Plum: Series synopsis
Peter ‘the Plum’ Lum (Brendan Cowell) is a living legend – he can’t walk down Cronulla Street without a selfie – and on radio when he talks footy everyone listens up. Now retired and reeling towards 50 with all the back pain and ailments a forward can expect, he lives in his humble house in Cronulla and works a casual job as an aircraft tug driver. The simplicity of this life is exactly what he wants – kicking the ball with his teenage son Gavin (Vincent Miller, Insider), and dinner on the deck with girlfriend Charmayne (María Dupláa, The One, Evil Woman), followed by a few too many beers at the local pub with his mates Brick (John Tui, Young Rock, Fast and the Furious Presents: Hobbs and Shaw), Squeaky (Josh McConville, Elvis, Mr Inbetween) and Magic Matt (Wayne McDaniel, Reckoning), the ‘Coxless Four’ according to their WhatsApp group.
But odd things have been happening lately to disrupt this coastal dreamlife, and Plum’s not the only one sensing it. Up on stage at a Sharks corporate event, he forgets the name of his favourite player – the player he named his own son after! Plum tries to shake it off, and the snowstorm sensation that keeps visiting his head, but when at work he suffers a seizure on the tarmac and nearly drives his tug onto an active runway, he’s forced to face reality. Plum almost certainly has Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE), a degenerative brain disorder, and according to the neurologists it’s time to switch things up or dementia and death are imminent.
The medical diagnosis doesn’t receive its intended effect. Cut from his dad’s cloth of “Never Take a Backwards Step,” Plum would sooner hide, run and head to the pub for drinks with the boys and pretend everything is peachy than confront things. But things are changing whether he likes it or not. His unpredictable behaviour and violent outbursts drive Charmayne away. Meanwhile his son’s patience with Plum’s secrecy is running out, as ex-wife Renee (Asher Keddie) keeps trying to insert herself into the drama.
And if all this was not enough, Plum keeps running into dead poets, never quite sure if they’re real people or figments of his addled brain…they keep telling him to write it all down.
Production notes
Based on Brendan Cowell’s novel of the same name, Plum is created, written and executive produced by Brendan, alongside co-writer Fiona Seres (Love My Way, The Great).
Directors are Wayne Blair (Total Control, Mystery Road) and Margie Beattie (Bump). The series features special guest appearances from Australian rugby league football greats Andrew “Joey” Johns, Mark “Spudd” Carroll, Paul Gallen, and James Graham.
Production Credits: A Roadshow Rough Diamond and Modern Convict Films production.
Major production investment from Screen Australia and the ABC. Financed with support from Screen NSW.
Worldwide Distribution by Entertainment One.
Creator and Executive Producer Brendan Cowell.
Producers: John Edwards, Dan Edwards and Jonathan Duncan.
ABC Executive Producers: Louise Smith, Rachel Okine and Alex Baldwin.
Produced and filmed on the traditional country of the Gweagal people, Sutherland Shire, NSW.
Plum: Asher Keddie and Brendan Cowell
Plum: Episode guide
Episode 1 – Hurricane
Sunday 20 October at 8.30pm on ABC TV and ABC iview
(Spoilers in episode summaries below)
Begins with a flashback to Plum’s playing days in Hull. When, with the help of a little smelling salts, players were sent back on the field after being knocked out. We then head to the present, following Plum through an average weekday in suburban paradise in 2018. Kicking the ball with his son, beers with the boys, salads on the deck with his girlfriend. But then his memory fails him at a corporate gig, and later at work on the tarmac a seizure has him in palpable danger, forcing the tough guy to face the facts. He may have some sort of brain condition.
Plum (Brendan Cowell)
Episode 2 – King of Cronulla
Sunday 27 October at 8.30pm on ABC TV
Sunday 20 October on ABC iview
We open on a flashback to Plum, all dressed up with young wife Renee, receiving his Australian Captaincy. But his dad rolls up drunk, and the ceremony is tainted for the footy hero. Late 2018 and it’s the week of his son Gavin’s final. Renee insists Plum tell his girlfriend Charmayne, and their son Gavin about the incident. Renee is still officially Plum’s next of kin, so was there to collect him from the airport. At the grand final Plum can’t take it, the game that gave him everything is suddenly too brutal, and he has to go. Plum drinks beer with a dead poet and lets his son down.
Tatania (Janet Anderson) and Plum (Brendan Cowell)
Episode 3 – Storm
Sunday 3 November at 8.30pm on ABC TV
Sunday 20 October on ABC iview
Struggling to come to terms with his diagnosis in episode two Plum was given a new lease on life by Tatania, a young trans bar owner, and now works in security at her venue – The Old Bike Shed. When wheelchair user Bridget recites a poem about how we all have the same amount of pain, Plum is moved, then given a little green book to write one of his own. The family head to Melbourne for a meeting with The Storm, but Gavin’s anger at his dad ruins the meeting, and at dinner the father and son come to blows. Renee and Plum land in bed as a result of the family breakdown, but not before a visit from Sylvia Plath, confusing Plum even more.
Episode 4 – The Gap
Sunday 10 November at 8.30pm on ABC TV
Sunday 20 October on ABC iview
Plum is on a zoom to Liz the head doctor but he is more interested in drinking beer out of a teacup. Unbeknownst to Plum, Charmayne his girlfriend has slept with Brick, which makes the boys night even more awkward. The one-night stand looms over Char’s head though, as it may have made her pregnant, or was that the last time with Plum? She turns up to find him in no state for reconciliation, as rock bottom looms for the ex-player, after a heart to heart about absent dads with his new friend, the ghost of Sylvia Plath. Sylvia gets him to write a poem to his father, and hope is on the horizon.
