JEMMASON POWER

THIS FRESH FACE IS STARRING IN HOT NEW DRAMA BLACK SNOW

Congratulations! Has this show been an exciting experience for you?

Thank you! It’s been surreal. It’s an honour to play Hazel [the younger sister of a teen who was murdered in the ’90s] and be a part of a project that introduces Australians to the Australian South Sea Islander community.

Did you have a creative process?

Apart from drama class in high school and university, I couldn’t tell you what a ‘creative process’ looked or felt like before this. All I had to draw on was my lived experience. Like Hazel, I left my father’s home town of Bowen, which is in Far North Queensland, to move to Brisbane to pursue a career. Longing to be by the ocean, missing familiar faces, all those emotions were already there, so I drew on that early on in the piece. Black Snow gave me the opportunity to explore and share vulnerable parts of myself that I’ve grappled with and learnt from.

Have you always been a creative person?

For the Australian South Sea Islander community, songs and stories are in our blood. My older brother is a deadly musician and singer. I took to the sporting world. First swimming, then netball. I trained and competed at elite level for half a decade. When I wasn’t playing sports,

I was working full-time. I didn’t really think of myself as “the creative one”. But I always appreciated the arts. What do you love about acting? I love the possibilities it has opened up for me so far. What was an average day for you when lming? Beach, co ee, hair, makeup, costume, lm scenes, home, rinse and repeat. I work as a facilitator and consultant for Education Training Management Perspectives. I’m a wife and have a son, and a British bulldog named Bingo. Home life is busy and fun.

What’s on the horizon for 2023?

Connecting to and honouring my Aboriginal and South Sea Islander ties. Learning Bislama, an English-based creole language, one of the o cial languages of Vanuatu. Go to the islands of my family, particularly Tanna. Continue my facilitating work. More acting jobs hopefully! I want to work on my craft as an artist. Work on my writing skills, too. We need more mob in the lm industry. (Black Snow is streaming now on Stan)

Alexander England as Anton, Power as Hazel and Eden Cassady as Kalana. Power says it’s “hard not to be excited” about her co-stars. The show has meant “discovering wonderful things about myself,” she said.