Maybe I'll Get Back to Biography Posts

I'm thinking that I'd like to learn more about some of the actors on The Secret Life of Us.

I've actually already done biography posts on three of the actors—Claudia Karvan, Deborah Mailman, and Abi Tucker.

I'm not sure I ever mentioned this, but I once got a very angry email from someone about the Deborah Mailman post.

Why?  Well, it was back when I had the previous title for this blog. The Girl Who Wished She Was Australian. He thought the title referred to Deborah Mailman, and that I was implying Deborah Mailman was an Australian wannabe. 

I just went back to read the email exchange. It's kind of funny. The guy was pretty apologetic in his own little way...when he realized his mistake. I was a bit hard on him. Fortunately, in the end I was nicer. Looking at the emails, I kind of wish we had become friends. 

Anyway, I kind of want to go back to doing biography posts but differently from what I did before. The problem with before is I made these huge lists, and I'd stick to them. So I'd be interested in someone one day. I would add them to the list; but then it would be months before I'd get to them. By then, sometimes I was much less interested in the person.

Now I think I'll write biography type posts when I find myself interested in someone or a certain subject. I'll write it that day...or soon. I won't make any type of list.  

And yeah. I'd like to know more about the cast of The Secret Life of Us.

I'm going to start with the guy who plays the guy I strongly dislike. I don't know either of their names. Let me look on IMDb.  

Okay. The character's name is Jason Kennedy. The actor's name is Damian de Montemas. I like the name Damien. I don't really like his last name. Those types of names are confusing to me. I always forget if it's a di or a de and whether or not to capitalize the de or di part.    

In my old biography posts, I'd spend hours looking at their filmography—tediously going over almost everything.

I'm not going to do that now.

I'll just glance at the stuff that's familiar to me and talk about whatever interests me.

It looks like his screen career started in 1995. He was on an episode of Police Rescue. Six years later, he was on The Secret Life of Us.  There was stuff in-between both projects.  

He was only on The Secret Life of Us from 2001-2002.  I would guess that's one season, yet IMDb says he was there for 44 episodes. I would guess 44 episodes would fit into at least two seasons, maybe three.  

Now I'm looking at the list of episodes on IMDb. The first season had 22 episodes. It ran from July....

Wait. Something is weird here. They list the pilot/telemovie as being on July 16, 2001 (Tim's birthday!), but then they say the third episode was on July 10 and the fourth was on July 11.  

If it weren't for some of our experiences with our binge-watchings shows, I'd assume IMDb had made a mistake. But with both Happy Endings and Ugly Betty, they had episodes that were completely out of order.   

Ah! But in this case, it seems maybe IMDb has made a mistake. TV.Com gives different dates for the episodes.  They say episodes 3 and 4 were on July 23 and July 30.  That makes more sense.

I need to get back to Mr. de Montemas.  

He's been on both my soap operas—Home and Away in 2007-2008, and he did two episodes of Neighbours in 2013.

It looks like he hasn't been in any of the other John Edwards projects.  I wonder why.  Because if you see an actor in one John Edwards show, it's likely you'll soon see them in another.  Well, I'm probably exaggerating, somewhat. I bet there are many actors who are in just one John Edwards project. But Claudia Karvan has been in at least three. Asher Keddie has been in two. Deborah Mailman has been in two....

I just looked at IMDb's biography page for Damien de Montemas. There's not much there. Maybe Lord Wiki will have more to say.  

No, there's not much there, either.  Lord Wiki doesn't even know de Montemas' age or where he was born. He does say that the guy studied at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts.  

Now I'm just going to Google.

Here's a whole article about him taking his son to the beach.  They refer to him as a Neighbours star, so I think I misunderstood IMDb about him being in only two episodes.  

I guess they could have been very important and memorable episodes?

Reading this article, about the beach, makes me lose any demented fantasies I have of becoming a celebrity. It's so ridiculous. The article describe the color of his swimming shorts. Should we really care? And if we do, it's still not necessary, because there's a picture of the swimming shorts right below the description.

