JULIE GOODWIN IS TAKING HER SHOCK EXIT WELL

It's in the news today, but it was actually on TV Reload the podcast last week. They might welcome back to TV Reload. My name's Benjamin Norris and on this podcast, I go behind the scenes with the biggest players in television. Each episode you will get a front row seat with content makers like executive producers, writers, editors and casting agents,

I knew from the minute they asked me that I was yeah, I was probably gonna do it.

The Sheriff has produced some of the biggest names in food.

I screamed and I dropped the phone.

The first time ever.

It's funs versus febites.

I truly feel like it's appropriate for me to not have won this time around. Julie the bottom of all of our cakes, well don't. I can say that the Australian drinking culture makes it very hard to be a non drinker.

I'm sorry, Julie. For the first time ever, you're gone home. We're going to all leave this richer for having been here.

Hi, Julie, how are you?

I'm great?

Thank you well, congratulations on your return to Master Chef Australia. Was this a hard decision for you to agree to come back to the kitchen?

It's funny. It was a decision. In my head.

It was a decision that I should have made differently, But in my gut, in my heart, I was I just I you. From the minute they asked me that, I was, yeah, I was probably gonna do it.

Why what was your head saying? Was your head saying maybe not well?

My head was saying, are you mad? And then my head said, yes you are. And that's the problem. I spoke to my psychologist and she said, it's like you've got two broken legs and you've told me that you're going to walk the Kakoda track. So the two broken legs being you know that I've had some ill mental health over the past couple of years and I wasn't

I think everyone in the world who watched, everyone in Australia that's watched this series would love to be like you, which is so funny because it doesn't always demonstrate what's happening on the inside for us. So while you talk about your mental health struggles, here we are in Australia watching you, and I think we all want to be you. It's very strange.

Ah oh look no, I I nobody's life is all sunshine and unicorns, you know, And if anybody's life looks like that, then you know they probably need to be asked if they're doing okay, because it's just not the truth.

It's not how life goes.

And you know, I love my life, but there's things that you know, things go hey why sometimes and that's just sometimes it's a little bit outside our control as well. So I think that that's just reality. But yeah, at the end of the day, I think everybody's got their ups and their downs.

Did you ring Poe and ask Poe? I mean, she came second to your win back in the day, and she'd come back just a couple of years before. Did you ring her and ask her whether or not it was a good idea?

I did?

You know? Touched Facebook poets and I'm like, God, crazy things happening again. She's you know, she and I are so similar to each other. We're such good friends, and we've been through so much together. And she knew I would say yes, and I knew she would say yes where they asked her too.

It's just I don't know.

There's she's got a very similar sort of sense of wild and adventure to us, so we kind of both knew that that would be the case. But yeah, I did I touch base with that because she'd only just done it on back to win, and you know, we've both been through I'm a celebrity to get me out of here. We've both had a lot of similar life experiences that Master Chef brought to us.

So we're very We're very connected.

I love to hear this. I just love the fact that you guys are still friends. I think that's beautiful.

We're great mates. We're great mates. She's like a sister.

You're probably the most celebrated though contestant in Master Chef history. What kind of pressure did that create for you coming back in?

Oh, look, the pressure that I felt. I'd like to say that I was putting it all on myself, but I'm not actually sure that's true.

I felt pressure because, you know, I feel like the foundation of my life at the moment has been built on my win from thirteen years ago and all the opportunities and experiences that came my way. So really, if I get into that foundation by going on this show again and shake it, what's.

Going to happen?

I could, you know, if I make an absolute tool out of myself, I could lose my business. I could, you know, it could bring my whole life tumbling down that I've constructed, you know. So that is a lot of pressure, and I didn't really know how it would go. I didn't know if what they would be looking for, if I'd be looking for things that are just completely outside my knowledge and ability. So there was a huge

What I take from you when you're on television is your empathy and your warmth and your likability, whether tactics or traits that you knew you would need to bring to your time back in the kitchen.

Oh, look, in terms of tactics and traits, I would just say trying to think clearly and be calm. No tactics in terms of how I went with the other contestants, none at all. It's just we're a bunch of human beings giving something a go, and we're in quite a unique situation, and so we all leaned on each other and I just thought that was really beautiful, and we all lifted each other up. And it was an agreement amongst us almost that we're going to all leave this richer for having been here.

