Home and Away star Lukas Radovich has had a real acting challenge in recent months after Ryder Jackson and Theo Poulos (Matt Wilson) teamed up to do some scary internet stunts!
Ryder launched himself into filming everything from eating a bowl of super hot chilies to doing a fire walk.
With a debt to aunt Roo Stewart (Georgie Parker), granddad Alf Stewart (Ray Meagher), and surrogate aunty Marilyn Chambers (Emily Symons) hanging over his head, he came up with an extreme ‘buried alive’ challenge, hoping he’d make enough money to pay them off.
But after the stunt goes horribly wrong, Ryder is left in a life or death situation.
“He loses all communication with the outside world and nobody knows where he is, so that’s really distressing. He realises it might be the end!” Lukas explained.
With Theo unable to get to Ryder after falling into a ravine, things are looking desperate. Ryder goes way over the time he’s supposed to be in the coffin and his oxygen is running out.
Thankfully Roo works out where Ryder is and saves him in the nick of time. But the brush with death leaves Ryder severely shaken.
“It makes him reevaluate his life and allows him to think about the future and that maybe he took things a little bit for granted before then.
“He makes a list of priorities and his family is one of them, as well as work. He wants to be able to put a bit more focus into his work life.
“I think you’ll see a definite change in his commitment and his focus to his personal goals.
”He’s still working at Salt and still wanting to be a bartender or work in that kind of field.
“In the months to come he focuses on that and finds a new found passion in some of the hospitality work that comes his way.”
Lukas admits that the stunt was the most challenging thing he’s had to do yet:
“I was really nervous, but I didn’t let myself think about it too much until the actual day of filming,” he revealed.
“When I got in the coffin I realised there was a real spider on me and real worms falling into the coffin because we’d literally just dug a hole and put a coffin in it! It was nerve wracking.”
“All the challenges have had different levels of danger. The chilli challenge was probably the easiest one to do.
“Although we did use real chillies! We were given an option of fake chillies, which were little tomatoes, or the real thing.
“A lot of the crew were into chillies and would talk about them. For weeks afterwards I was receiving dried chillies, chilli plants, chilli sauce… I’m in the chilli club now - I got initiated!”
Home and Away is Lukas’ first acting job after graduating from acting school in 2016 and he was brought into the fold of the iconic Stewart family.
With rumours that Ryder may soon be exiting the show, has Lukas had any thoughts about his acting career?
“Having Home and Away as my first gig has been absolutely incredible,” he insisted.
“Maybe in the future I might follow a lot of the Home and Away cast who go off and try to make their luck doing film and TV and theatre.
“Who knows. I think everyone’s journey is different, so I’ll see what happens.”
Home and Away airs weekdays at 1:15 pm on Channel 5 and 6:00 pm on 5Star followed by a 'first look' episode on 5Star at 6:30 pm.
