Tammin Sursok reflects on career regrets as she takes on most challenging role yet
Tammin Sursok looks back on her time on Home and Away, revealing what she’d do differently if given the chance.
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Tammin Sursok is not afraid to wear her heart on her sleeve.
The former Home And Away star has bravely endured battles with mental health, bullying, eating disorders and, most recently, a terrifying near brush with a school shooting in Nashville, where she currently lives.
But when it came to tackling a leading role inthe new film Blood, Sweat and Cheer, she didn’t feel courageous enough to star in the psychological thriller for fear it may trigger some of her past and present traumas, she tells news.com.au.
“I worked with my acting coach and she said to me, ‘This is going to cost you.’ And I was like, ‘Well, what do you mean?’ She’s like, ‘You’re going to come home every single day and be spent and feel exhausted because this character is in a lot of pain,’” she says.
“But I had to go there. I had to explore areas of myself that I really didn’t want to – parts of my past and my traumatic experiences – and try to build a character from the bottom up.”
“I guess the reservation was I knew that I couldn’t fake it – I’m not that type of actor. I have to really go there,” 39-year-old Sursok adds.
“I suffer from anxiety and I can let my mind go to dark places when it’s to do with the world. You feel like you don’t have extensive control and you’re overwhelmed, and it’s hard to then go to work and really try to mess that up and bring it to the surface when you’ve spent so much of your day, your month, your year, your life, keeping those feelings dormant.”
In the film, which is, inspired by true events, Sursok plays suburban divorcée Renee, who attempts to relive her youth through her teenage daughter, Cherie (played by Monroe Cline). When Renee’s parenting becomes overbearing, Cherie moves in with her father, paving the way for Renee to masquerade as her daughter and get the cheerleading scholarship she felt she missed out on in high school. But her obsession soon turns deadly.
“I was intrigued, entertained and shocked, literally from the first page,” she says of reading the script, which feels indebted to both Mean Girls and Heathers. “I know what it’s like to be a mother. I know what it’s like to feel like as you get older you’re becoming more invisible.”
The theme of regret runs throughout the film, which poses the question: if you were given the chance, would you do-over your life? For Sursok’s character, it’s a firm yes, but for the actress herself, the answer is not so black and white.
The South African-born, Aussie-raised actress got her start on long-running soap Home And Away when she was just a teenager – and, looking back, she wonders if she should have waited until she was older to begin her career.
“I obviously don’t have that desperation that the Renee has, but I know what it feels like to feel like you want to live your life over,” says Sursok, who went on to star in The Young And The Restless, Hannah Montana and Pretty Little Liars after leaving Home And Away in 2004.
“The thing is, the times in my life that I look back on and go, ‘Ooh, would I have started Home And Away at 15?’ I was so impressionable, I was so young, I didn’t really know which way was up. I chose to be an actor at 15. It wasn’t my parents – I wanted it so badly. But would it have been more helpful for me mentally if I had just had a normal high school experience and wasn’t in the public eye?”
“But then if I didn’t have that experience and I never would’ve gotten to where I am now, I would never have been on set and met my husband [film producer Sean McEwen], which means I would never have had my kids. So when you say, can you do something over, I guess it would mean could you do it over and still land where you are?”
Sursok says if she does have one regret, it’s not being kinder to herself when she was younger.
“If I could do it over, it would be less about the events and things that I did and more about how kind I was to myself,” she says.
“I still am not as kind as I could be to myself. I am a total perfectionist and that causes me a lot of anxiety. I would just give myself a break and I would give myself more compassion and I would tell myself that I was worthy and enough.”
Sursok got to somewhat relive that era in her life when she filmed a six-episode stint on Neighbours last year. Prior to that, the actress was adamant she would never return to soaps, but she changed her mind because she “wanted to make sense of my childhood”.
“I’d always said in the press that I would never ever come back to it just because it was a chapter and that chapter was over, and I was happy with how that chapter went,” she says. “And I was done. I was ready to move on to a different chapter, but then they offered me the role.”
Sursok says she realised taking the role could be an opportunity to re-examine her teen soap star years.
“It was so long ago. I don’t know if I made up what it felt like, what the smells were, just what the cafeteria, how it felt, how big the studio was … All these things that I didn’t know if I had made up in my head about the experience, I wanted to do that as an adult.”
“And it was a totally different experience, but also similar to what I remember. Firstly, I can’t believe how many hours they shoot. I don’t think I could have a family and do that — it’s too many hours. But it was a really cool experience. I’m glad I did it.”
Aside from acting and being a parent to daughters Phoenix, 9, and Lennon, 4, Sursok also focuses on her podcast, Women on Top, which she co-hosts with media personality Roxy Manning. The episodes explore the chaos and the charm about being a woman, mother and everything in between – and feature celebrity guests such as Alicia Silverstone, Tori Spelling, Corey Feldman and Rachel Bilson.
“We started the podcast when my four-year-old was in my stomach,” she recalls. “I was just feeling kind of lost. There’s been a few moments in my life where I felt lost around birth, I feel like I definitely have this sense of loneliness and I just wanted to connect with other people, connect with other women.”
“We talk about subjects that people just don’t. The first time you do anything, it feels like you don’t want to be that open and real, but then it just gets easier. Now I try to look at it like, will this help someone? Will this make someone feel less alone?”
Like in her podcast, Sursok is very vocal on social media about her experiences both in her public and private life. Last month, the Nashville-based star was in tears when her daughter’s school also went into lockdown after the school next door was targeted by a shooter in a deadly rampage that left six people dead. Sursok says she and her husband always wanted their daughters to attend high school in Australia, but given the recent shootings, they are considering moving here sooner rather than later.
“It’s just trying to figure out what the next steps are because America’s in a bit of trouble right now, for sure,” she says. “Australia will always be home. I did marry an American husband and my kids were born in America, so it’s just kind of getting them to understand. They loved living in Australia for eight months during the pandemic, so it’s trying to figure out a way to do that again.
“I want the kids to experience what it is growing up [in Australia]. I think it’s a pretty awesome upbringing.”
Blood, Sweat and Cheer streams on Tubi from April 15.
Originally published as Tammin Sursok reflects on career regrets as she takes on most challenging role yet
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