It's in the news today, but it was actually on TV Reload the podcast last week They're Life. Hey guys, welcome back to TV Reload. I want to thank you for clicking and downloading on today's episode with Lucy Coleman, who is the creator of Exposure, which is now on STAN Australia.
The whole series is actually.
Available to view on their streaming service, and I suggest whilst the story is quite bleak at times, it is still something I don't think we've really seen before and it's worth definitely checking out. Lucy Coleman is an Australian screenwriter and director, producing original work under her label Loosey's Hell Productions. Lucy Coleman's first TV experience is this series Exposure, which premiered on STAN Australia on the twentieth of June. Lucy is the creator and sole writer of the six
thirty minute series episodes. Commissioned by STAN and partnered by All Three Media, the series is produced by Justin Cozell, Sean Grant and Nicole Donahue under the newly established production banner Thirdborn. The series is something that was born out of a real life sitution situation but has inspired a fictitious crime drama that is quite bleak and yet quite
beautiful at the same time. I will talk about how this project was greenlighted, what parameters were given by the streaming service, and even how they created the young voices and nuances for these characters. We will unpack the darker themes and how Lucy wants people to approach this story, including survivors of sexual assault.
There's actually so.
Many great actors in this series, including Alice, the protagonist and Essie, but Lucy will talk about the bravery of some of the male actors had during the shoot as well. You will find out a little tease about what Lucy is up to next and why female driven stories will always be important to her. There's actually so much to unpack with Luce, and I hope you can sit back and relax as we delve into the wonderful world of
the stand original series Exposure. I want to kick this off by saying, this series is so groundbreaking, and I feel like, you know, it's a lot darker than we've seen of anything of this genre. How do you feel about people sort of saying a series like this is groundbreaking.
It's the intention of what we very much were wanting to do. I think it's completely in line with how authentic we wanted to be with the series, and I think with exploring such a bold, complicated, nuanced female character at the forefront, people having very different reactions to Yeah, I think it was absolutely kind of where we were wanting to go. We very much had intentions for it to be of its own unique world.
I think, Yeah, I just don't think of seeing anything like it. I was in Warburton with my partner. We were lucky enough to get a preview of the series, so we were sort of flying in a little blind and we put it on and it was like disappearing into a world. And I have a podcast on television,
so I watch a lot of Telly. I can't remember disappearing into a world in a way like this that felt so real and felt so raw and had me sort of often really confronting issues that I think people talk about on the surface a lot but don't feel comfortable enough to say doesn't make any sense to you.
Absolutely, it's actually really validating and lovely here, So thank you say that.
I just like it was such a world, you know, and I think, you know, we it might not be for everyone. I have to say that, because maybe people don't like bleak content, or maybe people don't like real issues being put up against their faces like this. But it's so powerful and it's so rich. I guess I should just say congratulations on doing something like this.
Thank you, thank you so much.
That really means a lot, because we have we have realized since kind of putting it out that it is, you know, that it sort of sits in a slightly divisive space. But I think that the art that I've always been drawn to the most has also been divert just sorry, what's the word I'm trying to say, charming? I sive. So I think that we very much were wanting to swing for the rafters and do something that felt incredibly authentic and contemporary and rich and bold and
just really go there. And it was incredible to work with a creative team that were all wanting, they were all on board to.
Take those risks.
And it's definitely project that I'm so deeply proud of to be able to put out into the world as lay it as it is.
Yeah, put your name on that, That's what I said, Yeah, totally.
I mean, this is a difficult subject matter in a way because I really want to be sensitive about it. But for you personally using your own story as a part of a tent pole to how you created the rest of it around it, I feel like this must have been quite cathartic for you. Has this been either very cheap or very expensive psychological session for you?
It's been a unique psychological session.
I like, I'm in the session with you, do you know what I mean.
Like when I'm totally totally I think it's.
Cathartic, I really do for you.
Yeah, No, it very deeply was.
I think it's something that I'll write about in time, probably through the means of some kind of literary essays, as opposed to making another show or something that was quite an extraordinary I think once in a lifetime experience of literally being in development on a show and going through my own process of acceptance of having literally pitched a show still in a place of denial, you know, working on a series, and then going through that process
of acceptance along with Jax the protagonist those sort of you know, penultimate and ultimate episodes. But yes, just to sort of also clarify, you know, it is very much a work of fiction. It is by no means auto fiction. It's the story of Kell and the chase of do not message was is absolutely not my real life. It's very much more that the trauma and the maladaptive behaviors that I was. That was sort of the nighting point from which I wanted to explore in the series.
