‘I didn’t think anything of being an older mother – I felt the same as I did when I was 25’: Asher Keddie’s candid motherhood confession

As she unveils her new TV series, Australian actor Asher Keddie has opened up about the shock realisation she had about being a mum.

Asher Keddie: ‘I’m excited about what it feels like to be an actor at this age.’ Picture: Sam Bisso for Stellar

When Asher Keddie landed her breakthrough television role in 2004, she was a young woman juggling two jobs: house cleaner by day and theatre actor by night. Two decades and seven Logie Awards later, and ahead of the premiere of her new Binge series Strife, Keddie, 49, can confidently say she has finally relaxed into her fame – and more importantly, herself.

On the new Australian comedy drama series Strife and the character Keddie plays, Evelyn Jones – a loungeroom blogger and publisher who becomes a force in women’s media – and where Keddie was in her own life in 2012, when the show is set:

“At that time, I was in a similar position as Evelyn. I had windows opening. I was enjoying enormous success with [television series] Offspring, but didn’t quite know how to handle that. It was very overwhelming. You yearn for that kind of recognition when you’re a young actor or artist and then something like that happens and you go, whoa, hang on a minute. I don’t know about that. I just want to walk down the street, I don’t want to be on the telly every night or on an ad. I feel very differently now. In retrospect I look back and wish I was able to enjoy that a little more and relax into it the way I can now. It’s part of the job. But I did feel I had to push hard to realise the opportunities. I didn’t feel I was allowed them. Being in every scene of the show is a huge workload as it is, but I knew that I wanted to push out further and have a little – well, a lot – more creative input into the way a show was made and written.

Asher Keddie stars in new Binge series, Strife. Picture: Sam Bisso for Stellar

Even though I was seen as someone that was kind of prolific – making lots of shows and getting great results, like with Offspring – I did still find it a challenge to lean in a bit more to the producing side of things. So it’s been a joy meeting producers and creative partners that really want to nurture that in me and encourage it. And Strife is really a big part of that.

I was around 44 or 45 [around 2019] before things started opening up in my life creatively and professionally. That’s how I feel. Some may look at me and go, ‘Oh my God, what’s she talking about?’ There was plenty to be excited about and to enjoy pre these [past] five years, but we all have certain ambitions and a drive to achieve certain things, and I certainly had that. It just it took me until I was 45 to really start enjoying the confidence and the backing and support to push things out professionally and creatively.”

Listen to the full interview with Asher Keddie on Stellar’s podcast, Something To Talk About:

On the double standard of female-driven content being taken seriously versus media created by men, and the role that played in this series:

“I just find sexism a really difficult thing to talk about because I was raised by very cool, very smart women in a largely female family and it wasn’t a conversation in our house. Part of me wishes that it had been because I think I grew up quite naively thinking that there was absolutely no difference between me and any boy or man in the world. I just didn’t understand that that was a thing. I’m really grateful to the women in my family for giving me the confidence to not feel encumbered in any way. That was a gift. But on the flip side, when I became an adult and I was trying to make my way as a young actor – and certainly for the first 20 years – I did see the cold hard truth several times. That was when I realised that, actually, I was feeling really diminished and not respected for the input that I was having. It’s so different now than it was in 2012. There are female voices everywhere. They’re assured, they’re confident, they’re committed, they’re invested, and they’re listened to. And that’s just joyous for me.”

The former Offspring star has opened up about how she handled her breakout role as Nina Proudman. Picture: Sam Bisso for Stellar

Asher Keddie is living by her own rules. Picture: Sam Bisso for Stellar

On how she approaches being shot for a magazine cover (in one scene from Strife, a character remarks, “I don’t look to magazine covers for realism. That’s what public pools are for”):

“I understand people have insecurities and perhaps they’d like to look a different way or they wish they looked like someone else, but I’m not going to sit here and pretend that I’m one of those people. I’m not. I’m OK with how I look. I’ve certainly got my issues and some shortcomings, but that’s not one that I feel anxious about. So I’m quite happy to be represented as I am on a magazine cover …

There’s kind of a strange character that forms during a photo shoot, as well, and that’s just fun. That’s kind of a throwback to being a child and experimenting and being creative. I mean, how fun to be on the cover of a magazine and sit down and have a talk like this and tell people who you are. At one time in my life that was truly mortifying, but it’s not anymore. I enjoy it now.”

On how Love My Way, the Foxtel drama in which Keddie starred from 2004 to 2007, broke new ground for her and Australian television – and allowed her to build a career beyond theatre:

“I’d been working in the theatre for a good 10 years at that time. I did not know what it was like to work on a show all day, every day. That was my first real taste of that. I was 29 when I got the role. I don’t know if I’ve ever spoken about this, but I wasn’t in a great place at 29. I was having a great time in the theatre. I was doing a couple of shows a year and the rest of the time I was cleaning rich people’s houses and I didn’t know, really, how to break through to the next step. At that time, my ambition was kind of shaky, I wasn’t feeling great.

