‘Apples Never Fall’ Gave Sam Neill What He Wants: “I Need a Project to Stretch Me”

Sam Neill wears many hats, and I’m not just talking about the iconic Panama hat worn by Alan Grant or the Akubra he wore in Hunt for the Wilderpeople. Sam Neill is an actor, a winemaker, a business owner, an Instagram personality, an author, and a skilled — if self-deprecating — raconteur. Sam Neill is also my guy.

I’m dropping the journalistic pretense here because I believe this to be universal. We all have that one pop culture person who means a maybe disproportionate amount to us, but whatever. We get it. That’s Sam Neill for me, and I’ve spent six years analyzing and celebrating the man’s body of work for Decider.

A perk of my profession — a profession that I take seriously despite this perhaps unprofessionally diaristic intro — is that from time to time I get to talk to the very people whose work matters a great deal to me. Yes, I’m a critic and journalist, but I am both of those things because movies and television have long stirred my soul. And in Sam Neill, well, I found comfort in a pandemic, an avatar for my own struggles with mental health, and — honestly — his filmography and beloved public persona helped me find myself, as a child and adult.

After six years of attempts, the stars finally aligned and I was given the opportunity to chat with Sam Neill (whose new drama series Apples Never Fall is now streaming on Peacock). I quite literally had a lifetime of questions stocked up (was that glorious mustache in Jungle Book really his?!) and 20 minutes within which to ask my guy whatever I wanted — within the bounds of professional journalism, obviously. And so it began, the most surreal Zoom interview of my career — and it began with Sam, the man himself, complimenting my home office…

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SAM NEILL: Brett, you’re in a very interesting room. I, however, am in a hotel room with nothing that means anything to me, but you seem to be surrounded by things that mean a lot to you.

DECIDER: I am, and I have a lot of you in this room as well. So that’s a lovely compliment you are indirectly paying yourself.

Good. Is that mostly movie stuff?

These are all movies and comics over here, X-Men. And then I have classic television and stuff over here. And I have a little Alan Grant section. But — Apples Never Fall! Your performance in Apples Never Fall touches upon a thing that really resonates with me about your acting style, which is your ability to convey tension, anxiety, and anger. You don’t seem like an angry guy.

I’d like to think I don’t have a lot of common with Stan, who is one of those alpha male people that I can’t bear in life. He’s also extremely driven. I’ve never had an ambition for anything at all. And he’s ruthlessly athletic, and I could never boast anything like that. Stan and I stand in contradiction to each other, that’s for sure.

In 2021, I watched about 50 of your movies — so first of all, thank you for helping me get through 2021. I coined this thing called Mad Sam, which is a style of acting that some of your movies have. Possession has it, In the Mouth of Madness has it, Fever has it, and there’s a lot of that in Apples Never Fall. It’s kind of like this through line in your career. What do you draw from when the script says, “Character is angry”?

That’s a very interesting question. Acting is acting. I make it up. [Laughs] I’m not an angry man. I mean, I can bear a grudge like the best of them, but I don’t think I’m an angry guy. I’ve spent my life avoiding fights of any kind, and most particularly physical. I’m not confrontational. Stan and I have hardly anything in common — except I think he can be quite funny at times, and he is well-meaning. I think I’m a well-meaning sort of person. But he gets stuff wrong. I empathize with that. And none of us are right all the time and Stan is certainly one of those. I’m at his side when it comes to that. None of us are right all the time.

I liked that you brought up that Stan does have his own dad-jokey comedy. Of course he would. You are so funny. Your Instagram is so funny. You’re so affable. When are you going to do more comedy? One of my favorite movies of yours is Death in Brunswick.

All right, okay! I never feel like I’m a funny person. I saw Taika Waititi the other day, he started shooting a movie down the road from my farm in New Zealand, and he and some of his cast, they came for lunch. And we were talking about this and I remember saying to Taika, “I don’t know how to be funny, Taika, and that’s something you really know how to do.” And he said, “Don’t worry about it.” I don’t know whether he meant don’t be funny or that I was funny and then I had it in hand. I still don’t know. [Laughs] One of the things that always kind of drives me crazy is that a lot of actors I really admire are no good at comedy. They just aren’t. It’s never gonna happen. But so many comedians, when they become actors, are really good. And that’s annoying. Just stick to comedy! [Laughs] That’s brilliant. Don’t be good at acting as well.

I love getting to see you in a TV show. I found ways to watch Tutankhamun, And Then There Were None in America, but I’ve been waiting for you to have this kind of prestige drama like Apples Never Fall. What was it like spending seven episodes with a character?

It was a long commitment because, of course, we went on strike in the middle of it. So what we thought was going to be perhaps four months ended up being nine months, which took us all a bit by surprise. But also had its upside in that we got to spend a lot of time together and all the kids were very close, and we keep in touch. And we’re having a premiere on Monday night, which will be a little bit of an anticlimax after the Oscars, but nevertheless that’s what they’re doing. And I can’t wait to see everybody again.

On a darker note: Possession really does resonate with me, and I don’t know how much you like talking about that movie because it’s insane. It is so intense.

Yeah, I wrote a chapter on it [in Did I Ever Tell You This?]. And it was the most intense thing I’ve ever done. And I would I would get back at the end of the day [of filming], completely exhausted, to my hotel in Berlin, which was kind of ghost town at that time. It was 1980. And I would run a bath and collapse into the bath and try and relax. I had a boombox and I would listen to Genesis. I don’t know why Genesis was particularly relaxing, but it was about the only thing that worked

Another moment that I’ve always wanted to ask you about is the In the Mouth of Madness scream, the bus scream.