How do you think it will sit though? Like, how do you think the show will sit with people who've experienced sexual assault though? Because I can imagine for you that this has been quite cathartic, and I haven't experienced sexual assaults, so I don't want to I can't put the hat on. But how do you think that lands with them? Do you think it'll be a cathartic experience for them or would you be concerned for them to sit down and unpack this.
I think that's going.
To be a very unique experience for the viewer, So I think there. You know, there's trigger warnings at the beginning of each episode that are completed to be taken seriously.
But then I received a really heartwarming message from an old friend of mine from back during my undergrad days, who I haven't seen in probably ten years, who reached out to me and said how incredibly meaningful the series had been to her, that she too had gone through similar experiences and had gone to therapy and had to kind of process that for herself, but she just was so she just felt so comforted by seeing Jax being this very.
Complicated young woman.
And you know, we kind of back and forth in a dialogue, and I think what was really meaningful to me that this friend expressed was that she said that this is something that is going to give other people that might not have the words to put their own story into that this will be a tool for other people to unpack something for themselves that they may not necessarily have, that have the capacity or the words to be able to do that.
You know, it's interesting. It's one of my biggest mantress is to share your story. And it's sometimes so powerful to see someone going through something when you felt particularly
alone by that. So seeing that isn't just you, or it hasn't just happened to you, that you're seeing it visually put in front of you like that can actually be quite a beautiful process, I think in some way, and that you go, oh, I'm not alone, Like this has not just happened to me, and I've seen that in shows where things that have happened in my life have been mirrored, and I've found it to be quite pathetic. So I do hope that's that's how it's going to land.
Yeah, I hope so too.
And I think that that was very like, that was so wholeheartedly my intention of wanting to tell this story was to allow people to not feel so alone.
I think you do that. I think you do that really well.
And I think you don't cheat the audience either on sparing us, where I think in television we've seen that before, where there's this sort of caution of oh no, we can't be that confronted or we can't be that real. You haven't cheated us at all with any of that, And it's so powerful and it's bold and it's very risky to do, you know.
Yeah, totally. I think that it was kind of hilarious. The day that the show came out, there was sort of a commentary from like an in the media was questioning, is this really the female experience?
And if so, then Jesus fuck.
And I found that so deeply offensive and so incredibly reductive, because yes, this is the female experience and if you felt confronted by that as a.
Man, then that's great because.
You should know what there's you know the effects of men's trauma is having so deeply on women. It's like I sort of I was joking them with my friends. I mean, did this man want a front row seat to me at twenty seven? Because you know, if it could have been almost even bleaker than what has ended
up on screen. I'm so proud of this show and the creative team and just everyone being as bold as they've been, because I think it hasn't shied away from trying to gloss it up or layer it with, you know, trying to make it easier or less gray or more digestible. It's kind of just really stuck true to being to the sort of hell that that experience can be.
I've read somewhere that you referred to this in a way about the northern Beaches of Sydney to puberty blues. There was a reference to that, and the thing that stuck with me in your referential ability to look at
nineteen eighty one to twenty twenty four. It's so surprising how little, very little we have come since then, and how toxic masculinity still exists, and that toxic culture can even still be happening, and why aren't we addressing that, you know, why aren't men wanting to be more accountable? It was just an interesting reference point, it is.
I know, I was bit nervous then when I read that quote that and I had said that because I was.
Like, oh, no, I hope that all the bitches don't turn on me.
They probably will, but you know, that's the thing.
If you want to be bold and if you want to join the conversation, if you want to make a difference, you have to take big swings. And I think that this show is taking some very big swings. And I also think, you know, act as like Sean Keenan. I'm hoping I'm saying his name right, because I've seen him lots of stuff. But even he taking this role on I thought was really brave of him.
Because so brave of him.
Yeah, and how incredible, by the way, is his performance?
I like, oh it really is it? Really?
It is both so brave of him and it's such an extraordinary performance. We were all just flawed by the work that he had done.
And then with Alice as well and Essie They're both just brilliant in this show like that every minute that they're on screen, and it's a lot of heavy lifting for Alice.
They are both so ingrained into their roles. Were you worried about because I'm not an actor, so I don't necessarily understand the process of that, or I don't understand each actor's individual process with how they connect to a character. But were you worried for the actors immersing themselves into some of these characters about how that might leave a lasting effect on them?
I think that Alice is such an incredible professional, still a young woman herself, but she has been acting since she was fourteen and has developed the most extraordinary process for herself. I mean, watching her every day on set was a complete and utter masterclass, and so I'm sure that it was instilled into Alice what that process was for her to be going in and out of a character on set when we had more sensitive issue days.
