Julia Zemiro's Home Delivery

Hello, I'm Julia Zemiro, and welcome to Home Delivery.

Just up here, thank you, driver.

Is this the same place?

This series, I'm going to be taking some extraordinary

actors and musicians...

So, no basketball, then.

I did pash a guy over there though.

..comedians and journalists...

Is it true your brother once shot you?

Yeah, he did shoot me, yeah, in the face.

..back to their childhood selves...

This room was just everything.

..and find out what has made them the people they are today.

Help, Julia Zemiro is radicalising me!

I'm in the beautiful South Island of New Zealand.

We first fell in love with him in My Brilliant Career,

and over 100 films later,

he's still one of the most extraordinary actors

Australia has ever produced.

OK, New Zealand.

It's Sam Neill.

Oh... look at that.

Would you look at this beast?

And I'm talking about the car.

Hello.

Ca va? Oh...

This car is extraordinary.

Was this the car that your parents used to drive?

Dad always drove Consuls

and I was always slightly embarrassed about them

'cause we wanted a Zephyr. Did you?

The Zephyr would have been a little more cool.

Oh. But how rare is this now?

Because everyone's kept the Zephyrs

and the Consul - look at it.

We always had the AA badge

in case we broke down, which it did sometimes.

It's a beautiful car. Good thing you're driving.

Oh, look, he's even...

Oh, first guest who's ever opened the door for me.

Can you be...? And it... Thank you, Sam Neill.

How extraordinary. Oh... thank you.

Seatbelts on, please.

Goes very fast.

We never had seatbelts in my day,

just slid all over the bench.

The moment he rode onto the screen in My Brilliant Career in 1979,

we knew we had a keeper.

I'm sorry.

Urbane and eloquent, Sam's own career has been stellar,

with credits as diverse as The Hunt For The Wilderpeople,

Jurassic Park and Peaky Blinders.

He refuses to slow down,

still creating engaging characters

and producing moving documentaries.

Two great armies faced each other here

and fought each other at a standstill for four years.

So, where are we going today?

We're going on to the Otago Peninsula,

which one side of the beautiful Dunedin Harbour,

to Macandrew Bay,

which was really substantially where I grew up.

No-one really wanted to live out there - it was out of town.

And we liked it 'cause it was out of town.

Look, here we are at the harbour.

It is gorgeous, Sam, honestly.

Now, Sam's not your real name. Sam is not my real name.

No. What is your real name?

Nigel. Nigel.

Nigel Neill.

Come on, Mum and Dad, what were you thinking?

Look, my...(CHUCKLES)

My best friend at school was a very funny boy

called Nigel Nutt.

Nutt?! Nigel Nutt.

We were under the gun, really. We were under the gun.

We were just asking for trouble.

But we decided together, "Why am I calling you Nigel?

"Let's change our names."

And we liked westerns

and we looked up a couple names in westerns

and there were a lot of Sams and there were a lot of Bills.

Great.

And I said, "I'm going to take Sam."

He said, "I'll take Bill."

This is about the speed that my father used to drive.

What am I doing?

30. Just a little over 30,

which is quite... quite fast enough on a road like this.

Here we are. Howard Street.

Might have to go down to first, actually.

To get up that hill.

Come on. Oh, Jesus.

Am I going to get up? Yeah, we are.

If we had a horse, it'd be easier, wouldn't it?

Shall I... shall I just...? Hang on.

This is awkward.

Oh, God.

I can't get it back down.

OK. You're OK on this side.

You're still OK on here.

Boys, could we just give it a push?

Yeah, give it a push.

Oh, oh, oh!

Yep. Here we go.

Let's get out and we'll just evaluate the situation.

Yes, let's evaluate.

We'll just give it a little rest.

Let's walk.

Done quite a lot of work this morning already.

Exhausted. We'll walk up.

I'm glad we've got legs and we can walk up.

I know. Aw...

It's OK. It's beautiful.

How long has it been since you were here, Sam?

1968.

Well, it's high time you returned.

Oh, my goodness. How beautiful is the garden?

Ohh, it's beautiful!

It was a good garden, but this is fantastic.

Look at the house, it's picture perfect.

I'm so touched because it's so well looked after.

Look, there is a lock on there,

but I don't think that lock ever worked.

People would just come in and say...

"Anyone home?"

And if there wasn't an answer, then you'd probably leave.

And this was always the dining room,

which always had this nice sort of garden aspect.

Gorgeous!

To me, this feels kind of idyllic.

Does it... did it feel idyllic for you?

I don't know about idyllic because...

I had this divided childhood

because I was at boarding school all the time.

So, this is where I came home

and I was always excited to come home.

And our family was together, my brother, my sister,

Mum and Dad.

And then you'd have to go away to school again.

I saw Stephen Fry on the thing the other day,

he said, "Self-pity is the ugliest emotion."

And I don't feel sorry for myself.

It's just the way it was. Mm.

I just... just coming here,

you're sort of, um...

..you feel those things again.

A few ghosts, you know.

This is the sitting room.

My father always sat in that... in a chair there.

That was always Dad's seat. You can be Dad if you want.

Please, I'll do it.

He'd say, "Time for... time for bed, old boy."

You do it. Time for bed, old boy.

OK, and you'd come over and say, "Goodnight, Dad."

"Goodnight, old boy." Goodnight, old boy.

No kissing goodbye, no hug?

No, goodness, no.

If Dad had kissed me, I would have been mortified.

Would you, really?

Well, it wasn't... it wasn't that kind of...

Family. And you did what you were told?

You went straight to bed? Muck around.

If Dad told you to go to bed, you went to bloody bed.

So, it's off to bed.

This is my sister's room.

Never liked to go in there

because she had mice and it smelled like mice.

Oh. That was Mum and Dad's room.

You never went in there.

This is the only time my father ever came into my bedroom.

Really? Only time.

OK.

You know, I'd say goodnight to him down there,

that was the last I saw of him until the next day.

One time, he came in my bedroom.

Shall I be you? You can be me in bed.

Alright. Door's closed.

Yes.

Come in.

He said, um...

"Alright, old chap?"

"Good, good, good. Alright.

"Um... Off to...

"off to college tomorrow.

"Off to college.

"Look, um..."

And obviously, he'd been sent up by my mother.

He said, "Look, I was wondering..."

"I was wondering..." (CLEARS THROAT)

"if, um... your old headmaster at prep school had...

"I'm wondering if he'd ever said anything about...

"about other boys."

And I said, "Yes, Dad, he did."

And he said, "Oh, good, good. Alright, right, right.

"That's great. Alright.

"Right, goodnight, old boy."

Mum had obviously said, "Look, Dermott,

"he's going to... he's going to college now.

"There'll be homosexual boys there or something