SIMONE HOLTZNAGEL SAS AUSTRALIA DEBRIEF

It's in the news today, but it was actually on TV Reload the podcast last week. They might welcome back guys to TV Reload. My name's Benjamin Norris and on this podcast I go behind the scenes with the biggest players in television.

Yeah, great questions. The show's about the game.

There's a lot of great television out there in Australia.

But I've also got to go behind the scenes with writers.

The truth is, when I started writing it, it wasn't had nothing to do with the news and casting agents.

They know from a casting point of view what they need.

And editors because that's what we do as editors where storytellers. Not to forget some incredible executive producers who are making some of the best TV in Australia. I have been on the program since the beginning and it's kind of in my DNA. So thanks for joining me each week and I hope the podcast continues to give you real insight into the magic of television today. On the podcast, I have Simone Hotsnagel, who is the latest recruit to

However, her post.

Pandemic role in Essays Australia has us talking about her career, her friendship with Charlotte, that pepper spray, and some behind the scenes goss from the show. I think you're gonna love Simone's candor, but I will also offer a trigger warning because this episode does include the discussion of suicide and if that does provoke your own feelings of distress, please call Lifeline on thirteen eleven fourteen. However, let's get

Nothing prepares you for Bring a Lit on Fire seventeen celebrities leave behind their comfort and security. No one's ever going to understand exactly what it was like to.

Embark on a life altering experience.

Something that I'm not working on because I'm like, I'm allowed to fucking talk about it if I want.

We'll take part in a condensed version of the SAS Selection course.

I was watching it back and I'm like, why would I so stress.

Summer here to fight for ademn shift.

If I had the opportunity to do it, I reckon it'd be totally different.

Hi, Simone, how are you?

I'm good?

Thanks, Benny, how are you?

I I'm really well.

I mean I'm a little traumatized because I don't like to see anyone I know go through something horrific. But I have to say congratulations on your time on SAS. How did you go watching last night's episode.

Watching last night's episode was probably the hardest one for me to watch, only because like I knew my interrogation was going to be in there, and you know, it's different when you're like doing something like if you're working out and you're like, oh, like that's this was like I'm going to die pain like I've never experienced in

We're gonna talk about the Charlotte thing in a minute because we have to. But from the moment that I heard you were cast on this show, I kind of felt like I knew how it was going to go, and you exceeded what I thought it was going to be.

Like I honestly, I was just so impressed.

It's funny because like going in, everyone's like, oh, do you want to change the public's perception of you? And I'm like I don't really care.

What they think of me.

I did want to do a good job, and I thought I was prepared, Like I trained for eight weeks my personal trainer in Woolengon and I was super fit. I was like lifting weight, but like nothing prepares you for being a lit on fire, like Hawd he trained for that, howd he trained for petspray, and like being almost drowned in a plane. The one thing I will say that I could have done more of was I

You can't train to much as much as you want to look a certain way or feel like you can tackle it. I mean, this show really is about real people going in and facing the hardest possible challenges. I think that's what audiences almost want to see. So I think you know, had you gone in there as action packed Barbie, it probably might not have been what you needed.

Yeah.

Well, it's funny because I was having this conversation with someone who's been on the show before, and we were both just saying, I wish they'd give.

Us six months notice.

But it's like they don't want anyone to be good, and I was going to be the shit run because I was like the token model, which is fine as well. It's like I know when I do or have done this type of like not that type, but you know, like the Jungle and stuff, it's like, I know what my role is there. I know it's reality TV, but everyone's kind of passed. There's always the token model, there's always comedian, there's always like footy player, you know what

But at the same time, you know, what I thought was really good was I enjoyed your interactions and the realness that you were able to continue to be throughout the series. Like I watched people on sas the Jungle, all of these shows that are celebrities that go in there, and I never really feel like they've allowed them to give themselves fully up to the experience where even last night, you were having conversation with one of the other girls,

The funny thing is not maybe maybe too much, not with Top Model, because that was like when I did Top Model, that was like eleven years ago now, and that was kind of before reality TV like really became this huge juggernaut, Like it was still in the early days and Instagram wasn't even invented when I did Top Model. It came out like a couple of months.

Later, I remember.

But I feel like so many people worry about saying the wrong thing, or like doing the wrong thing, and or like showing only like one side of themselves, like this kind of image that they already have or they want to hold up. And I'm just not about that.

But that's why you get hired for these jobs, you know that. That's why people who do fake it on these shows shouldn't be hired for these jobs. Because if we're going to watch, I mean, reality isn't the title, and I think in some way some of these shows have lost sight of that. But the closer we get to understanding the human condition, now we're being too deep, but you know, the closer we get to sort of exploring social experiment or people put into real situations of danger.

