Claudia Karvan on The Secret Life of Us finale that was never filmed

The Interview: Claudia Karvan on religion, The Secret Life of Us and growing up in front of a camera Claudia Karvan was 10 years old when she first stepped into a starring role in 1983's Molly, and the Order of Australia recipient hasn't stepped back since. By the time she scored her first AFI (now AACTA) award in 1996 for a feature role on hospital procedural TV series GP, Karvan was already a household name thanks to star turns in feature films such as Redheads and The Heartbreak Kid, which went on to inspire the long-running and recently rebooted teen series Heartbreak High. She was three seasons into starring in ground-breaking Australian drama The Secret Life of Us (for which she picked up her first Logie Award) when co-creator John Edwards pushed her to begin directing episodes, the catalyst which took Karvan from actor to film and TV all-rounder. Over the next 15 years, Karvan would co-create three shows, Love My Way, Spirited and Bump, often wearing multiple hats of actor, producer and screenwriter. The multi-hyphenate was on the Logies Awards stage again last week, accepting the Best Supporting Actress for her extraordinary work on SBS's Homebodies, a short-form miniseries written by and loosely based on the experiences of AP Pobjoy. Karvan told ABC she was proud to lend her voice to the first trans-led project to be awarded at the Logies. After more than two decades of keeping multiple plates spinning at once, Karvan is slowing down the pace with her latest role in SBS's The Airport Chaplain, alongside Australian icon (and her former co-star) Hugo Weaving and The Pitt breakthrough star Shabana Azeez. Featuring a cast of airport employees, the workplace drama revolves around empathetic-to-a-fault airport chaplain Tobias, played by Weaving. So, you've got two hours to kill before a flight. Where are we most likely to find you at the airport? The bookshop. What has your relationship been to chaplains throughout your life. Did you have one at your school? I did. I went to SCEGGS Darlinghurst, which is an Anglican school, and I loved singing in the choir and singing the hymns, but I never used the chaplain in the way people use Hugo's character. I'd never even heard of an airport chaplain. It's a fascinating role to perform, and they have them in airports all around the world, and in fact, they even have an airport chaplain international convention, a conference that you can go to. How has your relationship to religion and faith changed over your life? I think I only temporarily believed in God in fifth grade for a little bit. I went to a couple of Christian camps, which was so much fun. We played lots of games, and we read from the Bible, and it all just felt like jolly hockey sticks. It was the comfort that I needed, but when I told my dad that I was religious, he just laughed, and he went, "Pfft." When he laughed, I was sort of like, "Hmm, yeah, you're probably right." I'm not someone who has faith in a monotheist God. I do read a lot of Buddhist philosophy, though, and I often call on things that I've learned from people talking about Buddhism, or podcasts, or meditation books, or Leonard Cohen. I wouldn't describe myself as a Buddhist, but I do have a deep amount of respect for the discipline of Buddhism and the theory behind Buddhism. I think it's really revelatory. I love it. Where do you think a chaplain's role should be in 2026? Should it just be contained to an airport? Look, I wouldn't want to tell anyone how to live their lives. Like, I think if you've got faith and if that's what you need, it's a wonderful thing. We've got to be tolerant of all the ways people move through the world; we all move through the world very differently. Variety and diversity is what makes the world go round. I loved you in Homebodies earlier in the year. I thought that was the most beautiful story. After having worn so many hats for Bump, how is it coming back to primarily acting roles? Oh, look, it's pretty delicious because a huge amount of responsibility and planning and hard work comes off my shoulders and I get to ride on other people's coat-tails. There's so much work that happens before everyone comes on set and so much work that happens after a production wraps and I don't have to be a part of that. Even though they're very creative and gratifying phases, it's also nice to just be given a call sheet, learn some lines, join a team and be very grateful and gracious and all care, no responsibility. I love it. I really love it. It's great, too, because I can ask questions whereas before I'd seen what was under the hood because of my work in pre- and post-production. Now I can say, "How did this story come up in the room?" or "What are you looking for in this scene?" It helps me perform better. I believe this is your first time working with Hugo Weaving since 1999's Strange Planet. How was this experience compared to 27 years ago? Yeah, well, 27 years ago Emma-Kate Croghan directed us in a sex scene, and she was fantastically awkward and she declared herself as being very awkward. There were no intimacy coordinators and Hugo and I did a really clumsy, embarrassing sex scene and then Emma-Kate a week later went, 'Well, that was really terrible. Can we do it again?' So, Hugo and I had a laugh about that. But we see each other a lot socially and I'm very familiar with Hugo's work and it was beautiful just getting to the ease of working with him, it made the relationship so accessible. It's been 25 years since The Secret Life of Us. Have you had a chance at all this year to look back on how impactful that series was for you? And for a lot of Australians. Oh, absolutely. I mean, Deb Mailman, she just keeps going from strength to strength, what a privilege it was to have been her flatmate all those years ago. We've done podcasts and there's lots of stuff online. It's still finding new audiences, which is wonderful. It's still relevant to people in their 20s, which I find amazing. We wouldn't have known that back then. It was such a lucky job. Do you ever think it could be remade today? Reboots are all the rage. I would love them to do what they finally plan to do. They had a whole ending at the end of series three, which they never got to film. I definitely have sent messages to [screenwriter] Judi McCrossin and [producer] Amanda Higgs and said, "Look, why don't we just write a feature film, and we get to do what you guys always envisaged for the end of Secret Life of Us." Wouldn't it be great? But that's their bag, their show. I'm just going to cross my fingers. And the campaign starts today! You have such a huge career. Is there a role that you would really love to go back and experience again, knowing what you know now? Oh, that's a good question. I think I was probably not as brave or, like, more wary, protecting myself a lot when I was younger. So, I'd probably revisit all my younger roles and just embrace the team a lot more and trust the team a lot more and not be as reserved or guarded. So pretty much, I'll just redo my first decade. Well, that folds into my next question beautifully. How do you think your 10-year-old self would react if she could see your career now? Oh, wow. What a great question, my 10-year-old self. I think she'd be pretty surprised. I think she wouldn't know me. She'd be like, "Who's that person? Why didn't you become a lawyer?" As someone who's been in the public eye since childhood, what's the most important thing you've learnt about maintaining privacy when you need it? Just being kind to yourself. Knowing when to protect your boundaries and not judge yourself. Know when to power down. Learning how to say no. Self-care, that learning came to me very late in life. While I was watching Airport Chaplain, I couldn't help but think of how much I would love a Tobias just for my own personal life. Where do you think you could use a chaplain? In the ocean when I'm swimming or when I'm surfing. Or when I'm bushwalking and I think I'm going off track. Yeah, out in nature. My final question for you. What is the change in the Australian screen industry that you most appreciate in 2026 compared to when you were first starting out? Intimacy coordinators. They choreograph the scenes. They make them more significant. They're like an on-set chaplain, actually, because they assist you through the uncomfortable conversations, they hold your hand, they connect people, they make you feel safe. The Airport Chaplain premieres Wednesday, August 26 at 8:30pm on SBS and SBS On Demand.