Claudia Byatt
TV

Iconic actor returning to Neighbours

Guy Pearce will be reprising his role on Neighbours following his memorable return to the hit soap’s 2022 finale.

The Aussie actor hinted in an interview with Nine’s Good Weekend Talk podcast that he would be appearing in the reboot, which is already being filmed in Melbourne.

Pearce, 55m landed his big gig as Mike Young on Neighbours in 1986 and featured in more than 450 episodes before his departure in 1989.

In the show’s last episode, his character purchased a home on Ramsay Street with his love interest, Jane Harry, played by Annie Jones.

The beloved soap ended its 37-year run in July 2022 but was picked up by Amazon Freevee and Prime Video.

Pearce explained on the Good Weekend Talks podcast that the series’ return had “thrown” him.

“I was a little thrown by that,” he shared.

“Annie (Jones) and I called each other, ‘What do we do now, because we’re living in the street’,” he said.

“And she said, ‘Well I’m all right because I’m on the show anyway, but what are you going to do?’ I said, ‘I don’t know’. So we’re in the process of working it out.”

When asked if he’d return to Ramsay Street, he teased, “You may, you may”, but went on to say it was likely.

“Obviously, if I’m going to extricate myself from the show, I want to do it respectfully,” he said. “I wasn’t just gonna go, ‘Well, bad luck. You had your chance, that was it’, you know. So there may be a little appearance or two, shall we say.”

Neighbours is set to air on its home network channel 10 but will be available to stream for free on Amazon Freevee in the UK and US.

The revamped series will also be watchable ad-free on Prime Video in Australia and New Zealand seven days after the free-to-air viewing.

Image credit: Getty

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Neighbours, Guy Pearce, Reboot, TV