Logie winner is proof good things can come to those who put in the work.
”Lucky thing for me is that I have a job I absolutely adore,” she enthuses.
”I love it so much. I just feel so incredibly grateful to be still working in an industry that can be really tough. I don’t take it for granted.”
In the gentle comedy drama Under the Vines, Rebecca’s Daisy winds up running a vineyard outside of Queenstown, with a British lawyer named Louis (Charles Edwards).
It’s a classic case of will they/won’t they get together.
Louis and Daisy in Under the Vines.
(IMAGE: Supplied)On a TV landscape pock-marked with reality shows about young people finding love on islands, Under the Vines is unique.
It’s a show about, and aimed predominately at, older people.
”We’re exploring romance for an older generation,” Rebecca says.
”It’s just to show life doesn’t end at 40, 50 or even 60. You can still find romance and be considered attractive. That’s what’s been appealing to our older audience as well.”
Rebecca loved dipping her fingers into the character of Daisy.
(IMAGE: Supplied)Rebecca found fame in Australia in the mid-’80s playing mechanic Emma Plimpton in The Flying Doctors. In the ’90s came Halifax f.p, sitcom All Together Now and Snowy.
Then, in 2008, she landed the role of a lifetime as family matriarch Julie Rafter in Packed To The Rafters. She’s been fortunate she’s never felt she’s had to struggle against ageism in an industry that has always prized youth.
She’s also been insistent on, where possible, creating her own characters, like she did with checkout chick Lola Buckley in Wanted.
These days, people come to Rebecca with shows featuring women ”that are independent and attractive and still sexual.”
As Lola, on the run with Chelsea (Geraldine Hakewill) in 2016’s Wanted.
(IMAGE: Supplied)Now in a position to call the shots on her career, there could be change in the air for the actress.
She’s found herself asking whether she wants to continue taking on roles where she’s playing ”a romantic person.”
Her answer is: ”not particularly.”
”[It’s] not really where I want to go,” she says.
”I look at actors like Helen Mirren and Judi Dench and Meryl Streep. They just keep playing a huge array [of characters].
”Personally, the older I get, the stronger and more comfortable I feel in myself. So I feel like I can actually bring that to the screen as well.”
Rebecca has been open about her past battles, including struggles with anxiety involving 15 panic attacks a day. She has also spoken about the horrific sexual abuse her mother suffered from Rebecca’s grandfather between the ages of two and 15.
She does this, she says, to help others who have experienced similar trauma.
”Talking about my mother’s sexual abuse, growing up with an alcoholic father… I feel we’re all the same underneath, we just have different clothes on,” she says.
”Everyone has suffered in some way, shape or form.
”The more open we are about our struggles, the more I think other people are allowed to feel these things and maybe our suicide rate would lower because people would start seeking more help rather than taking the hardest way out.
”If I can help one person, I’ve done my bit. There is always at least one person who’ll listen. Sometimes you just need to have someone that can listen, so you can get it out of your head.”
Daisy was a role unlike any other for Rebecca.
(IMAGE: Supplied)It will be a busy couple of years for the sought-after actress. She’s left her home in Dunedin for Sydney to film something over the next four months. She can’t talk about that just yet, but it will give her a chance to see her mum, Shirley, in Brisbane.
”I can’t wait to see her and give her a cuddle.”
Then, she’s attached to three projects which will film this year. And she has her own creation, which could start shooting in 2024.
Meanwhile, Zac Bell, Rebecca’s son with producer husband Richard Bell, is in his second year at drama school.
She couldn’t be prouder and loves how he’s passionate about acting.
”He knows it’s a craft and that’s why he wants to study it,” she says.
”This is what makes his heart sing.”
The NZ born actress is best known for her role as Julie in Pacled to the Rafters.
(IMAGE: TV Week)And what makes hers soar. For all her triumphs and challenges, Rebecca is not tied to the past.
Nor does she peer too far ahead.
”Weirdly enough, I don’t try to look too much to the future,” she says.
”I plan for things, but I try to live very much in the present.
”As you get older, and start losing friends and family members, you start realising how transient and how fleeting life is. We’re only here for a blip and I want to make the most of that blip.
”I’m trying, as much as possible, to be very mindful of every moment.”
