- [Interviewer] So how did you get into acting then?
- Oh, that was through playing didgeridoo, like busking in Hay Street Mall, like in Perth, and Fremantle Markets. So I got into theatre, it was Bran Nue Dae in 1993. But yeah, playing didgeridoo, 'cause I auditioned for Bran Nue Dae just to play music. I knew it was a big musical and it had like 30 people in it or something. So I thought, "Oh yeah, I'm not bad at didge. I learned off some pretty good mob, so maybe I can get in there". 'Cause there was a 6-month tour of Australia, I thought, "I could just play didge and not have to do much at all, no dancing and singing and acting. I'll just be their didge player." 'Cause they had a live band as well, which was Kuckles. I thought, "Oh, maybe I can get away with it like that and not do much on it. Get to tour around Australia, just playing didge, wouldn't that be good? Without having to do much, lazy bastard." But yeah, no, it ended up they wanted me to dance, sing and act. So do a course and then you get selected. So I did that and then ended up in Bran Nue Dae, toured Australia for six months. Then after that I did a couple more plays on stage, with and here in Perth, and 'cause that was with Black Swan Theatre Company. And then Paul Barron, then Sweat, then got into television and sort of did an audition and got into that. And then the rest is history. Yeah, kept on getting other series and little parts in movies and documentaries` and mini-series and yeah, and things like that.
- [Interviewer] And you were saying earlier that your mob, they're from up north, up Broome kind of way.
- Yes. Yeah, I was-
- [Interviewer] But that's not where you grew up?
- No, I was brought up in Kalgoorlie. Yeah, I was adopted when I was six to eight weeks old, in Derby. My mother, she lives in Perth actually now, already had my older brother and sister, and was in an unstable situation. So be it willingly, give me up for adoption, which was lucky for me. But yeah, no mother likes to give their babies up for adoption. But so yeah, I was brought up in Kalgoorlie. But my mob from my grandmother, on my mother's side, yeah a lot of them live in Broome. But my grandfather was from Lombadina or Djarindjin. In between Broome and Derby there's Cape Leveque, it's like a a small cape, and mostly on the point is Lombadina or Djarindjin, which is , people that are and their language is . And then my grandmother was from Fitzroy Crossing, which is Bunaba. This is both my grandparents on my mother's side, which I never got to meet them by the time I met my mother, because they had passed on years before that. And my father's side was from Northern Territory. My grandfather was from Borroloola and grandmother was from Tennant Creek, Warumungu. but I never got to meet them either. They'd already passed away as well. But I never got up over there much. I think I met my father when I was 21 but he's since passed away. We buried him in Catherine in 2005. Got to meet my older brother and sister and still two brothers I haven't met yet. They were out bush or somewhere, Daniel and Damien, so... But yeah, that's where my people come from. But yeah, I was adopted, brought up in Kalgoorlie.
- [Interviewer] So how old were you, say, when you sort of really started to kind of reconnect back with your family and your culture and learning the didgeridoo and all that sort of stuff?
- So that was, I think I first mentioned it to Dad, like my white dad, he's passed away as well now. He passed away in 2012. I think I first mentioned it to dad like, "Maybe one day I'd like to meet my mother and father, my natural mother and father." I didn't say that to him. I was like, "Maybe one day I might meet them, you know, my parents." Even though he's my dad and mom. But yeah, probably after we did Bran Nue Dae, I think, in 1993. 'Cause that was the Year of the People's year, I think. 1994 was the Year of the Family. So in 1993 was the Year of Aboriginal People, Indigenous People or something like that. So I was like, "Hey." And I was just doing Bran Nue Dae, which was about identity and stuff. Which Trevor and I both played, acted as Willie in that six-month tour. And I was like, "Oh well I was born in Derby." 'Cause Willie, the main character, was from Lombadina, from Djarindjin. And Uncle Baba, he's also passed away, He was acting as Uncle Tadpole. And he was acting as, in the end, Willie and Uncle Tadpole, they turned out to be father and son I think, they ended up... So in real life. So it was about that time when I thought, "Oh, I might go back to Broome and see if I can find my mother at least, if they're still alive. I don't know." So it was about say 1993 when I thought, "I might go up there and have a look around and stay with Uncle Baba." It turned out he was my real uncle for my mother's cousin, well sister, in Blackbull Way, 'cause Bran Nue Dae was real. and we're from Djarindjin.
- Wow, yeah.
- So it was pretty much Jimmy Chi, he wrote my life story sort of thing, so yeah.
- [Interviewer] Yeah, Amazing.
- Because yeah, my mother's name is Margaret Albert. See, in Bran Nue Dae, Uncle Tadpole, his name is Stephen. Because Willie, his name's William Johnson. So he gets kicked out of and he's crying in the park and his uncle comes up, "Hey boy, what are you doing here?" And he goes, "Where are you from?" He goes, "Oh, I'm from Broome." He goes, "Oh, I'm from Broome too." And he goes, "What's your name?" He goes, "Ah, my name's Willie Johnson, William." He goes, "Ah, I'm Stephen Johnson." So when I met my mother, Margaret Albert, she goes, "Oh your name at birth was John Albert." And Uncle Baba, of course his name is Steven Albert. So he's like my mother's first cousin. They're like brother and sister. So it was the same thing, you know? It was like a lot of similarities there. So that was a big story in Broome there for a while, Yeah.