Whether we win or whether we don't, we will all.

Leave here richer in knowledge, richer in friendships, you know, and richer inexperience than what we arrived.

So that was that was all of us brought that to the table.

Well, you could have, you know, come back and you know you're a past winner, and you could have been jaded or arrogant or entitled. But we saw the absolute opposite of those traits. I felt like you won me over more with your humility, even being eliminated last night.

I wouldn't come back as arrogant. It's just not.

No.

I don't think I know how to do that one, because I'm just in it. I am in a state of awe and gratitude at the.

Things that come my way. I'm not an extraordinary person.

I'm a very ordinary person.

I'm just like anybody else. But these extraordinary things.

Have come to pass in my life, and I will never take that for granted.

I'm grateful for that from the bottom of my heart.

What would you say were the most significant changes to the competition since your first experience.

I think the most significant changes are actually off camera, So the fact that I was allowed to be in touch with my family throughout the process.

So the first time.

Around, I didn't see them or speak to them hardly for the nearly five months I was away. This time around, we were allowed to have contact. So that made a huge difference to me in terms of, you know, just being able to cope. And also we had a bit more privacy this time around. So first time around, there was twenty of us living in this house together.

It was like some weird frat party.

And this time around we were all in the same apartment building, but we all had our own bedroom and our own space.

So that made it very very different from me.

A bit more adult people, grown up and something that somebody of my agent stage.

Could cope with a bit better than being in on some weird school camp.

Yeah, big Brother Master Chef version doesn't sound that appealing. You'l beer like cooking all day and then being put into that house. No, thank you?

Oh lord, it was awful.

How do you feel about this? Because I actually think the fact that you came out, you know, I actually think that's helped you connect to audiences even more. I think if you if you'd one again, that would people be like, oh, yeah, you've won. But I think in some way it's sort of it's made us love you even more. Do you feel like that?

Look, I truly feel like it's appropriate for me to not have won this time around. I also don't know that I could have coped with all the conspiracy theories around it.

If I'd won again. So coming fifth actually meant that I was there until the very last week. I was in finals week, So for me, that was beautiful.

But I do think it's fair for somebody else to take that on and to have those experiences and have that moment. You know, I've had that moment and it was so special and it's something I'll never forget. So yeah,

Well, if you read it all the comments online, I think that you've exceeded everyone's expectations with your return. Everyone seems very happy with it. You've avoided all those conspiracy theories that may have surfaced had you had one. But I feel like as an audience, we really saw a woman who has been on a journey and still has a first for life. I think that's what I've walked away with. What has your life been like since we last saw you fourteen years ago?

Oh, life's been amazing.

I've I still pinched myself every day as to the things that pop up because Mick and Eye jack about it that it's my forest grump life.

You know.

I just go through life meeting these amazing people that I'd never thought i'd meet, you.

Know, things like my son, he's.

Now he's about to turn twenty four. I had to think about that to he's about to turn twenty four. But when for his twelfth birthday, the West Tigers, which is his favorite football NRL team, I was able to take him down to a training session on his twelfth birthday and they all signed his jump up. And that's purely because I went on a reality cooking program. It doesn't make any sense, but those are the kind of beautiful things that life has put in our path ever

And yeah, so it's just a constant adventure.

Really well, I love being in your audience. I listened to your radio show even though I was in a different state. I just wanted to.

Lovely.

And I also watched you in the jungle. I saw my friend Joel Creasy the other day and I said I would be interviewing you, and he said to say hello because he's obsessed with you.

He's adorable. My god, I love him.

So you've met a lot of people, You've had a lot of experiences. You know, what's been your favorite experience that this whole experience has conjured up for you.

Look, it's impossible to say what my favorite one is, but I would have to say that the one that kind of sums things up perfectly. Is that I got to cook with Kermitt the Frog. So while I was the resident cook on the Today Show, the producers rang me and said, oh, by the way, wear trousers tomorrow, not address because there'll be a guy underneath your kitchen bench as you cook.

But I'm just like, I beg your pardon. She goes, oh, sorry, So so I didn't explain that very well. We're promoting the Muppets movie.