I would really hate to be famous and be in an online magazine where people talk about the color of my swimming suit. That's kind of humiliating.  

In case anyone is wondering, though, I have a very ugly pink swimming suit that's not at all flattering. And it's a really stupid swimming suit that takes forever to dry. I bought it from Lands End, and it was advertised as being quick-drying. I thought swimming suits dry fast in general but was eager to have this suit that dried even faster than normal. But then it ends up drying incredibly slow. I don't get it.  

Here's another trashy article from a trashy magazine. This one provides some surprising information. Though Damien de Montemas plays a not-so-nice guy on Underbelly, he's nice in real life. How does that work? I thought if someone played a jerk on TV, they have to be a jerk in real life too.

Yes, I'm being sarcastic.  The thing is...well, is it me? Or does it seem like almost every time there's someone mean on the screen, we learn they're super nice in real life. And if there are two enemies on screen, in real life they're the best of friends. One day I'd like to hear of a villain on a show who is also incredibly mean in real life. 

No, I don't really want to see that. I guess I do like knowing that mean characters are played by actors who are not so-awful in real life. It's kind of comforting.

I'm going to go on and read more of the article. 

It's actually more of a slideshow.

Damian de Montemas has a life size poster of Marilyn Monroe. I guess he's a fan. Or maybe not. Maybe a friend mistakingly assumed he was a fan, gave it to de Montemas for a gift, and de Montemas stuck it to his wall in order to avoid hurting his friend's feelings.  

Damien de Montemas plays tennis. Fun.

He likes to eat at Mojos Tapas Bar in Bondi.  They have free WiFi there. This blogger recommends their garlic meatballs. I wonder if Damien de Montemas likes those.  

Well, here's something that's interesting. It looks like de Montemas has written a children's book. There's a spotlight page about him on Harbour Publishing House's website.  The book is called Nancy the Narcoleptic: The Story of a Little Girl Who Could Never Stay Awake.  It kind of sounds like one of those educational books for children—the ones that teach kids about various medical disorders and social problems.  But from the cover, it looks more like a fantasy. And the title would be a bit too exaggerated for an educational book. I mean if she could NEVER stay awake, then that would be more of a coma.

No...actually it wouldn't be a coma either. Because then you're not awake, so there's no chance of staying awake. Nancy is awake but can't stay that way.

I guess maybe there are extreme cases of Narcolepsy? 

I read the first few provided pages of the book. I'm not sure what to think of it.

I'm backtracking so I can read the spotlight page.

As a child, de Montemas was a fan of Enid Blyton. I hear of her so often, but I don't think I've ever read one of her books.  I should probably change that fact someday.  

De Montemas speaks in favor of book-books versus electronic books. I used to be on the same page, but I've been converted a bit. I still prefer book-books. But when I put my novel on Kindle, I started to feel obligated to read other people's Kindle books. And with self-published books, you can often get books for 99 cents or a few dollars...sometimes even for free. I like that. I like cheap reads.  

I also realized that what I didn't like, in terms of e-books, was the Kindle itself. The device annoys me. But then I started reading on my laptop, and now I often just read on my phone.

De Montemas has a love for a place called Mollymook. He calls it his spiritual home.  

Where is Mollymook?

Lord Wiki says it's on the south coast of New South Wales. We were in that area once.  

Well, I'm looking at Google Maps now, and actually we were about 80 minutes north of Mollymook. But still.....

Here's something that confuses me. Damian de Montemas is on a Muppet Wiki. Why? Because he was on FarScape. FarScape is a Muppet thing? What?! 

Oh. Wow. It kind of was. The make up and puppet-effects were done by Jim Henson's Creature shop.

But. I don't know. Is everything created by Jim Henson's Creature shop a muppet?  

Well, I'm getting tired, so I think I'll stop here. And actually...I need to finish the episode of The Secret Life of Us that I was watching before.