RAFTERS REUNION: DAVE & JULIE TOGETHER AGAIN
REBECCA GIBNEY AND ERIK THOMSON REMINISCE ABOUT THEIR TIME IN PACKED TO THE RAFTERS
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t’s been 10 years since they first played Julie and Dave Rafter in Packed to the Rafters and old habits die hard for Rebecca Gibney and Erik Thomson. Reuniting for New Idea’s exclusive photoshoot, Rebecca smoothly shifts back into character, asking her former co-star, Erik, “Would you like a cuppa, love?” “We were often in the kitchen making tea,” Erik, 51, recalls. Packed to the Rafters launched on Channel Seven in 2008, and it was an instant hit. The first episode was watched by more than 1.9 million people. And the second episode did even better, with more than two million people tuning in. “Those sorts of ratings were just unheard of for dramas,” Erik says.
Rafters was the family show Australia laughed and cried with. At the time, there really wasn’t another series like it on television. There were cop shows and medical shows, but nothing approached Rafters for family-based drama. “Whole families would sit down to watch it every Tuesday, and you realised the power the show had,” Rebecca, 53, says.
As she says, Dave and Julie became the “mother and father of Australia”. “I think everyone could relate to them,” she says. “They’d say, ‘They’re just like my parents,’ or, ‘They’re just like us.’”
What made the series, which lasted six seasons, such a success? “Sometimes you can’t explain why something works,” Rebecca says. “It’s as if someone has sprinkled magic fairy dust. And that’s
what happened for us.”
The series centred on Dave and Julie, and their extended family, daughter Rachel (Jessica Marais), sons Ben (Hugh Sheridan) and Nathan (Angus Mclaren), and his wife Sammy (Jessica Mcnamee) and Julie’s father, Ted Taylor (Michael Caton). It was filmed in Sydney, with exterior scenes of the Rafters’ house shot at a home in Concord.
That house still stands – and looks much the same as it did when the final episode of the series aired on July 2, 2013. Coming back to the Rafters’ house for the first time in more than six years, both Rebecca and Erik can’t help but feel a sense of nostalgia for the series.
“It really feels like yesterday since we were here,” Rebecca says. “But the tree’s bigger!” Erik chimes in. “They’ve obviously put a fence up to stop the fans having photos on the steps.”
As they chat and reminisce, it’s easy to see why Rebecca and Erik, currently starring in 800 Words, made such a believable couple on screen.
“We get along, so there was never any clash of egos,” Rebecca explains. “We were friends with total respect for each other’s work ethic and what we both brought to the series.”
It’s just as well they both enjoyed each other’s company. The show’s demanding shooting schedule meant they’d often have whole days shooting bedroom scenes. “We’d literally spend all day in bed – lying down on the job,” Erik says. “I had very young children at the time so there was a temptation to have a little sleep.”
What really set Rafters apart from other shows was its ability to tackle confronting issues. Everything from infidelity and marriage breakdowns to dementia, death and, of course, mature-age motherhood was covered.
The series took a brave step in showing Julie and Dave as parents to baby Ruby. One of Rebecca’s favourite scenes saw Julie thinking she was hitting menopause, but she was actually pregnant.
“She was crying because she thought she was getting old, and Dave was reassuring her that she’d always be beautiful,” she says. As for the birth scene, Rebecca says it was “the most fun I’d ever had”. “I’d done it before in real life, so I knew exactly what it was like,” she says.
Erik, who was a new dad himself at the time, was able to bring his own experiences to the set. “There is a fresh box of emotions that gets flung open and you can access,” he says.
Both Erik and Rebecca marvel at how the young actors on the show became stars before their eyes. Rebecca remembers a young Jessica Marais turning heads on set. “She’d be in a skin-tight red dress and everyone’s mouths would drop.” Ryan Corr, as Coby, made a big impression when he joined the show. “Coby was probably one of my favourite characters,” Erik says.
Of course, the scene that stands out as the series’ most heartbreaking – and one of the most shocking in Aussie TV history – was the death of Ben Rafter’s wife Mel (Zoe Ventoura) in 2010. Mel was texting while driving and was killed in an accident.
“I still cry when I see that scene,” Rebecca admits. “It was so emotional.”
“I get shivers when I think of it,” Erik adds. “We’d lost a member of the Rafter family, and as we walked up the corridor at the hospital it all felt very real.”
There have been rumours of a Rafters reunion in recent years. “The will is there,” Rebecca says. “I just don’t know if you’d be able to get everyone back,” she adds. “But Erik and I have always said, ‘never say never’.”
“I STILL CRY WHEN I SEE THAT SCENE … IT WAS SO EMOTIONAL”