Renee (Asher Keddie)
Episode 5 – The Tree
Sunday 17 November at 8.30pm on ABC TV
Sunday 20 October on ABC iview
In flashback once more, teenage Plum waits for his dad to come with the footy camp money, but he is late. When Albert turns up, he has a new family in the car, and young Plum is hurt. Present day and Plum is three days sober and sweating hard, taking Gavin and Char to Forbes for his mum’s 75th birthday party. But it’s not all cuddles and photo albums! The old tree is chopped down, mum is senile, and the searing heat adds tension, plus the new priest is kinda creepy. On the drive home Plum and Char air their secrets and he is left to walk home through the fields.
Plum (Brendan Cowell) with Sarah (Susie Porter)
Episode 6 – Impact Player
Sunday 24 November at 8.30pm on ABC TV
Sunday 20 October on ABC iview
In the final flashback, Plum touches glory, at his peak with the State of Origin shield in his grasp. But today it’s the opposite, after a mammoth walk through the bush, Plum eats a pie at a bus station. Brick makes a play for Gavin, he will sponsor him, and he can stay in Cronulla. A wayward Plum is told by his doctor that it’s up to him, and if he fights, he is in with a chance. After a scuffle on the front lawn with Brick, Plum takes what he has left of his brain to the Old Bike Shed, reciting an original poem in front of all his loved ones. The words that spill from his mouth bring him peace.
Brendan Cowell
Creator’s Statement | Brendan Cowell
Plum is a thriller hidden inside a dramedy.
Plum is a thriller for me, a relationship thriller. There’s cracked ice underneath Plum’s feet the whole way through the show. And that’s the feeling we always wanted, a slightly Scandinavian feeling of suspense and peril, because that’s what it’s like to live with a disease, to live with an addiction, to live with a fear that puts you completely inside yourself and alone, and for Plum, it’s the first time he has ever been afraid of something. And that something is death.
This show is adventurous, it’s brave, it’s playful and in many ways it is me, it is my personality. I love rugby league so much and I love poetry and language so much – so why not place them against each other?
The notion of the two choices we have as males; to be the effeminate poet, or in turn the thug, brute sports guy … well, what if they’re the same guy? What if we have both in all of us? I do. It’s okay to be both. It’s okay to be a poet. It’s okay to think beautiful thoughts and it’s okay to appreciate beauty and nature, your relationships and people as well as being a tough guy physically.
Why is that such a hard thing for us to reckon with? Why don’t we celebrate men being sensitive and poetic and thoughtful as well as physically strong? So, that’s a proposition.
Perhaps if we were in touch with them we could find a way to articulate ourselves when life came in hard.
Commentary on contact sports and concussion
A crisis is looming over all contact sports, in Europe, USA and Australia – it’s blowing up. Posthumous diagnoses of Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) are multiplying. Players are being medically retired at the peak of their careers due to the effects of repeated concussions. One of them, Boyd Cordner, was a captain of Australia’s national rugby league team. His cousin, 19-year-old Joel Dark, had died after a head injury just nine months prior to Boyd’s shock retirement at the age of 29. Paul Green, top-line NRL coach, took his own life in 2022 probably because of CTE symptoms.
The tricky thing with CTE is it can only be surely identified when the sufferer has died. But it explains a lot. The mood swings and the rage. The bursts of emotion and the forgetfulness. A new light is shed too late.
The characters and world of Plum are informed by in-depth interviews with neurologist Professor Chris Levi, who Brendan Cowell consulted for the novel Plum, and Dr Adrian Cohen, who was the medical adviser during production of the series. Brendan also conferred with high profile former players such as James Graham and Andrew ‘Joey’ Johns. They have given insight into the world of warriors grappling with an entirely new world of caring for their mental and physical health after decades on the battlefield. It’s an issue that’s complicated. A study by the British Journal of Sports Medicine found one in five NRL players tried to hide concussions from team doctors to avoid being taken off under the League’s Head Injury Assessment protocols.
This is a world where getting up from being knocked out was once a badge of honour, proof of warrior masculinity. Plum is a vital story for this cultural moment, addressing the hidden cost of the hyper-masculine culture that sustains rugby league and many contact sports, and Australia in all its bruised bravado and boozed up bluster.
Brendan says: “We want these tough sports to continue. We want to watch them. I’m Australia’s biggest rugby league fan – ‘Go the Sharks’ – but at the same time you want your players to remember their son’s names when they’re 40, to live normal lives after the final whistle has blown.
“So, that’s the kind of balance and, I guess, what this show is here to do. It’s not a cautionary tale, I’m not a doctor, the issue was only a chattering when I wrote the book but now it is world news, and I love to think Plum might stir up further constructive discussion.”
Plum: Themes and overview
Plum addresses huge questions around mental health and the way Australians, especially Australian men, deal with it. It’s people grappling with stuff beyond their emotional language.
The setting is Cronulla, a beachside suburb approximately 45 minutes from the Sydney CBD. It is in the Sutherland Shire which generations of locals refer to as “God’s own country”.
It’s where Brendan Cowell grew up and he describes it as extraordinarily beautiful with sandy beaches, green lawns, plenty of time for footy and barbecues and family-focused neighbourhoods with cul-de-sacs where all the kids would be out playing until after dark.
It’s idyllic in many respects but not unaffected by the flaws and complexities of modern suburban life.
The world of Plum is old fibro houses sitting alongside the new-money McMansions, superfood salad on the back deck and a dip in the pool. It’s working-class families, particularly fathers and sons, and attitudes to sexuality and to women. It’s the TV always on, it’s pubs, poker machines and boxing gyms. Drinking too much and talking too little.
Plum deals with themes of the need to change, to love and to communicate with those who love you.
Asher Keddie as Renee and Brendan Cowell as Plum
Cast and producers comment
Asher Keddie (who plays Renee) describes Plum as powerful, insightful and moving.
