Neill Rea: from Hercules to The Brokenwood Mysteries...

Actor and casting director Neill Rea made an early mark in hit Dunedin movie  Scarfies. He went on to appear in TV shows Duggan, Mercy Peak, and forgotten Ivanhoe series Dark Knight. Having created a stir by playing a rapist in Shortland Street, he got his biggest part to date: good guy detective Mike Shepherd in Prime TV series The Brokenwood Mysteries. 

In this ScreenTalk, Rea talks about:

• Being thrown around on an episode of Hercules
• Learning from acting masters John Bach and Nathaniel Lees on detective series Duggan
• The challenges of shooting on 16mm film for Scarfies 
• Odd experiences with insects, while shooting horror movie The Irrefutable Truth About Demons
• Struggling to cope with the plot-based style of Shortland Street
• Toning it down while playing a villain on the show, opposite Rebecca Hobbs 
• How working on Go Girls helped him when he re-cast series five of the show
• Being surprised at winning a lead role in The Brokenwood Mysteries
• Worrying initially that he was no good in the role
• How less is more when playing Detective Inspector Mike Shepherd 

This video was first uploaded on 29 September 2015, and is available under this Creative Commons licence. This licence is limited to use of ScreenTalk interview footage only and does not apply to any video content and photographs from films, television, music videos, web series and commercials used in the interview.

Interview, Camera and Editing – Andrew Whiteside