Bella Heathcote on her love of acting, Scrublands season two, and the best carrot cake in WA

Bella Heathcote can effortlessly list the things she adores about acting. There are the places it takes her, from the “extraordinarily beautiful” small town of Augusta for Scrublands: Silver to Atlanta in the US, where she is speaking to STM from. There are the people she meets, fellow actors and crew that become friends, and like family. There are the characters that she becomes and plotlines so far from her own life that she explores. In the first few seconds of the second season of Scrublands trailer we see her character Mandy clutching a knife as her face, hands and jeans are smeared in blood. A beaming Heathcote, who shows off the quokka colouring book a friend gave her during the interview, would never. It’s the reason she was originally drawn to acting, though, that keeps her chasing new roles and has audiences entranced by her on screen. “My mum died when I was 12 and I started doing speech and drama classes and I think it felt like a safe place to have feelings that just felt too big at the time . . . there is something about being on set — it’s my favourite thing,” Heathcote says. “When I’m not on set, and I don’t have a job coming up, sometimes I find it more difficult to be that present. But when you’re on set and in a scene and the camera is rolling, just to be that present and doing something that you love feels sort of like — this is such a big, silly word — but sort of miraculous.” This commitment to acting has seen Heathcote shine in a range of roles throughout her career which, like so many noteworthy names before her, started with a spot on Neighbours. In the 16 years since, the Melbourne-born actor has played film and TV roles across Australia and the US. She played Toni Collette’s daughter in the series Pieces of Her, Emily Mortimer’s daughter in Jake Gyllenhaal co-produced Relic, and Jamie Dornan’s ex in Fifty Shades Darker. In 2010, Heathcote won the Heath Ledger scholarship which served not only as a financial security blanket, but reassurance that she was on the right career path. Closer to home, she joined Lincoln Younes, Bryan Brown and Erik Thomson in the Kick Gurry-produced and directed comedy series C*A*U*G*H*T, and recently found herself back on set for season two of mystery series Scrublands. And if you thought her character Mandy Bond would finally catch a break after her former priest partner shot people dead in season one, sadly you’re mistaken. “She has very interesting taste in men,” Heathcote laughs. “In the first season it was really about trying to find out why Byron did what he did because she can’t come to terms with it because it seems so unlike him . . . and the season ends up with that resolved and with Martin (actor Luke Arnold) and Mandy’s relationship heating up and it looks really hopeful for them.” All appears promising for the pair as the second season opens, with Arnold’s award-winning investigative journalist returning to his birthplace — the coastal town of Port Silver, where Mandy has been settling in and enjoying a local yoga retreat. That is, until he finds the dead body of his former best mate and all signs point to Bond as the killer. Or do they? No spoilers here, but audiences are in for a twisty ride that uncovers secrets buried deep in the town’s past. The season — based on Chris Hammer’s bestselling novel Silver — was filmed over two months , with Luke Carroll, Debra Lawrance and Tasma Walton joining the cast, and Perth-born Ben Young directing. “It’s so amazing how quickly we can pump things out in Australia, like how we make such incredible content so quickly compared to America, where it feels like the same thing but twice the amount of time,” Heathcote says. The season plays out against fictional town Port Silver which in reality is WA’s South West town of Augusta, a place often overlooked for the bigger and more winery-abundant Margaret River and Dunsborough. “I don’t know how to express this accurately enough,” Heathcote says. “I googled the bejesus out of Augusta before I went there, because this is what I do. “And nothing I saw on Google did justice to that town. It was just so extraordinarily beautiful.” While Heathcote’s online findings may not have captured the region’s beauty, the series certainly does. There are bird’s-eye view panoramas of the rugged and striking coastline, sweeping shots of towering Karri tree-lined roads, and whales breaching in the Indian Ocean. “My husband came to visit me one day on set and there was a whole pod of whales. It felt like, how can this be real?” she says. “The town people were so lovely and welcoming . . . and please go to the Ragged Robin. They make everything in-house and have the best carrot cake I’ve ever had!” Scrublands: Silver premieres on Stan on April 17