‘Pirate’ Luke Arnold joins Home And Away.
Luke Arnold (above) tells how he is bucking the trend with a role on Home And Away.
Long John Silver has sailed into Summer Bay. Actor Luke Arnold, who played the legendary pirate for four seasons in Netflix’s Black Sails has joined the cast of Home And Away as Nurse Lewis Hayes, a grieving widower who has history with the Bay’s Jasmine Delaney (Sam Frost), who also recently lost her husband.
The 36-year-old actor says it is thanks to the Covid-19 pandemic he is finally doing what many Australian actors consider a rite of passage at the start of their careers.
“I skipped over it. I went to drama school and then I was doing bits and pieces in Australia but things took off for me when some American filmmakers put me in Broken Hill,” he says, of the lead movie role, which gave him an opening into Hollywood.
Arnold did return Down Under to star as rocker Michael Hutchence in the 2014 television mini-series INXS: Never Tear Us Apart but, since then, he has spent most of his time in South Africa filming Black Sails.
“When I’m overseas and I say I’m an Australian actor, people ask me, ‘Have you been on Home And Away?’ and I’ve always disappointed them by saying, ‘No’. It feels like I’m putting something right by finally coming and doing it,” he says.
“I think it might be one of the little gifts of 2020, suddenly finding myself back in Australia working on the most iconic Australian show, and I’m having the most amazing time.”
But it is not all plain sailing. Arnold admits while he has played some legendary characters on several big productions, Home And Away is just as challenging – if not more so.
“You do some roles that require bells and whistles, green screens and different time periods and I find that easier in a lot of ways than
what I’ve had to do on Home And Away which is really be quite raw with no crazy facial hair and peg legs to hide behind,” he says.
“It becomes a lot more me. I think if a role scares you, it’s a good idea to take it and I’ve been doing a bit more of that recently. If something comes to me and I don’t know how to do it or I don’t know if I can do it, then that’s more interesting to me.”
Arnold’s latest projects include co-starring with Frances O’Connor (The Missing) in The End, an upcoming Australian drama about euthanasia, and pursuing a burgeoning writing career.
He has published two fantasy novels featuring Detective Fetch Phillips – Last Smile In Sunder City and Dead Man In A Ditch – and hopes to write more.
“I think acting came to me because I was making stuff up and acting it out then, at a certain point, acting took over.
“But a couple of years ago I found the time and focus to give the writing a proper crack and it’s going really well,” he says.
“I really love both bringing my acting fans over to the writing world and also finding new people who have jumped into my stories without knowing anything about me beforehand.”
Arnold recorded the audio versions of his novels himself and also believes they could easily be turned into a television series. “Definitely people I have worked with before have expressed interest in that and I think it would work very well on screen,” he says. “The fact I work in film and television has probably influenced the way I write so I can definitely see it happening. At the same time, I’m not feeling particularly rushed because I’m loving being a novelist. If it did get put on the screen, I would like to be a part of it in some way, so some part of me is thinking it might not be a bad idea to bash out a few more books before we start bringing it to a new medium.” Meanwhile, he is more than happy spending time in Summer Bay. “My arse has been on screen about as much as my face but in this, the shirt comes off, the gear comes off to a degree, but it’s not to the extent of previous roles I’ve had to play,” Arnold says. “It’s not a bad thing to make something that all my friends and family will know about, can tune in for and I can have a little bit of a connection with them in this very strange time.”
“It feels like I’m putting something right by finally coming and doing it.” – Luke Arnold on taking a role in Home And Away