We also then had an intimacy coordinator there as well as a mental health nurse there to also help that characters go in it to move between being a character and coming back out of character. We took all of that very seriously, but Alice just I think has over time developed an incredible process and craft for herself. It was really because she's in literally every single scene of the entire show, so she was on set working the longest hours and she just brought it every day, every minute.
It was just incredible to watch.
Which I could imagine would be really hard because how long was the shoot for? Like how long were you shooting this?
About six weeks?
So like think about that, like six weeks in that mindset that she created because she is on screen warts and all, and when you're watching this show, you feel such a such a consistent mood that she creates as an actress. Yeah, that never lets you go as an audience, like you can't turn away.
I know, She's It's really remarkable.
And I can imagine putting a show like this out there is like a really clever way to address And I kind of was touching on this before, but the issues you know in Australia and confronting the elephant in the room when it comes to domestic violence. You know, how important was that for you to start that conversation? Have you seen that because this show's now been out for a week, have you seen that conversation being discussed because of this show.
I haven't yet, and I hope that the show does proliferate that conversation. More so, I think what has been and really touching is the messages that I'm receiving from women.
I think that's been the most.
That's you know, that was my exact reason for wanting to put this out, and so receiving those messages from women about feeling seen, about feeling heard, about having their experiences seen on screen, the appreciation for the show, that has been the most affecting for me.
I wonder about the writer's room as well, because I kept, you know, what's done exceptionally well. But this dialogue that you have created for these young people in this show is so well put together. Is that all you in the writer's room? Did you have younger voices coming in to make sure that that sounded that way?
That's not me. We didn't have writers' rooms.
Our writers' rooms per se were myself and the producers, who are extraordinary creatives themselves.
But yeah, no, we didn't have writers' rooms.
I went away and was kind of, you know, at the helm of all the scripts and that I think that just just come through from my life, you know, like that's just come through from my youth and my friends. And I think that, I, yeah, that's just kind of come through from my kind of scrappy, scraby twentiesn't. And I've always been someone that has heavily invested in friendships. That's always been at the kind of the forefront. They've
always been my most deepest and meaningful relationships. So I think that that sort of banter and naturalism between friends is just so just so part of kind of who I am as a creator.
It's done so well and it's creating authentic voices and I don't know, you know, it's interesting you sometimes speak to younger audiences about what they're watching on TV, like are we losing the younger audience because they aren't seeing themselves? So I think it's so potent to make sure that we're representing them in ways in which that they can connect to as well. And I genuinely feel like this he's doing that is bringing younger audiences to television.
Yeah, totally. I really hope that we achieved that as well. Think that you know, when I was a young woman, it was sort of like it frustrated me so like, this is in the comedy realm. But it frustrated me so much that there was sort of this all these like male comedy sex comedies like super Bad and The in Betweeners, and I loved, you know, I love The in Betweeners, but I was like, where where the for the female versions?
And it was sore on the podcast Don't worry, Lucy, keep going.
Okay, good, Yeah, And it was great to see kind of you know later dairy Girls come out, yeah and speak to the female experience of those years, and I think that, yeah, I very much wanted to really, yeah, connect to that twenties audience and connect to that twenties youth, and yeah, very much, you know, be giving this show to them.
Well, we all want to be seen. We all want to be seen on screen. You know.
That's the commit that's the currency between us, is to be seen. And I think you've done that in a way that there's going to so many people that haven't been seen like this before. You know, the show was commissioned by Stan and partnered with all three Media. How free did they allow you to make this project the
way you wanted to make it? Did they give you notes when the final scripts happened and said to change a thing like what was your relationship, making sure that the product was what you wanted it to be, and also listening to what those voices were saying.
Stan and all three were incredibly liberating.
I think that we were so lucky to have female commissioners, you know. I think that was just has been such a huge, like amazing grace moment for us to have women overseeing the project because they so innately got what we were saying and what we were wanting to do and wanting to achieve, and they just entirely backed us and championed us, and which was just really unbelievable because you can hear horror stories in that space of a creator.
Really what ends up hitting the screen was really not close to what they intended, and this is just so the opposite of that experience. We couldn't have worked with people who understood us were just so generous and collaborative with us.
So, yeah, they were really amazing and.
It's important to have that took a part of Imagine impact the script developing program. Did that allow you to be bold and make bold choices with your scripts? Is that sort of a space that you found that.
Yeah, I mean the lab was a very early and small part of the process, because you know, really development ends up becoming a long, multi year long process. But I think it was sort of being championed by such independent like you know, Sean and Justin and Nicole of Thurborn Films as such independent come from such an independent filmmaker background, and I think that's where the strengths of being able to be so bold and authentic with voice
came from. Was from these incredible filmmakers with their own incredible careers who value voice and authenticity as such a kind of mantlepiece of their own. I think that's where that sort of belief came from to be like, well, fuck, yeah, I'm getting handed the reins to do something really unique here, and no one was telling me to kind.