“I think it’s just a really fantastic insight into the male psyche, just how vulnerable it is,” Asher says. “Raising boys, I think about this all the time…what is it that I need to understand, what is it that I need to nurture, and what is it that I need to help them with to grow into adults that are confident… with their self-esteem intact.”
As Brendan explains, Plum has a burden of trauma from his past and now being humiliated and frightened by his disease but his silence and lies are a betrayal of the people who love him. Plum needs to realise he has such enduring relationships with the women who have tried to be there for him, his ex-wife Renee and girlfriend Charmayne, and he meets more women after his seizures who stir him to work with expressing his vulnerabilities and his strengths.
“The other theme would be the magic of creativity,” he says. “The positive thing would be the magic and healing beauty of creativity and if you can’t speak to others maybe you can speak to yourself. The written word and inventory and poetry, whatever it might be for you, is a great way to get that stuff out and to make sense of it.”
While embedded in Cronulla, Plum holds international appeal in its classic themes, contemporary relevance and creative leaps.
Producer John Edwards describes Plum as a story of a man learning to express his feelings. “It’s so special and so different,” he says. “It is very Australian in one sense but it’s not every show that gets poets visiting you from heaven. It’s a completely fresh take on a current problem where all over the world physical sports are facing the reality of dealing with brain injury.”
Producer Dan Edwards says: “People around the world, we all root for somebody who is trying, and Plum is trying, trying his best to change and I think that’s universal. What is surprising about Plum is it’s so funny but you absolutely empathise with these people and you definitely will cry.”
Producer Jonathan Duncan says: “Viewers will see it’s a personal story about family, friendship, fathers and sons and the way people, particularly men, cope with mental health and how honest communication (and lots of love) can ultimately help us all”.
Character and Cast Biographies
Peter “The Plum” Lum
Good dad. Loyal mate. A bit of an introvert. Tough as nails and will go down in history as one of the most skilful big boys ever to play the code. Plum grew up in the country and his mum still lives there. His relationship with his deceased dad swung between absence and adoration. Peter played bush footy, was a natural talent and scouted young – then came the power couple life and the money and the rest of it. Through this mad and magical journey, he will learn that his imposter syndrome was actually the suppression of a true poet.
Brendan Cowell (plays Peter “The Plum” Lum)
Brendan Cowell is a multi-award-winning Australian actor, writer, and director. He is the creator, writer, executive producer and leads the cast of the ABC TV series Plum, based on his critically acclaimed novel of the same name.
In 2022 he joined the cast of James Cameron’s Avatar sequels as villain Mick Scoresby captain of a large-scale marine hunting vessel on Pandora and was nominated for the AACTA Award for Best Supporting Actor in the successful multi award-winning Australian drama series The Twelve. In late 2023 he featured in the action thriller Paramount+ series Castaways.
His other international television credits include HBO’s Game of Thrones, Renaissance-era Showtime drama The Borgias and the BBC 1 series Press. He has numerous Australian credits, including Love My Way, the BAFTA and Emmy nominated The Slap, both of which he also scripted, The End opposite Frances O’Connor, and the mini-series Howzat! and Brock. Other feature film credits also include the crime drama Noise, the war epic Beneath Hill 60 and romantic comedy I Love You Too. On stage, Brendan played the title role in Joe Wright’s adaptation of Bertolt Brecht’s classic Life of Galileo at The Young Vic in London in 2017, as well as starring opposite Billie Piper in the award winning Yerma, followed by an Off-Broadway season in New York in 2018. In 2022 Brendan played the lead role of John Proctor in The Crucible at the National Theatre in London. He has also written and directed two films, one based on his hit stage play Ruben Guthrie, which opened at London Film Festival.
In addition to Plum, which was nominated for the 2022 Indie Book Awards, Brendan also wrote the best-selling novel How It Feels released in 2010 and is currently writing his third novel, Marmaladia.
Renee
Plum’s ex-wife, and Gavin’s mother, Renee and Plum met when he was billeted in with her family at 18. Three years later, when she was 18, it all took off, and with it their status as media power couple, and Renee was in her element as the glamorous WAG. Nosey, intense, and sometimes reckless with information, she can come across as a shallow gossip. But deep down she is fiercely loyal, and while they infuriate each other, Plum and Renee are next of kin.
Asher Keddie (plays Renee)
Asher Keddie is one of Australia’s most critically acclaimed actors, having worked extensively in television, film and theatre.
Asher was recently seen in the Binge comedic drama series
Strife, which she executive produced with Made Up Stories. This was Asher’s third collaboration with the renowned production company, having starred in the Amazon series The Lost Flowers of Alice Hart, alongside Sigourney Weaver, Leah Purcell and Alycia Debnam- Carey, and HBO’s Nine Perfect Strangers, alongside Nicole Kidman and Melissa McCarthy.
Other television credits include the Australian Broadcasting Corporation series Stateless, produced by and starring Cate Blanchett; ABC and BBC One drama series The Cry; SBS series The Hunting; the lead role of Ita Buttrose in the ABC’s Paper Giants: The Birth of Cleo (winning the AACTA Switched On Award for Best Performance in a Television Program); Network 10 series Party Tricks; Network 10 telemovie Hawke; and Nine Network/ Screentime’s Underbelly: A Tale of Two Cities.
Asher became widely known for her portrayal of Nina Proudman in the Network 10 series Offspring, for which she won the TV Week Gold Logie Award for Most Popular Personality in 2013, the Most Popular Actress Award in the same year and then again in 2014 along with the Most Outstanding Actress Award.
Asher is also praised for her 2007 ASTRA award-winning role as Julia in the much loved and lauded Foxtel series Love My Way, alongside Claudia Karvan, Dan Wyllie and Brendan Cowell. The performance secured Asher’s first AACTA Award nomination for Lead Actress in a Television Drama.