You're cooking with Kermitt the Frog, And I screamed and I dropped the phone and it was one of those called the s phones, and it fell apart and the batteries fell out. By the time I found the batteries and got them all back together, I was crying. And so yeah, and I got to go in and the guy who is in charge of Kermitt the Frog came out and said, how I introduced himself, And as soon as I heard his voice, I burst into tears again.

You know, at the end of that, I just thought, on what planet does this happen?

So if you could have told my five year old self that one day I would cook something with Kermit the Frog, I would have wet my pants.

I absolutely love it. I was a weird kid as well, so I loved Kermit the Frog. Somebody who you know, when they do those Facebook things like who do you relate to the most? Or who do you look like? Or whether it's my double ganger or whether someone I relate to, I've always had Kermit the Frog in the mix. So we have that in common.

Yeah, there you godless.

You know, last night we've got to see you sort of talk about your relationship with alcohol, and you were saying that you're no longer drinking. Can we talk about our relationship with alcohol in this country? Do you think that we have an unhealthy culture with the way in which we drink socially.

Oh look, I think that the you know, I've never been the person that steps in and says what we should be doing as a society, you know, in air quotes, because it's not my place. But I can say that the Australian drinking culture makes it very hard to be a non drinker. But I will also say that I see that changing. I see that changing. I see more sort of non alcoholic options on menus I see, and actually it's being driven by younger people. There's a lot

The social issues that it creates.

But you know, there's also a lot of responsible people who drink responsibly, and there's a whole industry around it. There's a lot of beautiful stuff around, you know, vineyards and all that sort of thing. So yeah, I don't judge anybody else. That's a decision I needed to make for my own health and well being and for the sake of my family.

And has that affected your family and your friends around you? I mean, is your change to remove alcohol from your life? Is that made your life different.

Made it better? It's made it better.

It's not something I have to think about or worry about anymore. But in terms of my friends, like I think, you know, I don't hang with a group of big drinkers, so it's not like I've put myself on the outer with my friends at all. But also I'm not going around going well. I don't want anyone to drink near me. I don't want anybody else to change what they're doing. This is a decision that I've made, and I don't

You know, it's each to their own, and this just had to be what I did for myself.

Yeah, reform drinkers and reform smokers can be really hard to take at times, you know what I mean? So you know, oh yeah I do.

And I don't want to be that person, you know, because because you know, I it took me a long time to come to that decision, and it's not up to me to rush anybody else to their decision.

It is. You know, it's very personal, and every person is very different, and everyone's relationship with alcohol is very different, and it presents in different ways in different lives.

So you know, having a problematic drinking doesn't just mean that you're you know, on a park bench with a brown paper bag.

There's all sorts of ways that can impact your life.

And I just found that it was impacting my life in ways that were not improving my lot. So I made the decision and.

To cut it out.

It's necessary for the medication that I'm on, and it's necessary for my own sense of well being and self worth, so it's much better for me.

Well, I can hear it in your voice. You do sound happy, So you know, I think that you've invested in yourself, and that's really important. I think for lots of us to do is to every now and again put our magnifying glass over who we are and what we're doing, so that we can evolve into being better versions of ourselves.

Well, id just think if there's something in your life that makes you feel guilty or makes you feel bad or makes you feel defensive, then you know, I'm not saying stop doing it.

I'm just saying I have a closer look at it.

Absolutely, have a.

Clo look at it.

If it makes you feel bad, why do you keep doing it? And if it's screwing with things, then maybe it's time to just take a step back, have a little look, and make a different choice. And the different choice doesn't have to be all or nothing. For me, it's easier to be all or nothing. I am in all or nothing person. But for others it might just be, you know, moderating things a little bit. It's you know,

One of the questions I love to ask people who are living in the spotlight and you've been living in the spotlight for so long, is we often read about what's written online. What's the weirdest thing that you've ever written about yourself or maybe something that's been completely untrue that you've read over the last fourteen years.

But there's been so many weird things, so many like I mean, there's the obvious fake scandals like Mick and I have. They've had us divorcing a few times now, which is so, you know, we've been together for thirty three years. That's not happy. But the funniest one that just came out was you know, good old Daily Mail. They put out an article saying I'd had a massive fashion fail, which is, you know, that's fine, that's my life.