Yeah, and like me, I have like never spoken publicly about, like, you know, suffering from anxiety.

So I was like, but like, I wasn't going to pretend that.

It wasn't happening. I couldn't just go and like not cry because I was like in that moment I still remember it. That was actually on the first day, and I was like full wig out mode. I was like, what the fuck am I doing? Like I was dressing out so hard.

It was obviously because like I was very overwhelmed.

But the thing that like set me off was so you know, like, oh, maybe not with Big Brother, but you know other shows, like the cameras are there and the producers are there right next to the camera, right, That's like not what it is like. And when we're in the base camp, it's just all cameras on the wall, so there's no actual cameramen in there, and we don't have any interaction with anybody, Like, no one's glowed to look at us, no one's glad to speak to you.

On and I just would not stop crying.

I was just like weeping, and I was just like it was my first kind of moment in that first day that I was there, and I.

Was just like, what the fuck am I doing here? Like I'm so out of.

My leg So whatever, I check it out for like four more days, Like, yes, they showed it in a different order, but like it still happened.

Yeah.

I noticed that like a couple of times where they would take your mask off and I could see that it looked like you'd already been crying.

I could already see that.

But you know, I kind of felt like you break down stereotypes because just remember what it's like being a little girl, Because I remember, and that is that we think that beautiful people if we looked beautiful or if we were a model, you know, like if we were these things, we wouldn't feel anxious. And so I just felt this was a good thing for young people to

I think that's amazing.

That's very good, like perspective on it, which I do agree with. Actually, if you see other people on TV, you know, for someone like me or whoever it is talking about, like you know, it doesn't matter like what you're doing, who you are, Like everyone has shit, man, some people just don't talk about it.

Well, you're a fan of the show, And what was the core reason for saying yet?

My core reason for saying yes, it's because it was in lockdown and I was still working, but I wasn't working anywhere near as much. And also like I just needed trying to focus on on to like be excited for it, to look forward to because you didn't know when we're getting out of lockdown, and I was just like I could be in my house for the rest of my life.

I don't know, you know what I mean, very easily. Yeah, Yeah, I think we also.

So when I say first asked, I was like, oh, god, probably not better yeah than I was just like, actually, yeah, because yeah, I needed take to focus on because like otherwise I would have just probably come rolling out of my house because I would have gotten so fat from just cooking and drinking. So it was nice to have like a goal to work towards in a time where we all kind of were like, what are we doing?

I have to ask what was the what would you pinpoint as being the hardest part of the experience. It did end with you walking with this pepper spray, But I don't necessarily know if that was the worst or if it was just the straw that broke the camel's back.

I don't I feel like my reaction to everything, which is so far out of my comfort zone, is pretty normal. Obviously, I wish I did a lot better. And I was watching it back and I'm like, why was I so stressed?

Mentally?

I was white mustling it the entire way through, Like after I had that pinning to Pike on the first night, like every day whenever we're doing a debrief and they're like, this is what you know when they're telling you kind of what the theme of the day is, and anytime, and they're like, this is about controlling your emotions. You have to control your emotions. I was like, OK, but literally instantly started just like weeping, and I just couldn't stop.

The weird thing about these sorts of shows is once it's done, you're always going to I think they call it Sunday Morning quarterbacking, where you're always going to pull it apart and think, oh, you know, this is how I could have done it.

I could have done it differently. What's the recovery period.

Like for this, because I can imagine essays is like, you know, deep facial, you know those ones where they really get into the nooks and crannies and butcher your face.

About to go and have I'm about to go and have laser. Oh I do know exactly what you're talking.

Okay, but is that how what's the recovery time not for a facial but for sas.

I took maybe like a week, just like chilling, because it's just again like when we finished filming, everything reopened and I was just like, I have just been through this like crazy thing, and obviously we couldn't talk about it, like you know, you can't really talk about that sort of shit with anyone, and it's hard for other people to relate you. No one's ever going to understand You're

I think, as well, don't you think with doing a TV show, people go, oh, that's glamorous. They want to be there, you know, they want to do that because that's about them, you know, and they don't realize that these experiences, it takes a lot to do it. It is not as easy as you think. Yes, you probably do think at the start, oh, I'll be on television and that there has to be a small amount of

It's funny, I am still working and stuff, like a still model, Like everyone things to think that I like, go work as a model anymore.

I do.

I just don't post about it on my Instagram because I'm doing like ECONMS, but I feel I was talking to Richard but Rose on the phone the other night and we're just saying and I was like, it's a bit different for him because he even do a fuck about TV love him dearly, but I was just saying, I was like, oh, it's such a weird feeling when you get out on a show.