Making her theatre debut in the 1998 Melbourne Theatre Production of Patrick Marber’s Closer, Asher has played leading roles in MTC productions including The Seagull, Les Liaisons Dangereuses, Cyrano de Bergerac and Madagascar.
Asher’s film credits include Rams, Swinging Safari, X-Men Origins: Wolverine and Beautiful. Asher recently completed the Paramount+ drama Fake, inspired by journalist Stephanie Wood’s book, reuniting with Offspring producer Imogen Banks to co-produce the series.
Charmayne
Argentinian born Charmayne is always travelling, always searching for the next adventure, or career move. It was in Tahiti where she was working in a tattoo parlour and big-wave surfing that she met Plum, and what was surely a fling, now has her re-assessing her opinion on kids and settling down. Char is fun and curious, she’s also an impulsive adrenaline junkie with a tendency to abandon things when they get boring or too hard – like Plum.
María Dupláa (plays Charmayne)
María Dupláa is a highly experienced Argentinian born, New Zealand based actress. Her work ranges from musical and theatre productions to her upcoming stint on the highly
anticipated crime series, Dark City – The Cleaner.
Her diverse credits range from: Amazon’s Rings of Power, INTRA, Life Beyond Me, among many others. Closer to home, María has featured in New Zealand’s number one prime-time drama series Shortland Street and South Pacific Pictures international success The Brokenwood Mysteries.
María comes from a family of actors in Argentina and began her career in the early 2000’s, in the core cast of Green Street. She has worked in different capacities on local and international feature films, commercials and numerous television and theatre productions. When she is not working or travelling María priorities her time wisely between family, friends and her passion projects.
Plum and his son Gavin
Gavin Lum
Sometimes it seems like Gavin, at 16, is the more ‘together’ bloke in the Lum household. But he can be pig-headed and his relationship with burgeoning hockey player Ainslee is nothing short of intense. A natural player like his father, and already on the pathways fast track, life for Gav is about to take a huge shift as he comes to realise that the hero he worshipped is falling off his mantle, and that the game Gavin loves is to blame.
Vincent Miller (plays Gavin)
Newcomer Vincent Miller is a Byron Bay NSW actor who trained with Chris Sommers.
Vincent recently completed a leading role in the feature film Inside, acting opposite Guy Davis and Cosmo Jarvis, and he also had the lead role in the high-profile Indie short film Wild Dogs.
The Poets (Charles Bukowski and Sylvia Plath)
After Plum’s seizure at the airport, he is then met with a series of strange and enlightening encounters. On the bus, and later at a bar in Parramatta, Plum meets Charles Bukowski, cantankerous poet/alcoholic with piercing advice for the man who is down and out. But when Plum’s issues climb into the emotional, searching for answers on dads and sons, Bukowski is paired up with Sylvia, as that earnest stuff is more in her wheelhouse. Sylvia Plath, who died too early. When Plum meets her in Melbourne, they form a strong bond and later share big truths on their upbringings and familial anguish. Sylvia and Charles are on assignment from God, and if they can bring the man in with some semblance of serenity, then they can retain their spot in the outer rings of heaven. The poets are in Plum’s life to help him find peace. As the pen is far mightier than the sword.
Plum (Brendan Cowell) and Slyvia Plath (Charlotte Friels)
Charlotte Friels (plays Sylvia Plath)
Charlotte was most recently seen in After The Verdict on the Nine Network, and The PM’s Daughter on ABC.
Her theatre credits include playing Miss Casewell in Robyn Nevin’s touring production of The Mousetrap, Drury in Goldilocks, Lady Anne in Richard III and Dunyasha in The Cherry Orchard for NIDA. Charlotte was last seen on stage in Oil for Sydney Theatre Company.
Matthew Sunderland (plays Charles Bukowski)
Matthew Sunderland is one of New Zealand’s finest actors. Trained at Toi Whakaari: New Zealand Drama School, he won the 2008 Qantas Film and TV Best Actor Award for his lead role in the feature film Out Of The Blue, stamping him as an actor of extraordinary emotional intensity.
Other films include A Mistake (directed by Christine Jeffs to be released in 2024), The Stranger (Un Certain Regard, Cannes Film Festival 2022), The Nightingale (Special Jury Award, Venice 2018), Pearl, Bloody Hell, Lost City of Z, and The Weight of Elephants as well as several award-winning short films. TV credits include the recently completed Desert King, The Luminaries, Wanted, and Rake.
Ainslee
Finishing school this year, this gifted athlete’s life is already planned out. If anything, it’s about which sport she will play for Australia in. Ainslee loves staying over at the Lum’s – it is fun and adult. But her happy relationship is tested in Bali when she and Gavin have their first fight, but unlike Plum’s example, they can talk it out, no matter which way it will end.
Talijah Blackman-Corowa (plays Ainslee)
Talijah Blackman-Corowa is young talent forging a career in film and television.
Her breakout role was in Goalpost Pictures’ Black Snow, appearing as
Isabel Baker in the series produced for Stan and Sundance. She joined the second season of Black Snow as a director’s attachment.
Charmayne (Maria Duplaa) and Brick (John Tui)
Brick
Brick’s playing muscle has turned into fat in middle-age, as he struggles to get up them sand hills more and more – not that he would ever admit it. Brick has been married for decades and has five kids, but he’s been sleeping on the couch for the past 18 months. His wife is sick of the drink and the gambling. And his gambling is a big problem. It’s all lies. Brick is as loyal as he is lecherous, as strong as he is weak, if only he could find the poetry like Plum has.
John Tui (plays Brick)
John Tui is a New Zealand actor of Polynesian descent. Known for his roles as Bolg in The Hobbit; The Battle of the Five Armies and US Navy officer Walter ‘The Beast’ Lynch alongside Rihanna, in Hollywood film Battleship.
