Ten Pound Poms, a six-part BBC One series about postwar Brits who were lured to Australia with the promise of a wonderful new life.<\/p>
Why did you say yes to Ten Pound Poms?<\/strong><\/p>\n Apart from the fact it was filmed in Australia? It\u2019s a great part but I also enjoyed learning about the history. This was the 1950s when it was very grim living in England. People were promised a sunny new life with great job opportunities for just \u00a310, but it wasn\u2019t as idyllic as they thought it would be: they were put up in migrant hostels and had their passports taken off them for two years. My character, Kate, is out there alone, rewriting her past. She has a secret and she\u2019s there for a reason.<\/p>\n How did you enjoy filming in Australia?<\/strong><\/p>\n It was a lot colder than I thought! All I packed were flip-flops, dresses and T-shirts, and when I got there I had to buy a warm coat, a rain mac and boots. But it was amazing. I\u2019d never been to Australia before \u2013 I had a bit of time off and I went travelling to Cairns. I went to a koala sanctuary and took a trip through the rainforest in an old steam train.<\/p>\n What do you look for in a role?<\/strong><\/p>\n I like strong women; I think that probably comes from playing Tina McIntyre in Corrie when I was 19 years old. When I\u2019m reading for these characters I feel a fire in my belly. When I left Corrie, I wanted the next thing to be right, and it was the same when I finished Our Girl and Brassic. I take time to think, \u201cWhat\u2019s the next step?\u201d<\/p>\n Do you find people want to typecast you?<\/strong><\/p>\n Yeah. Don\u2019t get me wrong, I\u2019m very lucky with the roles I\u2019ve chosen but there have been brilliant scripts which are very similar to something I\u2019ve just done. You think, \u201cThis would be great at another time but let\u2019s try and change it up a little bit.\u201d It\u2019s hard to say no, though.<\/p>\n You were cast in Coronation Street after only your second-ever audition. What was it like going back to auditions after that?<\/strong><\/p>\n Terrifying. I never in my wildest dreams thought I\u2019d get Corrie so I went along to that audition with the mindset that it would just be good experience. Then, after seven years, to go back into the big wide world again was scary. A soap is so safe.<\/p>\n There\u2019s a lot of interest in your private life because you\u2019re married to reality star and radio DJ Mark Wright. How do you manage that?<\/strong><\/p>\n I grew up being in the media, and my outlook on it changed as I was growing up. I stopped enjoying it as much and I wanted a bit more privacy. It was just a thing that slowly happened where I grew the confidence to say that I wanted to keep some things to myself.<\/p>\n What would it surprise people to know about you?<\/strong><\/p>\n Maybe that my most comfortable isn\u2019t when I\u2019m glam \u2013 it\u2019s wearing no make-up at home in my jammies on the couch with the dogs. And I\u2019m a good cook. I do a good gambas piri piri. I\u2019ll still get dressed up now and again for a red carpet, but they\u2019re very few and far between.<\/p>\n Well, in Ten Pound Poms you still look quite glam. Would you ever want to do something totally the opposite?<\/strong><\/p>\n If the role was right, yes, I\u2019d strip it back, get my hair greasy, anything. I dreamt of doing a period drama, and I\u2019m currently filming my first proper thriller, so I\u2019m totally open to whatever speaks to me.<\/p>\n You\u2019re an Essex girl now. Do you love it, or do you miss the north?<\/strong><\/p>\n Well, the weather\u2019s good! If I\u2019m in Essex for a few weeks, I get itchy feet and want to go back up north for a bit and vice versa. I don\u2019t understand why you can\u2019t get chips and gravy down south. I go for pie and mash but I don\u2019t like the liquor, so I get gravy and I\u2019m like, \u201cWhy has gravy not taken off here? It\u2019s so much nicer!\u201d<\/p>\n You started acting young \u2014 what would you have done if it hadn\u2019t worked out?<\/strong><\/p>\n When I decided to leave Corrie, I remember coming to terms with the idea of not acting again. I always said to myself, \u201cIf I don\u2019t get a job after this, at least I\u2019ve had a good run: not many people can say they\u2019ve had this career for six and a half years.\u201d The decision to leave was always a risk but it was the right thing for me at the time, so I\u2019d never have regretted it. If it hadn\u2019t worked out, I\u2019d have done something to do with dogs \u2013 that\u2019s my happy place.<\/p>\n Ten Pound Poms will premiere on BBC One and BBC iPlayer at 9pm on Sunday 14th<\/sup>\u00a0May, airing weekly on BBC One and with all episodes available on iPlayer immediately.<\/strong><\/p>\n Check out more of our\u00a0Drama<\/a>\u00a0coverage or visit our\u00a0TV Guide<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0Streaming Guide<\/a>\u00a0to see what\u2019s on tonight.<\/strong><\/p>\n Try Radio Times magazine today and get 12 issues for only \u00a31 with delivery to your home \u2013\u00a0<\/strong>subscribe now<\/strong><\/a>. For more from the biggest stars in TV, listen to\u00a0<\/strong>The Radio Times Podcast<\/strong><\/a>.<\/strong><\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n This interview originally appeared in Radio Times Magazine. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":32774,"template":"","categories":[1,5],"acf":[],"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2023\/05\/michelle-keegan-going-into-the-big-wide-world-after-corrie-was-scary-scaled.jpg",2560,1707,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2023\/05\/michelle-keegan-going-into-the-big-wide-world-after-corrie-was-scary-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2023\/05\/michelle-keegan-going-into-the-big-wide-world-after-corrie-was-scary-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2023\/05\/michelle-keegan-going-into-the-big-wide-world-after-corrie-was-scary-768x512.jpg",768,512,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2023\/05\/michelle-keegan-going-into-the-big-wide-world-after-corrie-was-scary-1024x683.jpg",800,534,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2023\/05\/michelle-keegan-going-into-the-big-wide-world-after-corrie-was-scary-1536x1024.jpg",1536,1024,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/56\/2023\/05\/michelle-keegan-going-into-the-big-wide-world-after-corrie-was-scary-2048x1366.jpg",2048,1366,true]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"This interview originally appeared in Radio Times Magazine.","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/32773"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/radiotimes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"""\"](\""https:\/\/images.immediate.co.uk\/production\/volatile\/sites\/3\/2023\/02\/michelle-keegan-92ba755.jpg?quality=90&resize=619%2C413"\" "\\"\"\"\\"\/")
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