U.S. audiences know Sam Reid as Interview With the Vampire‘s Lestat, however they’re about to satisfy the character he’s identified for in his homeland of Australia. Reid performs Dale Jennings reverse Anna Torv‘s Helen Norville in The Newsreader, an award-winning authentic collection from Australia’s ABC TV that first debuted in 2021. Its third and ultimate season premieres on February 2, 2025 in Australia, however Interview With the Vampire‘s streaming dwelling, AMC+, is bringing The Newsreader to keen followers subsequent week as a part of a brand new licensing settlement.
Beginning Thursday, December 19 and going by means of January 23, Sundance Now will launch one episode of The Newsreader Season 1 per week. Sundance Now titles can be found to AMC+ subscribers. As of the time of publication, Sundance Now and AMC+ will solely have Season 1, however Season 2 might probably come to the streaming service sooner or later. (Season 1 was beforehand accessible on The Roku Channel and ARTE in English for a restricted time.)
The Newsreader is about within the maelstrom of business tv newsrooms in 1986 Australia. In Season 1, Dale is a diligent younger reporter, determined to turn out to be a newsreader. Helen is a notoriously “troublesome” star newsreader decided to construct credibility. After Dale is assigned to be Helen’s producer by their ill-tempered boss, Lindsay (William McInnes), an sudden connection rapidly grows, giving them a help system each out and in of the newsroom that they every desperately wanted.
Paired collectively over three months, Dale and Helen cowl a unprecedented chain of reports occasions — from the shock of the Challenger explosion, to the hype of Halley’s Comet, to the complexities of the AIDS disaster. From messy beginnings, a deep bond is shaped that upends their lives and transforms the very cloth of the nightly information bulletin.
The Newsreader is created by Michael Lucas, and each episode is directed by Emma Freeman, director of the critically acclaimed trial episode in Interview With the Vampire Season 2. Reid has been taking part in Dale and Lestat again to again since 2021. With The Newsreader now behind him, Reid seems again on Season 1 Dale with TV Insider.
After we first met, you had simply filmed [The Newsreader] Season 2.
Sam Reid: Proper.
I didn’t get to observe it till earlier this yr. It was randomly on this French streaming app, and I used to be like, oh my God, I’m going to satisfy Dale Jennings. I lastly did, and it was superb. I might shield him with my life. He’s so painfully awkward.
[Laughs] Yeah.
I like him a lot. For individuals who don’t know, give us a little bit intro into Dale Jennings, his objectives within the newsroom in Season 1, and why he connects with Helen.
Dale Jennings is an formidable reporter who has aspirations to be a newsreader. His entire life has been centered round holding up these archetypal photos of those very, very steady, sturdy people who find themselves represented by means of these sort of nearly cardboard-like newsreader figures. He’s acquired a variety of inside turmoil that he latches a way of stability and a way of calm onto these figures within the information. That’s what he aspires to be. He desires to be this excellent particular person, nevertheless it seems that the information is a really tumultuous place, and this one that he’s idolizing, Helen Norville, seems to be a way more difficult human being than he even imagined. They join on that stage that they each use the information as a type of masking, actually. I feel that the information and newsreaders are actually nice examples of a private and non-private persona. In America, it’s barely completely different to the UK and Australia, I feel. I did truly use a variety of American newsreader references as a result of American information is so theatrical. They’re large tv spectacles.
Shouldn’t be, however it’s.
Oh, I do know. And I feel Australia within the ’80s most likely had a bit extra of that as a result of there was much more restricted tv channels, so I undoubtedly tried to have a look at a variety of American newsreaders, significantly as we progressed with Dale. He turns into a bit extra Americanized. However yeah, there’s this dichotomy between the general public and private persona that I feel Helen and Dale actually join on as a result of privately, they’re each absolute messes, however they’ve an actual connection to the work. They love the work.