John’s most recent feature credits include the role of Korso in director Ron Howard’s SOLO: A Star Wars Story, Moses in New Zealand feature Savages, Wade in Australian Independent feature Paper Champions, which premiered at Melbourne International Film Festival, and in Fast & Furious Presents: Hobbs and Shaw playing the youngest brother Kal Junior to Dwayne Johnson’s Luke Hobbs.
John is the only Power Rangers actor to play two different characters who both became Rangers; Anubis “Doggie” Cruger, the SPD Shadow Ranger, in Power Rangers S.P.D. and as Daggeron, the Solaris Knight, in Power Rangers Mystic Force.
His TV credits include regular NZ TV work including recurring roles on Go Girls and Shortland Street as well as appearances in mini-series Tatou and comedy-drama Nothing Trivial. Most recently John can be seen as Afa Anoa’i of The Wild Samoans in three seasons of NBCU’s successful series Young Rock.
John trained at the prestigious drama school Toi Whakaari and is a sought-after theatre actor after performing such roles as Othello in Othello and Julio in The Motherfucker With The Hat. John is also an experienced voiceover artist and is the voice of Mauga in popular video game Overwatch 2.
Squeaky
An intense, up-for-it sort of a bloke, Hugh’s dynamic AFL career was shortened by his off-field debauchery and inability to sit through injury periods without a bender. Living alone in a shitty flat, Squeak lives for the boys, it’s all he has. But when Plum befriends Tatania, it seems Squeaky also has the chance to go and live his best life too, to be his true self.
Josh McConville (plays Squeaky)
Josh McConville is a multi-award-winning Australian actor known for his versatile character acting. Since graduating from NIDA in 2008, he has worked extensively across theatre, film, and television. On film and television, Josh can be seen in Baz Luhrmann’s Oscar nominated film Elvis as Sam Phillips the owner of Sun Records and is currently filming The Correspondent, starring Richard Roxburgh. He was nominated for an AACTA award for his role in One Percent as Skink and won over audiences and critics at South by Southwest Film Festival for his role as Dean in The Infinite Man. He can also be seen in the critically acclaimed second season of Mr Inbetween. Other screen credits include – NCIS: Sydney, In Limbo, No Escape, Fantasy Island, Escape and Evasion, The Merger, Cleverman, Down Under, Wild Boys, Underbelly II: A Tale of Two Cities, Joe Cinques: Consolations, The Killing Field and The Turning: Commission, alongside Hugo Weaving and directed by David Wenham.
His theatre career has seen him work nationally within all major theatre companies. Credits include ‘Biff’ in Death of a Salesman (STC and Black Swan), Oil (STC), Sunday (MTC), Hayfever (STC), All My Sons (STC), After Dinner (STC) Arcadia (STC), A Midsummer Night’s Dream (STC), The Sublime (MTC), Cyrano de Bergerac (STC) with Richard Roxburgh, Mojo (STC), Noises Off – for which he won the Sydney Theatre Award for Best Supporting Actor, Romeo and Juliet (STC), In The Next Room (STC), Truffaldino in The Servant Of Two Masters (Coogee Arts Festival), and the much acclaimed Gross Und Klein, opposite Cate Blanchett and directed by Benedict Andrews.
Magic Matt
Magic Matt played basketball in the glory days of Australia’s history and his power play in the key and ability to pass under pressure saw him hold his position for decades. But after the death of his brother and a career-ending hip injury, Matt has all but departed the basketball world, choosing to frequent the pubs rather than the media or coaching scene.
Wayne McDaniel (plays Magic Matt)
Wayne McDaniel is a former Australian National Basketball League multiple AllStar player, voted one of the 25 Greatest Australian Players of All Time, who took up acting before playing basketball in his hometown of San Francisco. His first stage production was back in Junior High School playing the role of Crooks in Of Mice and Men.
Wayne has featured in over 10 stage productions since arriving in Australia in 1983, including Festen for Sydney Theatre Company, This Is How It Goes for Darlinghurst Theatre Company, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest for the Seymour Centre and many more. He has appeared in many TVCs and had roles in numerous television and film productions. He recently appeared alongside Aden Young in the drama series Reckoning as well as Ryan Gosling in the Tag Carrera worldwide ad campaign last year and also appears in Godzilla x King Kong: The New Empire.
Wayne has also had a meditation practice since 1987 and is a keen breath work practitioner. One of his future visions is to start a podcast around the neuroscience of meditation breath work and visualisation for healing trauma and well-being.
Oliver
Oliver moved over to Sydney to start up a new medical practice after his NGO wife abandoned him and Kaia, their daughter. A highly intelligent, practical Kiwi, Plum is an intimidating figure to this nerdy dude. They’re just so different. But as this story pans out, and Oliver realises the implications of the disease, Plum comes to see this man, just like Renee, is on his side.
Jemaine Clement (plays Oliver)
Jemaine Clement is a musician, actor, writer and director from New Zealand. He can be seen in James Cameron’s Avatar sequel and will next be seen in the Sony feature Harold & The Purple Crayon. He created and executive produces the CW/HBO comedy series Wellington Paranormal as well as the FX/Hulu series What We Do In The Shadows.
He is currently writing and executive producing the upcoming AppleTV+ series Time Bandits, based on Terry Gilliam’s 1981 film. He starred in the 2018 independent feature An Evening with Beverly Luff Linn, alongside Aubrey Plaza and Craig Robinson. The film, written and directed by Jim Hosking, premiered at Sundance in 2018 and sold to Universal. Jemaine also appeared opposite Ben Stiller in the Annapurna feature Brad’s Status, which premiered at the 2017 Toronto Film Festival.
In television, Jemaine starred as “Oliver Bird” in FX’s drama series Legion created by Noah Hawley.
Jemaine is perhaps best known as one-half of the musical comedy duo Flight of the Conchords. The group completed a U.K. arena tour in the summer of 2018, which sold out only minutes after going on sale, and can be seen in the HBO special Flight of the Conchords: Live in London.