Are you wrapped doing a show?

Because you know different when it's lives to air, might show a show fed right, So, like I said, like I had months pre show training, then filming the actual show, and then you wait for it to come out, and you do all this publicity and you're excited for the show to come out and finally see it, and then it comes out and you're like oh, and then like of course the other thing comes along, but you're in

So I was worried.

But then as well, when we got the date to the show to come out, it was it came out the day before charlotte anniversary, and I was like.

Fuck me, how annoying.

Like I obviously didn't know how they edited it, but I was like, Okay, it's going to be me on TV the night before her anniversary with my interrogation like talking about it. I was like, fuck, what shit's timing? And then it wasn't that bad and they only played it last night, which you know it was her weird was her funeral eight years ago yesterday and then eight years later, still on TV talking about it.

Well, I mean, it's a big part of your life. I think you have to give yourself some credit for that.

Yeah, I think she would be too. I just like, it's not that I don't like talking about it, like I'm so happy to talk about it, and I know she'd still love people talking about it, But it's just more I don't want people to think that, oh, like I'm still talking it like oh like she's still talking about it, like I'm trying to stay kind of relevant or something. But that's just like amazing, I know, Like, and it's been like everything that I have seen has.

Been like good feedback.

Everyone's like that was really heartbreaking to watch, which it was like I cried watching it, and I knew what I said.

I was there.

It's saying that I'm like working on because I'm like, I'm allowed to fucking talk about it if I want.

If you're not talking about this in thirty years time, I'd be shocked. And then for anyone who would comment on that in any other way, doesn't know the situation, doesn't know how close you are, or maybe they haven't lost anyone.

I knew I was going to cry in that, and I knew they were going to ask, because that's really like my only thing, Like I don't have any other great, big scandals, like I.

Don't necessarily know if that's true.

Maybe that is, I mean, losing my father, like that was the biggest thing that's probably happened in my life A minute dwarfs, Yeah, something like that is always going to be. I mean, you've been on the front cover of Playboy, You've been countless guests, contracts you know that have been seen globally.

And I was so.

Worried for you at the time because you were such a baby, like you were so young, and I just thought, how are you going to pick yourself up? And then the more I got to be in your audience and see you succeed and succeed and succeed, it's mind blowing to me. You know, it's amazing.

It's funny because I think back to that and I'm like, oh, I didn't actually like because after she died, I like ran away. Basically I left and went to America like a couple months after that and just took off.

And then everything just kind of happened through me.

So yeah, it's just it's such an interesting it's been an interesting eight years.

I don't know about you, but do you think Charlotte would have done this show? I kept thinking, had she survived her mental health battle, I could imagine Charlotte being on sas people.

Have asked me that. The only reason that I can think of that she wouldn't have is because her knees were really fucked up. I don't know if it would have been like worth it for her to do more damage to them because she was getting like stem cells injected into her knees just for a while there. But I reckon she would have done it and then been like take the money and run late like Eve in the first six hours.

Yeah see, yeah, But I mean I also remember Charlotte talking about she wanted to never work in television again. The last time I saw her, she was showing me some pillows.

Yeah, she was starting to do homework. Ye that last year she was real pissed off with some people, but yeah, she was starting to.

Do other things.

I definitely remember talking about about you to Charlotte very clearly. Like I remember being in her place one night and you'd gone to the bathroom and she asked me for advice on how she could be a better role model for you.

Both, like you were there with magic.

Yeah, but it was funny though she was so she was so maternal with the two of you girls. Yeah, and she really did want to work out how she could be a better role model for the two of you. But I think she saw so much of herself in that in actually in you particularly, I think she saw a lot like it felt very much like a bit of a mirror and a bit of a Doo's.

Funny because like Madge is my best die and I was super like Charlotte, and I was super similar in so many ways that like Maddie and Charlotte, they were super similar in so many ways, but like.

Very different ways. Does that make sense.

But yeah, she was super like really maternal with me and mad Like me and madd had teeth to her house and we'd just like go down there and like she'd come home and we'd just be in her lounge room wearing her clothes. We'd have we had some power from her wardrobe. Our favorite outfits of hers. We called them our lounging clothes. So it didn't matter like what we were wearing. As soon as we'd go to her house, we'd get changed. Maddie would put on some like Camilla thing.

We were there.

And I remember this one day that that happened, and we were, yeah, sitting on her lounge wearing a stuff, and she came and she was like, hello, how are you, and like just went into her room and she came back out and she didn't even say anything, and she just walked over to me imagine the lounge and handed us both one hundred dollars and kissed up on my head and we were like thank you, and then she just like went back off and was like pottering around

Yeah, it's funny, much.