There’s a really romantic scene — it was most likely probably the most romantic scene between the 2 of them — in the direction of the tip of Season 1 the place after they’ve gotten an enormous story and so they’re sitting on a clifftop in Darwin. They’re meant to be having this romantic date, [but] Helen simply needs to work, and Dale completely sees that. He sort of says, you don’t need to sit right here and have champagne with me. You simply need to give attention to the work. And he or she says, yeah. And he says, that’s OK. I get it. That’s nice. That’s most likely their most romantic second, to be understood in that house that the work comes at the start else, after which they offer one another the house to do it. They’re complete oddballs, however I feel they’re made for one another. I actually really feel like they’re destined to be collectively. [Giggles]
I get that vibe too. And he loves that she needs to give attention to the work.
He loves it.
He already beloved her, however he sort of falls in love along with her extra in that second. He’s like, this gal, that’s precisely what I might do. He respects her a lot.
Yeah, and he idolizes her. She’s so spectacular, she’s so highly effective, and she or he can be very thrilling as an individual to be round. She’s acquired a variety of management in the way in which that she operates, and Anna is like that as nicely. They simply sort of stroll in, they take a variety of management of the house. Extremely beneficiant, however they don’t take any s**t. And Dale simply takes s**t all day, each day, nonstop, significantly in Season 1. [Laughs] And so it’s very aspirational, I feel, to be round somebody like Helen Norville.
Courtesy of Roku
Do you suppose they work with out the work? In the event that they didn’t each love the information, in the event that they didn’t have that of their lives, might their relationship nonetheless work?
No, I don’t truly. I don’t suppose they work individually with out the information, or not less than they haven’t labored it out. I can’t actually converse an excessive amount of for Helen. That’s a complete different ballpark. However I really feel like Dale hasn’t actually labored out who he’s. He’s solely labored out who this archetype that he needs to be is. Enjoying that’s actually enjoyable as a result of he’s such a multitude. He’s so difficult and he’s so gangly and simply attempting to work out his toes exterior of the information. However as quickly because the information is on — oh, grasp on. We’re speaking about Season 1. [Laughs]
I feel he is aware of the place he needs to be. He’s acquired a very sturdy aspiration about the place he needs to be. It is rather nerve-wracking for him to have the ability to ship on that, and so Helen actually helps him turn out to be that factor. She exhibits him how one can put on the general public persona, and she or he teaches him how one can do it. She’s there holding his hand the entire time. She makes him this assured, highly effective factor, regardless that he’s crumbling on the within.
But additionally in flip, he makes her really feel lovable. Lots of people make her really feel like she’s fully unlovable.
Yeah, however he does love her. That’s the factor.
He loves her a lot.
He does love her, and he loves her for all of her quirks.
Lots of people do really feel like that [unlovable], and there’s a variety of quirks to Helen’s persona which can be very particular person to her, which Dale adores and he doesn’t make her really feel dangerous about them. That’s who she is, he accepts her for them, and he’s by no means actually judged her ever. They actually spur one another on. They’re a very pretty couple truly. Their dynamic, all the things about them, the way in which that he understands her and offers her house to be who she must be with out judgment. And the identical on her half.
The issue is, the extra difficult their relationship turns into, the extra they discover out about one another, the extra that’s examined. That relationship turns into increasingly and extra examined. However significantly in Season 1, it’s actually about them discovering that concrete, infallible lock of a connection and belief in one another, which they undoubtedly do by the tip, nevertheless it’s a undoubtedly tumultuous journey to get there. [Laughs]
We are able to’t speak an excessive amount of about the remainder of Season 1 or past as a result of we’re doing preview right here, however the [Season 1 finale] scene the place he’s speaking about his sexuality along with her — god.
Yeah.
Courtesy of Roku
I weep each time I watch that. It’s so lovely.