But I wore all throughout mastership.

I wore all different jewelry like knives and forks and pizzas and fried eggs and all sorts of stuff. Well, I wore this tiny spoon necklace and they wrote an article of fe Now we all know it's just one of her pieces of food jewelry, but some viewers have said it looks like a snuffspoon rugs.

Oh my god, Oh my god. I'm sorry it made me laugh because it made me think about a pair of earrings that my nan gave me when I.

Was a young girl, and she said, I got to these beautiful palm leaf earrings and they were marijuana between me Nana and her palm leaf earings and me and me little coached necklace of a walking talking drug and billboard.

It's so funny that how people who watch television and people who idolize people, we investigate everything and we can turn the most simplest things into something ridiculous without necessarily knowing the truth.

It's amazing to me.

It's amazing to me what theories gets about it, and you know what people assume and what they think, and like, I can't go into it with people online because you just you start that conversation and all the conspiracy theorists come out of the woodwork. So but I read some of it and I go, wow, that's so far from the truth, you know. You know, things like there were some people that said I've signed on for Mastershift because

Also, no, you know, we all just I'm the.

Same thing saying that we were there to compete and that was the deal that it was all. It's all above board. You know, it's all above board. And I don't think a showl like Master Chef would last for fourteen years as a bit of a that kind of show if there was all that kind of machinations going on.

There's just not.

But yeah, online is a funny old world. You don't want to live there too much because it was screwed with your head.

I like to say that you've sold magazines and you've brought people to the Daily Mail just your face being there. You know people are going to buy into that. You know you've been helping them sell those publications for years.

Well, can I tell you if you go to some of those articles, all you'll see is a hastily snapped paparazzi photo and an article that describes your outfit four different ways. There is absolutely no substance to it. And what I've learned about magazines is that they can make stuff up from the ground up, and unless you have a massive money behind you, you can't do a dam thing about it so they can put on the front edge of the paper my marriage is on the rocks

I just don't.

So I've just I've just got to hope that the people who know me know better and the people that don't know me don't matter, and just get on with malash.

You know, have a sense of humor about it. It's like what I always say to people, you know, if you take it too seriously to ruin your life. So you just got to laugh it off. Talking about your final episode making it to top five. You know you picked the dessert. Did that spell doom for you? Like? Did you think it would have been different had you picked something else? In that kind of lottery of associating what people were doing.

I would have in the scheme of things, I would have picked assert as my fourth preference out of four choices.

But no, I didn't actually think, well that's the end of me.

The longer I thought about it, I actually thought whiskey lends itself to desserts, probably more easily than it lends itself to vegetable.

So you know, at the end of the day, and that's the same all through the competition.

You know, you have things thrown at you that I saw, ingredients I've never even heard of before. But at the end of the day, it's just a bunch of ingredients that get turned into something that you eat. That's how I chose to look at it. It'll have a taste, it'll have a behavior, it'll have a texture. How does that work with the other things here that.

I have to work with?

And that's just kind of how you've got to think on that show because some of that stuff I've honestly I've never heard of sheer koji, I've never cooked rainbow cray.

Yeah, it's amazing.

There are also a couple of times where you had to recook throughout the competition, you know, which another pressure tests you had time to do. Was that kind of a clue that one day you might not have enough time that that might be the reason why you would be sent home?

Oh?

Look, always, every single time I'm in one of those pressure tests, whatever, I know that you've got to hit the ground running. You cannot faff around because if something goes wrong and you have to redo it.

That is going to take you right to the wire.

So I always tried to leave myself enough time, but I just didn't have enough time last night. It's one of those things I sort of likened to when they say, you know, you've got three hours.

To do this task.

It's like getting up at seven in the morning and having have it done by ten. You know, three hours sounds a long time, but it's really not.

It flies.

So yeah, I wish i'd had time to redo my cakes. Having said that, I actually probably my decision making was not at its peak in that moment, because I actually decided that it would be okay tocent.

I mean, everyone's burnt a cake. Before anyone who's made a cake has burned a cake. Could you not have maybe done what we've all done at home and try and cut off the burnt bits, or try and shave down off the burnt bits? I mean, did you think about doing that? Well?