Like then you and I were wearing a Barney outfit. I think I remember, if I remember correctly, Do you remember wearing that Barnie the Dinosaur outfit.

Ah, she had that Barney outfit. She was obsessed with that thing. She used to put that on even when she was at home by herself because which I know because she put it on one night and went and ran down the wharf and loved herself out of her house and one of our other girlfriends had to go down and let her backing. She had the staircake. She

To Mardi Gras.

I was like, do we enter it floats in honor of Charlotte and we just all wear barning costume.

But people wouldn't have understood that, but I definitely think that they're gay community were obsessed with Charlotte Dawson. You know. I just I think you could have easily done that. Imagine all those men in drag as Charlotte. I think that I think we should still do that.

Would be amazing, you know, I wouldn't should totally do that. We should be organized next year.

Yeah, well we'll do it for the ten year.

We'll do it to celebrate her life, you know, And I know that there's still so many people out there, especially in the LGBTI community, that just anyway so obsessed with her. We could talk about this all day, and I'm so glad we can have a laugh and we can share these stories and it's not you know, I didn't want to talk about this today with you if it was going to be sad, Like I want to talk about it because it's funny.

But do you remember this. You're going to have to clarify this was true.

But the night I was there with you, did Russell Crowe come past and bang on her door?

I think he did, and then Charlotte goes, and then he.

Ran, and then he ran and Charlotte goes, like I mean to me like, the fact that Russell Crowe is doing this.

Is just doing knock and run on your is.

The weirdest thing ever.

And then knock and run happens, and then she's like, you know that's Russell Crowe is just you know, no Russell. She didn't say she wasn't name dropping him. She was just like and I was like who, and then I think, yeah, that's right. And then someone clarified me was like, no, she means Russell Crowe and I was.

Like, yeah, I have a great photo on my phone somewhere of eighteen or nineteen year old maybe. Yeah, they're around about like nineteen or twenty. I have a photo of them at her niece's christening in New Zealand together and they're both like teenagers, so wild.

Yeah.

Anyway, anyway, get that back on track. So you've been able to achieve so much with this modeling career, and you know, I think it's been really inspiring. But the thing that I've always wanted to ask you is like, what was your favorite job that you booked that you really liked. I'm a man, so no one's ever going to ask me to be on Playboy. But I imagine if I was a woman and I did Playboy. I would think that was really amazing, But you told me.

I was doing Playboy was amazing. But when they because they approached me a couple of times, so they approached me and asked me to do it, and I was like, and they were like, you have to go and you get naked at the meeting, and I was like, I don't know, and I was only like twenty one, and I just moved to LA and I was like, oh, and I was like, do we want to Playboy? Because they asked me a playmate and I was like, is

Then they were like, okay, what.

If you just do the cover? And at the time, I was only twenty one, So I shot my Playboy cover five days from my twenty second birthday. So at the time I was like, I just like, I know, obviously I was of age, but it's still I'm like, I feel like people should be a bit older to do Playboy.

I don't know, as you get older you think that. Do you think back about your being of a certain age and you think, God, was I doing that at eighteen?

Or God was I doing that at twenty one?

You know, Yeah, it's just.

Were like I think that, like you get like women get sexiers, they get a bit older, you know.

What I mean.

Anyway, But my favorite sorry that was a fucking tangent. My favorite job would be any of my guest campaigns. Not the first one because I was fucking cold that day. Oh my god, I was cold. Probably the one that we did out in the desert and we had all these cars.

It was for the Gumball Rally. That was pretty lit.

Did you do you feel like you're on the Spis Girls music video? You know, the Spis Girls music video say You'll be There or whatever it was whether out in the desert.

Do you remember that music?

Yes, I think I do know one. It was like that.

We had like flares and cars like driving around us.

The shirt everywhere. It was great.

We had big trailers to go home and make up in. Just felt like a superstar.

Well, I've been in your audience as best as a friend, but you know, just as anybody else has been, so I remember, I do, I know the shot. So for me, I'm relating it to Spice Girls, but that's probably showing my age. So I have a pitch for you on the podcast, and I reckon that if we talk about this, it's gonna have. It has to happen. So I'd love to see you back on a reboot of Next Top Model, but it's not just like what we've seen before. I think that you could bring the format to being quite

What do you think, Yes, that is a fucking dream of mind that they would redo Top like not redo Top Model, but like reboots. And there was conversations half years ago, and you know, we had a couple of meetings and I said it was like I remember I went with my agent.

