Lisa McCune on her new era, Blue Heelers and the one way she could return to the role ‘if there was a cryogenic head somewhere’

Former Gold Logie winner Lisa McCune reflects on her iconic TV role in Blue Heelers, putting forward a theory on how she could return.

If there were a merit badge for helicopter parenting, Lisa McCune would wear it with pride. She earned it by making no apologies for wanting to spend quality time with daughter Remy, 20, and sons Archer, 24, and Oliver, 21, despite their grown-up groans.

“I know that it’s part of their journey as adults to need me to leave them alone and let them forge their own path,” McCune tells Stellar.

“I totally respect that. But I also say to them, ‘It’s about community and helping each other. And if you guys are really busy studying and working part-time jobs, me cooking you dinner is not invading your personal life’.”

Yet McCune, 54, also adds that there are some benefits to her children getting older. Last year, she relished having the freedom to compete on Dancing With The Stars (which she won with pro Ian Waite in August) and season 4 of Taskmaster Australia (which filmed in September).

Lisa McCune is entering a new era. Picture: Jedd Cooney for Stellar

“I didn’t have to go and organise my mum to come in and do school pick-ups on Wednesday and Friday and do the reading with them,” she explains.

“All of that has gone sadly, because I did love it, but it also means that I have more of the ability to just jump up and delve into some things that I’ve been wanting to work on for some time.”

One of those things is running her own production company. McCune co-founded Broad Story with Wentworth director Fiona Banks; they welcomed Underbelly screenwriter Greg Haddrick to the fold in March 2024.

Although “I wouldn’t call myself a producer just yet”, she demurs, neither is she using Broad Story to generate vehicles for herself. “It just feels like the right time,” she says of appreciating her 30-plus years of acting experience while trying out a new aspect of the creative process.

“I’m not scared to ask questions and totally admit that I don’t know the answer to things.”

McCune and Banks may have first worked together on ’90s staple Blue Heelers, but the pair have no plans to add a reboot of the classic cop series to their production slate, as much as McCune still admires it. “Rural stories are really important stories,” she says.

The four-time Gold Logie winner, on set for Stellar. Picture: Jedd Cooney for Stellar

Picture: Jedd Cooney for Stellar

“Anything where we can raise the profile of a country town at the moment, I think is great. There’s no reason why Tom Croydon (played by John Wood) is not still living in Mount Thomas,” she reasons.

“And John Wood would be magnificent. I mean, what a fine actor. And maybe William McInnes (Senior Constable Nick Schultz) could come back and be running the station.”

As for her own character, Constable Maggie Doyle – whose 2000 death left fans reeling – McCune jokes of a return, “maybe if there was a cryogenic head somewhere, they could pop it on another body”.

This year marks 30 years since she won the first of her huge hall of Logie awards (four of them Gold) for playing Doyle.

“The kids would take them to school for show and tell. I’d go and pick them up from the school and someone was chucking one down a slide,” she laughs. To safeguard their future, McCune decided to gift all 10 to the Australian Centre for the Moving Image.

Golden girl! On the Logies red carpet. Picture:NewsWire/Monique Harmer

“I said: ‘Would you guys like them? They’re not in great shape.’ Anyway, they very kindly agreed. And so, I took them in a shopping bag. I’ve got a feeling that they might have fixed them up a little bit as well. Now I don’t have the responsibility of looking at them and looking after them, it makes me hungry to win more.”

Better yet, theatre goers can see McCune during the national tour of The 39 Steps, a vaudevillian take on Alfred Hitchcock where the four-person cast take on multiple roles.

For McCune, that means mastering lots of accents.

“I get to play a German, a Scottish girl, and then this kind of English woman who falls in love with the protagonist,” she explains.

“It’s fun, and I love that.” And after starring last year in the serious, Pulitzer Prize-winning Sweat, McCune is fine if her performance as a German spy has a smattering of Russian villainess mixed in.

Lisa McCune on the set of Blue Heelers, in the role that made her famous. Picture: Seven

“If I got a review for this saying ‘Lisa’s German accent is not great,’” she quips, “then I will be doing my job correctly.”

With so much going on in The 39 Steps – including many speedy wardrobe changes – McCune expects things won’t always go to plan. “Funnily enough, those disasters are why we get addicted to doing live theatre as actors, because you kind of love it when things go wrong,” she says, smiling.

That being said, McCune has banned friends and family from attending the show until she finds her feet. Even still, she has learned to embrace the anticipation of the curtain going up for the first time.

“As [famed soprano] Marina Prior rightly said to me one day, ‘Lisa you’re not nervous – you’re just really excited,’” she recalls. “And she’s so right. I am.”

The 39 Steps opens August 8 at the Sydney Opera House and will stop at Newcastle, Melbourne and Brisbane through October 19. Tickets: www.the39steps.com.au

See the full shoot with Lisa McCune in Stellar on Sunday, inside The Sunday Telegraph (NSW), Sunday Herald Sun (Victoria), The Sunday Mail (Queensland) and Sunday Mail (SA). For more from Stellar and the podcast, Something To Talk About, click here.

Originally published as Lisa McCune on her new era, Blue Heelers and the one way she could return to the role ‘if there was a cryogenic head somewhere’