Returning to the hood

Rebel with a cause back on set in Neighbours homecoming, writes Lisa Woolford

IT WAS an almost out-of-body experience for Stephanie McIntosh when she stepped back on to the sprawling Neighbours set – her home for many years as the rebel-who-meant-well, Sky Mangel.

“It was just so surreal. It was like there’s been no time gone at all but at the same time, it was the exact opposite ... it felt like so much time has gone by, which it has,” McIntosh says .

“I can’t quite get my head around it. I’m older and I’ve got children now. It’s same, same but different. It’s so familiar and sentimental to me, so ingrained – even the drive here. There’s something about entering the gate and there’s something about entering the doors into the green room. It’s just never changed and it’s so nostalgic having those feelings triggered again.”

It has, in fact, been 12 years since McIntosh’s TV alter ego farewelled Ramsay St, heading to Port Douglas with Boyd (Kyal Marsh).

This week, she’s back as Sky (now a mum-ofthree and a senior detective), as the iconic soap celebrates 35 years of weddings, deaths, scandalous affairs, teen pregnancies and bedhopping. The network is going all out to celebrate the milestone with storylines including five weddings and three deaths.

One of the weddings will see McIntosh and

Bridget Neval’s characters reunite 15 years after they shared a rare gay kiss on Australian television.

While there’s been many a controversial plot line played out in the tranquil, suburban setting, conservative groups were outraged after the kiss was shown in the G-rated timeslot - with radio callers accusing producers of “making homosexuality look cool”.

“Back then I was probably just a little more challenged by it,” McIntosh recalls.

“I was more shocked at where they were taking the character. This time I felt it was coming. Universally, it’s a lot more socially accepted now and it should be. I think that Neighbours was so brave and just thought ‘it’s something that should be so normalised.’ It’s great they are bringing it back full circle, at a time when I think it should be supported.”

Neighbours continues its trailblazing, introducing Georgie Stone’s transgender character Mackenzie just last year.

McIntosh was proud of how the show sensitively handled her own character arc.

“I felt I had to be very delicate and tread carefully and make sure that it was looked after in a really special and authentic way and I think Neighbours pulled that off,” she says.

“I got a lot of mail back in the day from teen girls and guys who were gay who were just so thrilled that we took the show there and there was some dialogue about it and it was out in the open.”

The 34-year-old was also thrilled to reunite with Neighbours stalwarts Ryan Moloney, Alan

Fletcher, Jackie Woodburne and Stefan Dennis for the anniversary episodes.

But it was the chance to share the experience with her real-life niece, half-brother Jason Donovan’s daughter Jemma, that made McIntosh’s return even more special.

While their storylines don’t cross over as much as the pair had hoped, just seeing each other on set and hanging out in the green room was a treat.

The proud aunt says she was overjoyed when Jemma won the part of long-lost Robinson family member, Harlow.

“I just told her it will be some of the best years of your life, both personally and professionally,” McIntosh says.

“It’s just the greatest acting school, there’s just no other school or program like it. It’s been running as a tight machine for so long, that you have to jump in quick and learn fast..”

Despite being, as McIntosh terms it, in mummyland for the past five years — raising her daughters Milla, 5, and Goldie, 14 months, with partner Piete Hieatt — she says it’s been so easy to step back into the world of Sky.

“I feel like it’s the right time after having my girls,” she says.

NEIGHBOURS 35TH ANNIVERSARY - TEN/WIN PEACH THURSDAY AND FRIDAY AT 6.30PM