Tatania
Owner and manager of The Old Bike Shed – a bespoke theatre bar for local misfits and queers – Tatania’s life hasn’t always been this fun. Transitioning in her teens, her father was ashamed, so when he died she used all his corporate dollars to start this bar. Tatania rescues Plum at the beach, employs him to do security, and in many ways saves his life.
Janet Anderson (plays Tatania)
Janet Anderson graduated from the National Institute of Dramatic Arts in 2022. She made her television debut in the ABC series Reef Break in 2019 and can be seen in the Paramount + television series The Last King of the Cross (Season 1) alongside Lincoln Younes and Tim Roth. Janet is currently shooting the second season of The Last King of the Cross.
Janet was recently nominated by the Sydney Theatre Awards for Best Performance in a Leading Role in an Independent Production for the one-woman play Collapsible she starred in. Performed at the Old Fitz in Sydney, Janet helped bring this well-reviewed production to Sydney from the UK. Prior to this Janet performed in the theatre production Mercury Fur directed by Kim Hardwick and in the critically acclaimed one woman show Overflow directed by Dino Dimitriadis – which is having follow up seasons in 2024 in both Sydney and Melbourne.
Janet is also a changemaker and vocal advocate for trans rights, she has written op-eds for Vogue and been interviewed for the ABC on her #letthemswim campaign.
Sarah
Sarah and Plum were close as kids. Growing up in the same madness, remote as hell, they would walk to their tree and find things to do. But now Albert has passed and their mum is ailing, Sarah has taken up the duties, while Plum has remained the footy legend, throwing money at the problem in absentia. Sarah convinces Plum to agree on putting their mum into a home.
Susie Porter (plays Sarah)
Susie Porter has built a reputation as one of Australia’s most outstanding actors. Her remarkable list of credits includes feature films Summer Coda, Bootmen, Better Than Sex, Mullet, Paradise Road, Idiot Box, Two Hands, Feeling Sexy, Monkey’s Mask, Teesh and Trude, the award-winning Little Fish, The Caterpillar Wish and The Turning: On Her Knees. Over the past few years Susie has been seen in the critically acclaimed Ladies in Black, The Second, Cargo, Don’t Tell and Hounds of Love. Susie was recently seen in the Anthony Hayes directed feature Gold, starring alongside Zac Efron, John Curran’s Mercy Road and Matt Nable’s Transfusion.
Renowned for her exceptional performances across a diverse range of unforgettable characters on the small screen, Susie appears as the calculating and ruthless criminal Marie Winter in Wentworth (Series 6-8). She played the lead role in East West 101 (Series 1 – 3), East of Everything, RAN, My Place, Love My Way, The Secret Life of Us, The Jesters (Series 1 and 2), Sisters of War and Underbelly: Squizzy. Other television appearances include the ABC’s excellent mini-series Seven Types of Ambiguity, Pulse and Janet King (Series 3); Network Ten’s bikie drama Brothers in Arms; the family series Puberty Blues (Series 1 and 2); the comedies Problems and It’s a Date (Series 2); the telemovie Dangerous Remedy, mini-series Hungry Ghosts and The Unusual Suspects for SBS. Susie appears as Agnes in Irreverent, in The Blue as Detective Inspector Sarah Crave for Paramount + and Lady Jane Fox in The Artful Dodger on Disney +.
She has worked with many major theatre companies and her most recent theatre credits include the critically acclaimed Summer of the Seventeenth Doll and That Face.
Susie has been widely acknowledged by her peers and the public with multiple AFIs, IF Awards, Logie Awards and AACTA and FCCA nominations for her work.
Dana Hanlon
Back in the day Dana was a major sports journalist. Her career took a swerve when an inebriated Facebook storm got her blacklisted with all major papers – but she is back with a vengeance, 100% sure her ex-footy star dad died of CTE. Dana knows Plum has it too, and is hell bent on exposing the truth, but in the end, reveals herself to be a true ally.
Jenni Baird (plays Dana)
A WAAPA graduate, Jenni Baird’s first credit took her to the US where she filmed a pilot for Touchstone Television, Metropolis, after which she returned to Australia and landed the three-year role of Paula Morgan on the much-loved drama All Saints.
Returning to the US in 2004, Jenni filmed pilots Global Frequency and Conviction and guest-starred in various television dramas before joining the cast of Emmy-nominated The 4400 for its final season in the role of Meghan Doyle.
Jenni made her feature film debut in Alien Trespass, starring opposite comedy great Eric McCormack, followed by television series A Place To Call Home, as the sinister Regina Standish who appeared across five seasons. Jenni’s performance was nominated for three consecutive years for Most Outstanding Supporting Actress at the Logie Awards.
Jenni also starred in the Ensemble Theatre’s production of Circle Mirror Transformation and psychological thriller Backtrack with Oscar winner Adrien Brody, which screened at multiple film festivals including Tribeca.
Dr Liz Lombardo
Liz is Plum’s neurologist, or as he calls her, “the head doctor”. She is warm and empathetic but still a straight talker with her patients, and her adoration of Plum as a player collides with her concern for his head trauma, as more and more he looks to her as his confidante.
Sara Zwangobani (plays Dr Liz Lombardo)
Sara is an Australian actor who grew up in the Australian capital, Canberra. Her heritage is Zimbabwean and Irish. She studied dance from an early age and graduated with a diploma in drama from the prestigious Victorian College of the Arts.
Most recently Sara starred in the Amazon Prime block buster 2022 TV series, The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, playing Marigold Brandyfoot. She has appeared in numerous popular Australian television series: Love My Way, Doctor Doctor, All Saints, Packed to the Rafters, Two Twisted, as well as US shows, The Starter Wife, Nightmares and Dreamscapes: From the Stories of Stephen King.
