The Supanova series rolls back into town this November (Adelaide & Brisbane), bringing with it a bevy of film and TV stars including Daniel Gillies who plays Elijah in 'The Vampire Diaries' and its spin-off 'The Originals'.
Now based in LA, the Canadian-born, New Zealand actor has always held a special place in his heart for Australia. “I love Australia and I love the Australian fans, they're really funny,” Daniel says.
“I find that Australian fans have a particular brand of humour I like when I return anywhere Antipodean – it's so dry and so, so self-deprecating and so naked, and it has a lot less of that pervasive, kind of ubiquitous political correctness about it that I see in the United States, which has poisoned all humour.
“That's not to say I'm a raging conservative, f...ing Trumpy with a MAGA hat; I'm certainly as far left as you can go, but it's become a strange time for public speech right now and I think it's going to do me good to be around some Aussies again, let a little air out of the tyres.
"I always find Australians and Kiwis are so ready to laugh, and often eager to laugh at themselves. I love it, I need it.”
In his role as Elijah, Daniel embodies the essence of tall, dark, handsome and dangerous, a potent combination that sees him attract a swarm of both male and female fans. “I will say I get approached by a lot more males,” he says.
“When you're out and about there's a lot more guys [who] come up to you and go: 'Bro! Dude, I love Elijah'.
“And the narrative is almost always the same, it's almost always: 'Yeah bro, my girl watched the show – I didn't watch your show, I didn't even know what you're f...ing show was, then I started watching 'The Vampire Diaries' and thought you were kind of cool'.
“There's a natural sense for men to want to defend themselves against the fact they had the inclination to watch the show.”
Though best known as Elijah, Daniel recently portrayed notorious real estate heir Robert Durst in the 2017 Lifetime movie 'The Lost Wife Of Robert Durst', a role that Daniel says deserved more time for which to prepare.
“Whenever someone brings that experience up, I always have a bit of a sigh of regret,” he says.
“I took the role with like 13 days to prepare and I really wish I'd had another month to work on it because I think I would have brought something else to it. Put it this way: I imagine the director's cut of that is something wonderful.
“I don't think I've had a better experience with a director than I had with Yves Simoneau. Yves was just splendid – he let me come in and play and experiment and surprise him, and he was nurturing and helpful and I'd really like to work with him again some day because it really felt like it was the most pure, creative experience I'd had in many years.”
