After a brief hiatus, beloved Australian soap, Neighbours, returned in September with its new home of Amazon Freevee. Fans were elated with the return, but after the end of episode one revealed that Toadie (Ryan Moloney) and Terese (Rebekah Elmaloglou) were getting married, they had questions. Previously, the characters had not even been in each other’s orbits, and during the previous finale, they were both happy in relationships with other characters – Toadie had married Mel (Lucinda Cowden), and Terese reconciled with Paul (Stefan Dennis). Since then audiences have been demanding to know how this new couple came to be, and now the wait is finally over.
This week Neighbours: A New Chapter rewinds the action all the way back to the last season finale, with four episodes revealing key events from the intervening two years. At the end of last Thursday’s episode, Mel made a shocking return to the street, causing more confusion and revealed that she knew the dastardly Eden (Costa D’Angelo). The plot thickened further when Holly (Lucinda Armstrong Hall) also said she had a story to tell. From Monday to Thursday this week, Mel and Holly will each make shocking confessions, which will leave Ramsey Street rocked to their cores. Ahead of the explosive week of television, THN were invited to speak with both Lucinda Cowden and Lucinda Armstrong Hall. Here’s what they had to say:
How is Mel feeling when everything comes everything comes out? Is there any relief at all or is she just terrified of the consequences?
Lucinda Cowden: I think it’s a combination of those two things. I think there’s got to be relief in there. You’ve got to be happy to not be holding that in any longer, but the consequences are incredibly enormous that she’s absolutely petrified as well. I think there’s an initial relief that there’s a line drawn under it and that the truth is out there.
Viewers are used to seeing Mel being the upbeat character, and she’s often the comic relief in a scene. What was it like to be at the heart of the story and to get your teeth into those unbelievably dramatic scenes?
LC: It was fantastic! It was great. I felt really honoured that they thought I could do it for a start. It was really great to see a totally different side of Mel, and just not have all of those Mel tropes there, and just strip her back and see her. She still has that enormously big heart and she’s still trying to do the right thing by people, but she just doesn’t have the energy that she normally has.
I’m currently rewatching the old series of Neighbours in tandem with the new series. Holly has just visited as a young child. How does it feel coming back after such a long break and now being a fully-fledged member of the Neighbours team?
Lucinda Armstrong Hall: It feels really awesome. I’m so grateful to be back as a main cast member. It feels like a homecoming in a way. I have really fond memories from when I was really little on the show, so it’s really nice to come back and sort of feel like I’m with family again.
Any chance Holly might give the singing a go again?
LA: I hope not. I’d be up for it, but Holly got a bit of stage fright. I think Lucinda would get some stage fright, too. So maybe no singing right now.
Do Paul and Melanie deserve forgiveness? Do you think that they deserve to go back to their old ways and pretend like nothing ever happened?
LC: I don’t think they can. Actually Paul does the right thing, almost, by not marrying Terese on that day. He actually does something for her, for the first time. He’s almost selfless, but let’s face it, he’s still Paul Robinson. I think Mel’s a much more redemptive character. I think that, the more things evolve, I think you realise that everybody was in a bit of a ‘rock and a hard place’ scenario, but they all colluded in doing the wrong thing.
Everything comes out whilst Karl is away, how is he going to cope with what Holly got up to and has kept from him?
LA: I think he’s going to be pretty shocked. Holly’s been holding on to this secret about Eden and the betrayal that she went through personally, her side of everything for a year. I think for good reason she felt really ashamed by what happened with Eden and Krista and yeah, I think Dad’s going to be a bit shocked that Holly’s gotten up to so much stuff and been around on the street and not made herself known to them.
What are viewers going to be most shocked by?
LA: Oh my God, I mean like literally everything. I think that every element about this storyline is shocking. Maybe just the explanations for why things have turned out the way they are now.
LC: I think they’ll find the whole Melanie revelation shocking. I think Eden is quite shocking.
LA: Eden’s super shocking! The truth about Eden, who he really is…
LC: ….he’s a bad, bad, man.
Neighbours: A New Chapter is available to watch on Amazon Freevee. New episodes are available Monday – Thursday at 7am.