On stage Sara has worked with numerous Australian theatre companies, appearing in Maggie Stone for State Theatre Company of South Australia, Sydney Theatre Company productions, In the Next Room (or The Vibrator Play), A Streetcar Named Desire (alongside Cate Blanchett), The Crucible, Summer of the Aliens, Antony & Cleopatra, Griffin Theatre’s Girl in Tan Boots, Old Fitz Theatre’s Lyrebird, Darlinghurst Theatre’s Cloud Nine, Belvoir Downstairs’ Dirty Butterfly, Imago and Women in Shorts. She also toured Australia for the Bell Shakespeare Company, playing Mark Antony in their acclaimed production of Julius Caesar.
Bridget
Bridget grew up in Cronulla but never really fitted in. Always an intellectual who preferred being indoors with a book, her world moved even further from the usual beachy lifestyle when an accident 10 years ago left her using a wheelchair. She’s a regular at Tatania’s poetry nights, and she spots a poet in Plum, gifting him a little green book to write in.
Crystal Nguyen (plays Bridget)
Crystal Nguyen is an actor, theatre-maker, singer and disability advocate whose performing career began at age 15 when she placed sixth in the inaugural season of Vietnam’s Got Talent.
Living with Brittle Bone Disease, Crystal is committed to projects that challenge the stigma around disability and self-expression, whether that’s acting in the ground-breaking anthology series Erotic Stories for SBS or collaborating directly with organisations like UNICEF to advocate against ableism.
Crystal’s stage credits include BESIDE for the Perth Festival 2021, The Complete Show of Waterskiing, From Here, Together and Teenage Dick. Most recently, she represented Western Australia in the Midsumma Pathways Program for outstanding queer and disabled artists.
Chris Davidson
A career journalist, Davo played one game for the Eels and was never asked back. He is tight with the players, and is often out on the sauce with them, though bonds become complicated when a week later he is knifing that same kid in the press. He has a good heart and loves the game, but his wandering eye and attraction to power can undo all that.
Matt Nable (plays Chris Davidson)
Matt Nable is an Australian actor, writer and director. In 2007, Matt wrote and played the lead in Paramount Pictures’ first Australian acquisition, the critically acclaimed The Final Winter. Following that success, he headed to the US where he played the lead role in the television pilot SIS. He went on to star in such feature films as The Killer Elite with Jason Statham, Clive Owen and Robert De Niro; 33 Postcards with Guy Pearce; K-11 and The Turning, a chronicle of short films based on stories by Australian writer Tim Winton, with cast Hugo Weaving, Cate Blanchett and Rose Byrne. 2013 saw the release of Riddick with Matt in a lead role alongside Vin Diesel and in 2014 the revenge and redemption drama Fell and Around the Block with Christina Ricci. Also in 2014, he worked alongside Ewan McGregor in Son of a Gun. In 2016 he appeared in the Mel Gibson directed feature Hacksaw Ridge and Incarnate alongside Aaron Eckhart and in 2017, Jasper Jones alongside Hugo Weaving and Toni Collette. 2018 saw the Australian release of 1% in which he starred and wrote. In 2021 he appeared in the Robert Conolly directed drama The Dry and in 2022 the Russell Crowe directed feature Poker Face.
Matt’s television credits include East West 101, Underbelly: Badness, Bikie Wars: Brothers in Arms, playing Ra’s al Ghul in the US series Arrow and DC’s Legends of Tomorrow, Quarry, Gallipoli, Hyde & Seek, Winter, Blue Murder: Killer Cop, the mini-series Barracuda, with his performance garnering him an AACTA nomination and Foxtel series Mr Inbetween which secured him another AACTA nomination. He was recently seen in the ABC/BBC series Wakefield, South Pacific Pictures/Shaftesbury’s co-production The Sounds, The Twelve for Foxtel, Year Of for Stan and Bay of Fires for the ABC. Matt can be seen in the global franchise NCIS Sydney for CBS Studios and The Last King of the Cross for Paramount +.
Matt has published three books with Penguin: We Don’t Live Here Anymore, Faces in the Clouds and Guilt. His most recent book Still for Hachette is a number one Australian best seller.
More about the production team
Plum is the first series for Brendan Cowell’s Modern Convict Films. He has two other series in development but for the writer/actor/producer/director this marks the beginning of his company’s passion for ambitious, challenging and bold new work. In cahoots with his oldest friend, producer Jonathan Duncan, Modern Convict is based in both Sydney and London, where Plum was developed from book to screen.
Roadshow Rough Diamond – Producers
Roadshow Rough Diamond is the teaming of John Edwards, Dan Edwards and Roadshow Films. They have made the hit Stan mini-series Romper Stomper (winning the Silver Logie for Most Outstanding Mini-Series or Telemovie and selling internationally to the BBC and Starz) and Stan’s record-breaking hit Bump (selling internationally to the CW in the United States, BBC in the UK, HBO Max for Latin America and CBC in Canada to name just a few) with the second, third and fourth series receiving rave reviews. Recently released is the spin-off Year Of, an intergenerational high school drama set in the same world as Bump and the Nine Network series Human Error and the ABC mini-series Plum.
RRD’s further productions include Gregor Jordan-helmed Australian Gangster for the Seven Network (Red Arrow internationally) and Les Norton, which was made for the ABC with Sonar Entertainment.
Dan was previously the Executive Vice President for ANZ/Japan for ITVGE, and a regional Director for both Endemol and Southern Star based in Hong Kong. Romper Stomper, Australian Gangster, Year Of, as well as the upcoming production Whale Fall are co-created by Dan.
Previously, John has made 44 productions, 16 of them winning Logies and AFI/AACTA Awards, many of them ground-breaking and transformative, including Offspring, Puberty Blues, Love My Way, The Secret Life of Us, Tangle, Police Rescue and On the Beach.
