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Alan Fletcher has played Neighbours’ resident GP Dr Karl Kennedy since 1994. He is the third-longest serving actor, after Home and Away’s Ray Meagher and Lynne McGranger, on Australian TV. Before Neighbours aired its final episode last week, Fletcher spoke to National TV editor Louise Rugendyke about the show’s end and what he would donate to a Neighbours museum.
Hi Alan! How are you feeling about – another – end of Neighbours, only two years after Amazon revived it?
Oh, I’m very sad for fans and all the people who lost their jobs. I’m sad for the industry that’s lost the best television and film school we ever had. So yes, it’s a sad day, but at least when we got to the end of this batch of Neighbours, the extra two years that Amazon gave us, there was a lot to celebrate in that because we had crafted the best possible show we could have crafted. Getting a chance to revitalise the show between seasons was a game-changer. It made the show look better. We had diversity increases. It was fantastic. So, yeah, I feel a bit celebratory as well.
Stefan Dennis, Jackie Woodburne and Alan Fletcher in the final episode of Neighbours.
I always think that was one of the things people underestimated about Neighbours – it is one of the most diverse shows on television.
I’m sure it was a conscious decision. The writers and the executive producer, Jason Herbison, were very much driven that way. That only reflects the way the industry is moving, you know? And it’s very crucial for our industry to reflect the diversity of our society in this television product.
You’ve been on the show since 1994, when Karl and Susan Kennedy (Jackie Woodburne) moved into Ramsay Street with their three children, Malcolm (Benjamin McNair), Libby (Kym Valentine), and Billy (Jesse Spencer). What do you think made the family such a hit with viewers?
The Kennedy family gelled from the first day. None of us really knew each other, and the whole family became a unit very quickly, which is, I think, why the audience grew to love us and keep us on the show. I was blessed as an actor. Obviously, I was blessed mainly to work with Jackie Woodburne, who’s one of my dearest friends. And she and I have a natural affinity when we work together.
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What do you think is in Karl and Susan’s special sauce? Because, honestly, I don’t why she didn’t kick Dr Karl out years ago after his multiple affairs and love child with Izzy.
The one thing Susan knows is that despite his considerable flaws, Karl has a good heart, and he also loves his family dearly, and his family are his main priority in life. I think his inherent weaknesses are one of the things that endeared him to a lot of people.
Come on, Alan, just say it – Karl’s inherent weakness is the ladies.
Well, it was a long time ago [laughing]. These days, Karl suffers a lot from hubris. He would go and spontaneously write a cheque for a spectacular amount of money to be part of a fashion business, an investment that went, of course, pear shaped and lost the Kennedys a fortune. He is the sort of person who makes spontaneous and silly decisions a lot of the time because of his own hubris.
Knowing what do about Dr Karl, would you pick him out of the phone book as your GP?
Well, I think I would. Because the one thing about Karl is that he was deeply caring of his patients and his medicine. But, you know, it’s hard to get away from the reputation that he killed Cheryl Stark [he gave her an overdose of morphine after a car accident]. So that might cause some people, if they were looking at the CV, to question whether he was the best man for the job.
Alan Fletcher, playing Dr Karl Kennedy on the set of Neighbours, in 1998.Credit: Joe Castro
Does part of you wish Neighbours was continuing? If it got picked up, let’s say, by another streaming service, would you sign back on again?
I’m not sure if I’d sign back on again. I’ve had a good run – 31 years – and I’ve got a lot that I want to get on with. And I’m not a spring chicken any more [Fletcher is 68]. But it would be my greatest hope that some form of Neighbours-ish type show could be re-created to please the audience. Australia has a paucity of work for people, crew and actors and Australians love Australian TV. So the more Australian TV we can create, that’s more jobs, more skills. And, to really bawl about this, it’s great export earnings for the industry. You know, Neighbours made a lot of money for the Australian film and TV industry.
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Do you think Neighbours was taken for granted a little bit?
I think people in Australia weren’t quite aware of the impact the show was having around the world. I mean, they vaguely heard about that. But to this day – the day of the show ends on December 11 – there will be millions of people watching the program. This is not a program that died a natural death. The cost-benefit analysis of film and TV meant the show finishes. So that’s what’s sad, I suppose – it’s not as though the show ran out of an audience. It’s just the way the world works.
If you could donate anything to a museum from Neighbours, what would it be?
I could donate Karl Kennedy’s debut, long-playing album from [his band] The Right Prescription. Fremantle Media were extremely generous to me, and they actually gave me Karl Kennedy’s guitar when I left.
The Kennedy family (clockwise from top left): Malcolm (Benjamin McNair), Susan (Jackie Woodburne), Karl (Alan Fletcher), Billy (Jesse Spencer) and Libby (Kym Valentine).
If you could craft a new life for Karl and Susan, where you would like them to end up?
They would sail off into the sunset in a caravan, the two of them, and go on to have another rich life of adventures, travelling around Australia and then eventually the world. It would become a serialised television drama which would run for 20 years, and Jackie and I would eventually retire at the age of 95 having made another successful television program.
For that to get made, I think you’d have to start solving murders as well. Maybe Karl and Susan could make a guest appearance on Return to Paradise?
Well, everyone is turning up on that.