And that’s the enjoyment of Emma Freeman. We spend a very long time circling this scene. We shoot the entire present in a single go, so we shoot six episodes concurrently. It’s sort of like taking pictures a six-hour-long film whereas we shoot it, so it’s sort of complicated since you don’t have any sense of through-line or consistency. However we stored on circling the scene. We had been scheduled to shoot it, after which we thought, no, it’s not the best time. And so we actually labored out the characters and spent a complete season understanding who they had been earlier than we acquired to the precise revelation of the place they present one another their true selves and what felt proper. We truly shot just a few completely different iterations of that and some other ways to go about it till we lastly landed on that one. And we simply shot it as soon as, principally.
Wow. I want I might speak extra concerning the finale, it’s so lovely. However to speak concerning the first episode: Dale’s first replace on the information desk is probably the most painfully humorous, uncomfortable scene. I scream laughing watching it each time. Inform me the way you and Emma Freeman labored collectively to determine how one can make that scene so viscerally humorous and uncomfortable and awkward to observe.
Emma shoots the entire present. The enjoyment of The Newsreader — and significantly working with Emma and Earle Dresner, the [director of photography’s] model for that present — is that the units that they construct are so interactive since you shoot in actual movie studios and actual information studios, after which the workplace is a whole workplace block that we are able to transfer round in. And the identical with a variety of the home areas and stuff. We name them “mega blocks,” and so we are likely to shoot perhaps 5 scenes collectively. We’ll ram all of them collectively so what you get is a full sense of journey by means of the scene. So you possibly can have Dale getting made up within the make-up room, after which he would arise after which do the stroll out to the information desk and sit down and the digicam will keep there whereas he has his make-up touched up and other people coming out and in and operating.
We are able to shoot these all as lengthy, 10-minute takes, in order that does create a way of foreboding and nervousness even when you’re doing it as a result of they’re nerve-wracking conditions. Now we have the precise autocue for the information rolling on the display. Now we have the music taking part in, the information intro, very tense music taking part in. And studying autocue stay is definitely actually onerous, and to sound pure [while reading it] is absolutely onerous. However that scene was at all times there. That was one of many first issues that actually drew me to the present as a result of that scene, a variety of issues get developed as we go, however that scene was at all times very concrete in Michael Lucas’s authentic script, and I simply thought it was so humorous as nicely.
I’m attempting to not chortle simply excited about it. I’ve to ask you concerning the particular sound you make when he’s about to go on and he’s like, “Ooh!” The place did that come from? Why did you make that little sound?
[Laughs] Nicely, as a result of Dale’s doing voice classes with a vocal coach, so he’s attempting to alter his voice to sound extra like a longtime skilled newsreader. That’s why he sounds so bizarre and robotic. He’s been taught by some sort of backward, Eighties, I think about them to be some very strict vocal coach. And that’s truly a vocal warmup that I used to do after I was doing a musical within the West Finish. Everybody does the vocal sirens the place they’re like, “Aah! Aah!” And actors, after they’re doing it, simply do it very confidently and stroll across the stage simply trying completely loopy. I like the concept of any person who’s not that attempting to try this, how ridiculous it’s for another person. In order that’s the place that got here from.
I imply, I do a bunch of random crap, and I by no means know what’s going to finish up within the present. Emma at all times loves the weirder, so that you simply try to go together with it. The benefit of a personality like Dale is he’s so messy and uncomfortable and he’s stuffed with all this sure vitality that you are able to do so much with him as a result of he’s so repressed. One factor I at all times take into consideration Dale is even when he will get the chance on the information desk, he needs to leap up and down or get actually excited or scream, however he can’t actually let it out. And in order that’s that entire factor. He’s at all times form of repressed and held down, so all the things he does is form of [Laughs]… has acquired this bizarre vibe to it.
He’s such a weirdo. Now we have to wrap up quickly, so a fast Interview With the Vampire query. What are you able to say about the place you’re within the manufacturing course of for Season 3? [A start of production date has not been confirmed as of the time of publication.]
Nicely, they’re writing it [grins].
Proper.
Proper, yeah.
Is that each one you possibly can say?
[Laughs] I can say that they’re actively writing it.
The Newsreader, Season 1 Streaming Premiere, Thursday, December 19, Sundance Now & AMC+