I kind of did.

I cut all the edges off to make all the pieces uniform, and as I looked at the bottom of the cave, even as I looked at it last night, there was only one part that was quite dark, and oh my god, when I saw what the judges got, I think I think they got the only.

So that was just the way the cookie crumbled.

So yes, I could have shaved the bottom of I had tasted it, and I didn't think it was necessary. But that was obviously an incorrect judgment on my part. And that's you know, that's at the end of the day.

What.

Brought that to an end? You know, And that's how our stories all end.

It's either a massive disaster or it's a small incorrect decision or a small poor judgment.

And that's what got me yesterday was just a bit of poor judgment.

And what's going to happen next, you know, after coming back and doing Master Chef all over again, what do you want to do with this next chapter of your life?

I think for the next chapter, I'm going to wait and see what presents itself.

It's I have no solid plan. I'm going to keep running my.

Cooking school, and I'm going to keep loving my granddaughter and spending as much time with her as I can. And I'm going to breathe in and out and just see what flows my way and then make decisions as to what I do.

And a lot of reality shows have placed, you know, fans up against favorites these days. Do you think that new contestants versus celebrated contestants is a good concept for Master Chef or do you think, you know, if they do something like this again, it should just be as straight all stars.

I think that there were unique difficulties in putting fans versus favorites. I think they were navigated the very best way that they could do. And I actually said, when I was asked to go on it, how are you going to make this fair? Because obviously half of us have year's experience in hospitality and have do not how

Who do you think will win at this point? Now you know, before people left, do you have any idea who you think will take it out?

Do you know what?

I think it would be incredibly foolhardy to pick a winner.

We've seen through the whole thing.

Like we were all shocked as when Fashi went home, and I think, to me, that's been the moment in the competition where we all just went, oh God, anything could happen here, Anything could happen here. So I think out of the four people that remain, any one of them could take it out, and any one of them, anyone who's still there at the end of the competition, has fought tooth and nail.

To be there and deserves to be there.

And I'm thrilled for whoever does make it all the way to the top.

Well, as I've spoken to everyone who has come on the podcast, we've all talked about you because everyone has loved being there in the kitchen with you. They've loved seeing you in there. You know, it has been the ultimate Master Chef experience to be able to be in that series with you standing alongside them. So that must be pretty amazing for you to know.

Ah, it's beautiful, and that's just a really lovely thing to hear. Thank you, And I feel so much love and fondness for all those people, and it's really lovely to know that they feel the same way.

Yeah, well so funny. I mean, you could go back in there and be like Julie Goodman. Ah, she's a piece of work. You don't know what she's like behind the scenes, but everyone was the opposite. Everyone's just like, oh, would love her, or they want to just share what they learned from you that we didn't see, Like do you know that Julie plays an electric guitar and you

That's so beautiful. Thank you.

I've had some beautiful messages. You know, we've all stayed in touch and people, you know, we've all we all get in touch with whoever's eliminated on a particular night and just make sure that they're surrounded by their loved ones and doing okay.

And you know, there's there's.

Truly and honestly a sense of family amongst that group of.

People, which I love. The last question, Julie that ask everyone who joins this podcast is what is something from behind the scenes that were as an audience, did not see something that we won't see from your experience back on Master Chef kind of behind the scenes secret.

Oh gosh, behind the scenes, we had great scenes.

There was a lot of scene, a lot of dance and oh gosh, Alvin teaching us how to bootscoot, came and showed us some Venezuelan dance moves. Gosh, we were we were kind of semi writing and musical, so we would bust out just so some inappropriate moments. One of my favorite behind the scenes things was I made everybody a fake immunity pin. And actually in one of the eliminations, they tried to play the fake community pin so that never made it to end, but that was fun.

It lightened up a very brief hard moon.

Well, I'm looking forward to Master Chef for Musical, can't wait for that to come out.

It's a work in progress made, but it's going to be hilarious.

I'm sure that there's lots of Austrains, including myself, that would love to be there and be in your audience, and Julie, I will forever be in your audience and I absolutely love watching you in anything that you do. You have some magic that I don't even think you understand, a currency that connects to us as an audience, which is amazing.

So thanks, thank you for your beautiful words. I really appreciate it.