Melissa George to Australia: 'I need you to be quiet'.

Remember this if you’re ever interviewing Melissa George: don’t ask her any questions about Home and Away.

The Australian actress (who is now a US citizen) reportedly had a meltdown on Channel 7’s The Morning Show last week when they played a clip of her from her time on Home & Away.

According to news reports today:

CHANNEL 7 spoke out yesterday about a tirade unleashed by former Home And Away castmember Melissa George, who threw a hissy fit on Friday’s The Morning Show because the segment referenced her days at Summer Bay.

The brekkie newsroom was still reeling from the outburst yesterday, which witnesses described as “erratic” and “unbelievable”, as the Aussie actress threatened to walk off the set if hosts Larry Emdur and Kylie Gillies made mention of the character that made her a star, Angel Parrish.

“She kept saying she’s had so many bigger roles since Home And Away that it was offensive to talk about it – she even said she’d send Seven an invoice because she inadvertently promotes it through the media,” an insider said.

The program’s executive producer Sarah Stinson, said she originally thought the meltdown was a prank.

You can’t see what went on behind the scenes but watch how frosty Melissa George is when they come back from the Home & Away clip. Awkward.

Sure, it’s been 16 years since Melissa played the character of Angel Parrish on the soap – and since then she’s moved on to roles in Friends, Grey’s Anatomy and Alias.  But, naturally, her former role comes up in interviews – especially when she’s in Australia.

Is it really something to be so ashamed of?

In a subsequent interview, Melissa went into surprising detail about why she was reportedly “offended” when The Morning Show’s Larry and Kylie mentioned H&A and why she threatened to walk out:

“I don’t need credibility from my country any more, I just need them all to be quiet,” she said. “If they have nothing intelligent to say, please don’t speak to me any more. I’d rather be having a croissant and an espresso in Paris or walking my French bulldog in New York City.

“I’ve never spoken out about it because I have to be the loyal good Aussie, who goes away and comes home.

“But I’m a really hard-working woman and people have to respect me for what I’ve done … my next call will be to Home And Away to ask them to pay me because nobody does more promotion for that f … ing show than me.”

Australian expat and Mamamia contributor, Kirsty Rice feels Melissa’s pain. Today she has written in defence of Melissa’s comments (and Melissa has even tweeted a link to Kirsty’s story, saying “This lady has said it all”).

Kirsty writes:

A girlfriend of mine was telling me the story of a mutual friend’s return to Adelaide. After a nine year break from the city of churches and serial killers, she returned to her old work place. In the time she’d been away she’d travelled extensively overseas, become a mother, and tried her hand at a few different roles. She was a little surprised on her first day back, when an old colleague asked if she’d been on holiday because she hadn’t seen her for awhile.

“Did you have a good holiday?”

She’d been gone for nine years.

On a recent trip back to my hometown, I made a stop at the dry cleaner in the town next door. A business I had once visited on a weekly basis for about two years.

“G’day Kirsty – haven’t seen you for awhile” said the same beaming man I’d remembered from twelve years earlier. “Are you still working at the radio station?”

I had to think about it for a minute. I’d erased that part of my life from my mind (let’s just say it wasn’t a career highlight).

“No, I moved, I don’t live here anymore”

“Where’d ya go? Back to Adelaide?”

I could have just said yes, and got on with the day, it had been thirteen years since my previous visit, and it was possible it would be another thirteen before I returned – but I couldn’t. It felt dishonest to the new life not to acknowledge how much it had changed from the old one. It wasn’t just that I felt I wanted to tell him, I needed to tell him. Everything was different, it was a fib to pretend it wasn’t.

I told him about how I’d fallen in love and then taken off on an adventure. I opened my wallet to show him a picture of the little travellers, and talked about where they’d been born and where they were now. I explained I’d had some time off but then returned to work. Within a couple of minutes I’d almost erased the single girl who arrived rushed every Friday afternoon to pick up her party clothes for the weekend, and penciled in the new mother of four, living in the desert. Ta da, that’s what I look like now.

Thankfully, he seemed interested. He listened, said he was happy for me and then filled me in on his news. I don’t know if he really cared, but it felt nice that he appeared to be happy for me.

A story about Melissa George rolled through my facebook feed this morning. I read a few “who does she think she is” comments before getting the gist. Melissa who is now 36, according to the piece, “chucked a hissy fit” about being asked about a role she played in an Australian soap 16 years ago. A role the article tells me “made her a star”.

These are the tweets Melissa sent after the show.

I don’t know Melissa George personally, and I was never a Home and Away viewer, but I did love her recent performance in The Slap. I can’t really remember her as Ross and Rachel’s nanny on Friends and I don’t watch Alias, nor Grey’s Anatomy, but I would imagine all of these events would have had her pretty excited out about how much her life and career has changed. And I’m guessing the nomination for a Golden Globe for her role in “In Treatment” may have been one of the highlights.

A quick Youtube search of Melissa will show you she has happily answered her fair share of Home and Away questions (it’s usually question one or two in any Aussie interview) – so why did it get up her bum so much this time? Why doesn’t she want to go back and revisit a job she had 16 years ago, answer the same questions, laugh at the same old pictures?

Maybe she’s just moved on?

Maybe, it’s time everyone else did too.

The post was originally published here and has been republished with full permission.

Kirsty Rice is an Australian writer and Blogger currently living in Qatar. After calling 7 countries home over the past 11 years she’s embarrassed to admit she still can’t pack a suitcase properly. Visit Kirsty’s blog here.

Do you think it’s understandable for Melissa George to feel exasperated when Home & Away is mentioned? Does Kirsty have a point? Have you ever been frustrated in a similar way?