I remember going to that audition. I’d just done a stint on [television series] The Secret Life Of Us. [I was] asked to audition for Love My Way for this character Julia. Only one script was given to me. Clearly, the writing was incredible. It was so funny. It was so sad. Already in the first episode, it was really engaging, very compelling storytelling. But I went to the audition really low in confidence and self-esteem. I’ve never done this before or since – I walked into that audition and thought, I don’t care anymore. Now, I’m not a person that doesn’t care. I care enormously for things, much to the annoyance of people in my life. It was a very odd, very out-of-character feeling for me. I almost wanted to sabotage it – and I think I tried. I was enormously surprised when, within 24 hours, I got a call to say that I had got the role. So there’s something in that. I allowed myself to not hang on so tight in that moment, and I got that incredible opportunity. It was a good lesson. I was relaxed, I just let go and got that role that literally changed the direction of my professional and personal life.”

Asher Keddie is on the cover of this Sunday’s Stellar. Picture: Sam Bisso for Stellar

On playing Nina Proudman on the hugely successful Offspring (2010-2017), which brought with it nationwide fame, and how the attention sat with her:

“A lot was happening in my personal life. I was working really long hours on a show that I just absolutely loved. I’d fallen in love with my now husband [artist Vincent Fantauzzo] and his little boy, Luca. Life was full. It was overwhelming, in so many good ways, but also overwhelming in a way that I wanted to reject, as well. I just wasn’t quite comfortable enough in my own skin yet, at that age, around 36, 37, to embrace it as fully as I wish I had. I don’t really have regrets. But I wish I had been able to sit in that moment over those few years and really enjoy it and be proud of myself. I just sort of wasn’t able to because I had so much going on. Although I have lots to say, I’m strangely introverted in some ways. At that time I was in this kind of mode of feeling quite desperate to self-protect and also protect the new family unit that was developing. I may have been a little bit impenetrable and a bit distant. I might have been a bit unapproachable or something, but it’s really because I was a bit uncomfortable and I just wanted to protect everything. It was a really interesting time.

Everyone thought I really was Nina Proudman and I’m so different to Nina in so many ways. It was huge also for people coming into my life at that time. It must have been pretty full-on for Vince and then his little boy coming to my life as well, like, what is this? Vincent didn’t even know who I was when he met me and I know that sounds weird, but he really didn’t. So, it was kind of a big time.”

On family life with her husband Vincent Fantauzzo and their two boys, Luca, 14, (Fantauzzo’s son from his first marriage) and the couple’s son Valentino, 8, and her reflections on a comment Fantauzzo made in a 2019 Stellar interview that their life is “beautiful chaos”:

“Absolutely nothing’s changed. It is beautiful chaos. He has a way of describing things that really knocks it on the head. It is chaotic, but it’s manageable. We both like that and the kids are like that, too. The boys are up for life. We get it right sometimes and we don’t other times, and if we don’t get it right and if it ever gets stressful, we just dance. We put music on at night with the children. We cook food and we dance and diffuse any tension or stress. We’re good at being together now, after 13 years. We’ve found our way to really solid friendship and love and it’s not unconditional because it’s got to have boundaries and it’s got to have commitment, but we’ve found our way to that. I think we’re doing it pretty well.”

On how she feels about turning 50 next year:

“It’s got lots of layers. I’m feeling excited, actually. I’ve got a big year coming up, creatively. I’m excited about what it feels like to be an actor at this age, as well and working the way I’ve wanted to for many years. I feel good. I’m also conscious of the flip side of being 50 and having an eight-year-old child. That has just occurred to me recently and I imagine it’s a fairly relatable feeling for a parent that is around 50 but still has a young child – I had Val when I was 41. At the time, I didn’t think anything of being what apparently is an older mother. I felt the same as I did when I was 25. I was physically robust and that was fine, but not that long ago I did the stupid sum thing in my head. I thought, oh, I’m counting how old I will be when he’s 18. So that was a strange thing to do but perhaps that’s just what you do when you’re turning 50. You realise that you’ve probably lived the majority of your life, but you still have young people there whose lives you want to live with them and watch them. It’s a bittersweet kind of thing, but most of it is sweet and most of it’s exciting. I’m glad I feel the way I do moving into my 50th year, that is that things are opening up more than they ever have. As a young person, maybe I would have thought, oh 50, that’s so old, you’re finished your career and you’re done. But it sort of feels opposite to me, so I’m going with that vibe.”

Strife premieres on December 6 on Binge.

Read the full interview with Asher Keddie inside The Sunday Telegraph (NSW), Sunday Herald Sun (VIC), The Sunday Mail (QLD) and Sunday Mail (SA). And listen to her on Stellar’s podcast Something To Talk About below:

Originally published as ‘I didn’t think anything of being an older mother – I felt the same as I did when I was 25’: Asher Keddie’s candid motherhood confession