She was like whoa, And because.

You know, we thought the meeting was going to go for like thirty minutes, we were there for like two hours. And I basically just said I was like, listen, in the real world, I was like, yes, Top Model was like the one of the greatest experiences of my life, changed my life. But in the real world, you don't overseas and living in some huge mansion. I was in a model apartment with like six girls in one bedroom with three bug beds for a couple of months. Like,

But that is handy. I mean, it's a preparation. It's not just a uh yeah, toss and burn kind of scenario where you're like, oh god, we need these props to play the roles of these people on this show.

Like it shouldn't ever be like that. You know, it shouldn't be.

Yeah, you know, you got to We've got to flip these sorts of things and then make sure people are prepared. I mean you look at the singing shows. I mean, I'm sure you would feel the same way. Like these people go and do these singing shows and they're extraordinarily talented, and then nothing happens to them because they've had no preparation.

You think, yeah, and it's like, obviously, still do the fabulous photoshoots and stuff that kind of makes it more like real life, because you don't, I mean, unless you're like Kendall Jeneral, like gij he did you're doing photoshoots like that every day.

But like you know, most.

Models start out doing a comm and then you might do like one campaign or saying a week or whatever, but generally you're doing look books, you're doing ECMM. That is where you make most of your like bread and butter money. That's to put it into the universe.

I'm doing it right now.

I need to materialize this because I want to see it and it's also been something that I've thought about for such a long time. And I'm sure you know, well should foxtell and any network anyway, We're going to make it happy. The last question I ask every body is what is something behind the scenes of you know, the show we're talking about? So we could talk says, but you know, what's something from behind the scenes of sas that we as an audience didn't see?

What we might appreciate this.

One day after I got we have the spread, and I walked off the and the doctor handed me over to the paramedic and I went into the medic room and I fucking got way worse than what was shown on TV. Like I they were, they were two minutes away from coming and like Pollice sedating me because I just was I could not stop crying. I could like, I just couldn't calm down, Like I was so overwhelmed with the physical pain, and then just emotionally, I was so fast and I was like full on the table,

I was like, Okay, that's I need when I'm forty two, and they'd be like, if I'm in distress, I need to call my mum. And you've probably had the same reaction to, you know, needing all that kind of medical attention. After seeing on the first episode what's his name, Paul in the news?

Oh fuck me. That was the funniest thing.

Jeff Huegel, I love Jeff Huegle. Him and I were standing next to each other in that line after being set on fire, and Jeff and I like because they said to us, they were like, you guys didn't like chat amongst yourselves, but just heap it down. And Jeff and I are standing there and I'm like, we both have no shoes on, and Jeff's like, nice, now, polish you've got on your toes him it's a good color.

And I'm like thanks, Jeff.

And then Paulie comes running at the beach and Jeff and I I was about to peat my pants. We could not get it together. Like him and I were like sent over, like hobbing onto each other, screaming, laughing, And then they came over and they were like hate, like shut the fuck up, stop laughing, and you know.

When you just can't.

So we're both standing there like silent laughing, like and couldn't even stand up straight.

It was so funny. That's one of my favorite memories too.

Actually, I loved you.

You could see you laughing though, and when you're told not to laugh, you can't help but continue to laugh.

Yeah, anytime we had to do anything, I always had. I feel like I always had this stupid smirk on my face, like even when Ant was I think it was when I like sell out of that root and Ant.

Was like talking to me and I was like I do.

So many people are like she didn't take it seriously, and I'm like I did. Sorry, my face just looked dumb.

No, But that's what people are so rude about that kind of stuff, because who the hell, who.

Are these people? Are they there? Do they know?

Because people know extreme situations react really differently, Like I quite often in really extreme situations can become quite Like I'll become quite focused and take the challenge on. I'll become quite what a Gena Leano said about Andrew and the Real Housewives, like I'm morph into a man. I know I am a man, but like it's so funny, like in extreme situations that's how I react, where I'm very effeminate by day. You know, by day you'd think

You know, mate, put.

The Doritos down and go and hang it yourself in a plane in some water, and then come back and tell me.

Yeah, seriously, I know, I'm like fucking try out these civilian ones because they're not going to ask you, because no one knows who you are, no one cares.

But anyway, I just have to say to you, I absolutely love you. I could watch you on any show. There was a show where you'd go pit through people's garbage. Actually that would be fun to watch you, to go in through people's garbage anyway, I would be. I love, I just love watching you on Telly. Thank you so much for coming here instead of d briefing the whole Essays experience, and yeah, I'll be forever in your audience.

Thank you, Darling. That's so sweet.

Thank you for having me