Jonathan Duncan – Producer
Jonathan Duncan has many years multi-platform media experience in Australia, UK and Asia. Previously he led The Precinct Studios and established entertainment agency, Freeform. He is a founding member of Rogue Star Productions which went on to produce Brendan Cowell’s first stage play Men and the short drama feature New Skin. Jonathan executive produced Brendan Cowell’s award-winning feature film Ruben Guthrie which opened the Sydney Film Festival. He is a founding member of Common People Films which was formed after developing the series Once in a Lifetime Sessions with Universal Pictures International for Netflix. Based in London, the company works with some of the best young directors creating content for some of the world’s biggest brands and music artists and is about to go into production on the feature thriller, Violent Things.
Fiona Seres – Series Co-writer (Writer – Episodes 3 and 5)
Fiona Seres is an Australian screenwriter whose credits include The Great for Hulu, The Woman in White, The Silence and The Lady Vanishes for BBC, Tangle, Love My Way and Dangerous for Foxtel and Strangerland, which premiered at Sundance Film Festival, screening in the World Cinema Dramatic Competition.
Wayne Blair – Director (Episodes 1 – 3)
Wayne Blair is an acclaimed film, television and theatre director, writer, actor and producer.
Wayne’s debut hit feature film, The Sapphires, a musical comedy, had its world premiere at the Cannes Film Festival in 2012. The film has since played at festivals including Telluride, Toronto, Aspen, Zurich and Hamburg, earning him worldwide recognition. The Sapphires was the highest grossing Australian film of 2012 and won eleven AACTA Awards, including Best Director and Best Film. In 2013 Wayne directed Septembers of Shiraz, which featured at the 2015 Toronto International Film Festival and opened the San Diego Film Festival, with an impressive award-winning cast including Salma Hayek and Adrien Brody. In 2015 and 2016 Wayne co-produced and directed Cleverman for Sundance TV / ABC, starring Iain Glen, Frances O’Connor and Deborah Mailman. In 2019 Wayne’s feature film Top End Wedding, starring Miranda Tapsell, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival. Wayne’s most recent film is the feature documentary Firestarter, which he co-directed with Nel Minchin. The film tells the story of the Page brothers and the Bangarra Dance Company.
A number of TV credits include Bay of Fires for ABC TV; Total Control series 2 and 3 for ABC TV; Mystery Road series 2 for ABC TV co-directed with Warwick Thornton; Seachange for Channel 9; Bite Club for Channel 10; Love Child for Channel 9; Redfern Now for ABC TV; Lockie Leonard Series 1 and 2 for Channel 9; Australian-British children’s supernatural comedy TV series Dead Gorgeous for the BBC and Australian children’s TV series Double Trouble.
Wayne directed and performed in Jesus Hopped The A-Train and directed Ruben Guthrie at Belvoir while he was an associate artist there in 2009 and 2010. Wayne wrote and directed a stage adaptation of Njunjul The Sun for the Kooemba Jdarra Theatre Company in Brisbane and directed Unspoken at the Old Fitz which toured nationally in 2006 with Performing Lines and won Best Independent Production at the Sydney Theatre Awards. Other theatre directing credits include The Removalists, The 7 Stages of Grieving and Romeo and Juliet for the Sydney Theatre Company; Debbie Tucker Green’s play Dirty Butterfly and the biographical play, Namatjira.
Writing credits include the short film Ralph which Deborah Mailman directed and won the IF Award for Best Short in 2010 and Bloodland, a concept by Stephen Page and Kathy Marika for Sydney Theatre Company’s 2011 main stage season. The play was directed by Bangarra’s Stephen Page and performed in traditional language. In 2012, Bloodland also toured to the Adelaide Festival and for the Queensland Theatre Company.
Wayne wrote and directed short film The Djarn Djarns which won the 2005 Crystal Bear Award in the Kinderfilmfest competition at the Berlin Film Festival. The film also won a Deadly Award for Outstanding Achievement in Film in 2005, Best Screenplay at the Flickerfest Film Festival 2006, Best Short Screenplay at the AWGIES, Best Australian Short at the Film Critics’ Circle Awards and has screened on SBS and Foxtel. The short film Jubulj, which Wayne wrote and directed, won Best Film at the ImagiNATIVE Short Film Festival in Canada. In 2011 Wayne was awarded the Bob Maza Fellowship by Screen Australia to provide opportunities for career development, the Andrew Myer Fellowship by the Australian Film, Television and Radio School in 2007 and the Richard Wherrett Fellowship by the Sydney Theatre Company in 2006.
Margie Beattie – Director (Episodes 4 – 6)
Margie Beattie is one of the Australian film and television industry’s most experienced professionals with three decades of expertise working on some of its most iconic and critically acclaimed productions, both local and international. Her career began in Brisbane within the Brisbane Independent Film Makers Association which sparked her creative passion. After being selected as one of the limited participants for the prestigious Awards School, a globally recognised course for aspiring creatives, Margie focused on film and television and has never wavered in her commitment allowing her to achieve her career success to date.
Her experience is deeply rooted in that grass roots beginning in her early 20s, quickly transitioning to a first assistant director running sets for Australia’s best and brightest in comedy and drama and with international industry icons. Over the past few years, Margie has worked on Australian and international films and television series including Holding the Man, The Leftovers, The Commons, Nautilus, The End and recently, Apples Never Fall. Margie has also worked as a long-term collaborator with John Edwards on acclaimed Australian series such as Love My Way, Puberty Blues and latterly directing Bump.
Margie was immediately attracted to the complex characters and the deeply moving, relevant story Brendan Cowell has crafted in Plum. She is committed and passionately dedicated to high quality productions and it is series such as Plum which keep her focused on a bright future for the Australian film and television industry and her future within it.
[With thanks to ABC TV publicity]
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