Of you know, pull back full back, or.
Can you just take a few edges off here and there and smooth it out? And I don't know about this, and I don't know about that, And it was really an environment to be encouraged to be as bold as possible.
Well, I think that's something that you must have learned, because I mean I was also saying that you know, you shadowed justin with Nitrom and that movie was such a sensitive subject matter and Australian media seemed to so prepredacious about that story being made into a film. But I thought, if you're going to learn to turn off the outside noise and stay true to yourself and oh was the grit, I think working on a film like that must have taught you how to do it.
Yeah, And I think just having really feminist values is very much what teaches me to do that too. I just want to see so much progress in the space
of women's stories. I just hope that I can be a part of continuing to break down barriers of versions of women that people feel like are acceptable for screen, because I think as we continue to put these more bold and daring female protagonists out there, like promising younger women and I may destroy you and shop objects and you know, now hopefully adding exposure.
Into the mix of that, I think we're just giving so much.
Power to women to be fully seen and heard for, you know, the entirety of who they are as deeply layered people. So I think it's kind of really I think it's really my feminism that pushes me to really have a bit of a no, no hold bask kind of attitude to my work.
Absolutely.
I mean it's interesting because you think about it for so many years on screen, like you were sort of alluding to before, we just sort of see the same sort of primary colors on how you want to show women on screen and in storytelling, and then you start looking at what we're doing now with streaming services, particularly
with Stan and my hat is off to stand. With this particular show, it's like we get the druent collection of color, and that means that these people that aren't niche, that are everyday women in Australia can see themselves on screen, and I think that that's something that we need to push harder for. I'm in your audience. I can't wait to see what you do next. By the way, can you even tell me what you're.
Going to do next?
Amazing? I'm well, I guess I kind of like you know, I'm.
Still in early development days of myself, but I'm going into a bit of a gender and capitalism space, so that's sort of the next next frontier and going into kind of some transgressive characters and yeah, I'm going to kind of take on.
The workforce there while I get the wood, do you know what I mean?
That's what my partner and I say when we're watching something good on television, because we have the fireplace we go to in Wolton where we watch a lot of shows, and it's always, if the show's really good, you wait here while I get some wood for this because we're going to be here for a while.
I am amazingly I love that.
Yeah, and probably a few reads.
I could talk to you, Lucy forever, because I just think you're an extraordinary storyteller, an extraordinary content maker.
But I'm running out of time.
And my podcast always finishes with asking people, what is something from behind the scenes, something that as an audience we wouldn't get a chance to see or know from watching this series?
Oh my gosh, Yeah, I mean, I think we all put it on the table. But do you know what I think is a Really was just such a really beautiful experience for me on the show. The male actors of this series were such beautiful young men, and so it was incredibly healing to have written these male characters, that these male characters had been so true to a part of my life, to then cast them with some of the freaking loveliest.
Men out there.
Was just a complete and utter joy. And I've become such good friends with like a whole lot of.
Them casting in these as much as I see this as a female driven story, their performances and the spaces that were created in this story by some of the men in this To be that vulnerable or to be that to expose themselves like this takes a lot of guts, I think, you know.
Oh, totally totally, And they were just the loveliest young men and they just gave me a lot of hope about that there is change, that there is a lot of change being made, and that some that you know, that these incredible young men are out there, and so that that was just I think kind of a behind you know that sort of I think are behind the scenes.
No, I love it, I love it.
I think that is so amazing, LIZI I want to say thank you so much for being so generous with your time and sharing your story with this series but also with me today. I hope more eyes get to see this series, and I hope just as many people like myself will be in your audience to see what you do next.
Oh thanks Benjamin, Yeah, Thank you so much for just so deeply engaging with the show, and I.
Watched it twice.
Oh my god. Wow.
Well I kind of have to, like, if I'm going to speak to someone, I want to have the I think it's important because I think you have to have the viewers experience. You need to ask questions, you know what I mean. And that's a difference. Then you're kind of being a journalist, and that's that to me. Those two roles are so separate, you know what I mean.
If you're going to talk to someone like you and thank god you said yes and here we are, you go back and watch the show again with your notepad and pen and want to know more.
Thanks so much.
Yeah, it really means a lot too that you've engaged so much with it and have just s been You've really got it and you enjoyed.
It so much. Yeah, it means a lot that people are digging it.
Go and watch it.
For anyone who's listening to my podcast right now, go and watch this one.
Yeah, you're in for a wild ride, I think.
Yeah, it is a wild ride.