It is one of the most primal screams I’ve ever seen.

Yeah [laughs].

Could you do anything after filming that?

You know, I love John Carpenter so much. I would do anything for him. If he said, “Shred your voice.” I would do it for him. Actually, if you really scream for real, it does you no harm. If you’re half-hearted about it, that’ll ruin your throat.

So you can go all in. Well, I mean, you sing every now and then on Instagram, so I think you know something about vocal care.

Well, not like my friend Jimmy Barnes, who is in a band called Cold Chisel in Australia. Cold Chisel and AC/DC were the hard rockers of my generation. And he’s screamed all his life and he now sings better than he’s ever sung before. Just kind of a medical miracle. But he tells me that he went to the doctor’s and they found that he sings with a different part of his throat somehow, freakily. So maybe I discovered that other part of my throat that doesn’t get affected.

I wanted to ask you about all of the amazing leading ladies that you have worked with over the years, starting with Annette Bening. What was it like working with her on Apples Never Fall? What did you learn from her?

Well, I just love her. She’s such a warm and funny person. If I’ve learned anything, it’s that women are better than men. They’re better actors. They’re much better politicians, and I would really like to live in a world that was actually run by women. There would be no situation in Ukraine. There would be a different situation in the Middle East. People would be fed and peaceful and life would be as it should be. [Laughs] But at the moment it’s a mess, and look at the people who are responsible. 100% Men.

I can put a pin in the leading ladies thing because one of the things that I love about you is your commitment to learning and being progressive, specifically — things like your docuseries The Pacific: In the Wake of Captain Cook. You didn’t have to go through Captain Cook’s routes and talk to the native people of those lands and get their point of view. You didn’t have to wear the Aboriginal flag on your jumpsuit in Event Horizon. You don’t have to go to Pride parades. And most people, when they get older, they get more insular and closed off. How are you still so open to life?

Thank you very much. You know a lot about me. That’s great [laughs].

Or creepy! I don’t know.

Look: I hate that people always say the older you get the more conservative you get. I think that’s bullshit, you know, and I would hate that to be true of me. I’m always learning and that’s one of the reasons I love my job. I am always working with new people. There’s always something to learn from them. I get very drawn to different countries and there’s always something to learn from a different culture.

The Pacific was a wonderful job because there are so many related but entirely separate cultures as well, all around the Pacific. You’re right. That was a deliberate learning exercise because I needed to — you know, Captain Cook, who so called “discovered” so many of these places, he didn’t at all. If there are people on the beach, you didn’t discover it. But I needed to see from what I used to coin “both sides of the beach.” I needed to understand what effect coming across new people would have on Cook and his crew and I wanted to know what it was like for the indigenous people, wherever we were, to see a strange, three-masted vessel come over with these weird white people on it. And I wanted to know what impact that had in the long run on all these people. It’s a very interesting journey for me and I’m still learning from it.

Thank you so much for that. I will get back to the leading ladies that you’ve worked with. Nicole Kidman in Dead Calm.

That was really early in her career. I just watched BMX Bandits over the weekend on a whim, and to think that six years later she’s with you on a boat, fighting for her life. What was it like working with Nicole Kidman at that point in her career?

Well, that was the that was the first time — I must have been in my late 30s at that point. She was in her early 20s. And that’s a long time ago, but that was, I think, the first time it was pointed out, “babe with old geezer.” [Laughs] And the second time was in Jurassic Park when I must have been in my 40s by this point and Laura [Dern] was in her 20s. Another time, babe was with even older geezer was with us. But it never felt like that. We always felt as though we were equals or something.

Laura Dern, specifically, you’ve worked with her at least three times in the Jurassic franchise. What have you learned from her?

I’m just in awe. She was one of those actors who is absolutely capable of anything. And when you look at at the diversity of her career, I think she’s the bravest actor I know. She’ll take on anything. What was that film where she’s addicted to some terrible drug [mimes huffing paint].

Citizen Ruth.

Citizen Ruth! I mean, she’s happy to take on something that has absolutely no dignity whatsoever, and I take my hat off to that. And I used to think [Robert] Downey Jr. was one of those, but then he became a sort of safer actor at some point. He would take on really scary and undignified things too. I love that sort of people.

What is next? You make so many movies. You’re always working. What are you still hoping to do with your career?

Um, well, to use a cricket analogy: I still want to puts more runs on the board. Maybe that’s a baseball analogy. On the scoreboard, you know? I need to put some more runs on the board. And I think just quietly, I’m probably — I’m not saying I’m any good, but I’m better than I was, put it that way. And so the older I get, the more chance there is of me putting in a halfway decent performance. [Laughs] I need time, and I need a project to stretch me. [Apples Never Fall] was certainly a stretch. As I said, I wasn’t playing close to myself in any way. So, yeah, more of same, please.

Well, thank you again, so much. Your work has meant so much to me for my entire life.

That means a lot. Thank you. I’m jealous of your room. I just have one boring painting, which isn’t even real. It’s a plastic reproduction of something.

Well, if you’re ever in Queens, you are more than welcome to come and see the Sam Neill shrine.

Apples Never Fall is now streaming on Peacock.