Netflix's new adaptation of the Australian classic My Brilliant Career opens with smutty performance poetry and a Divinyls needle drop, signaling a departure from typical period drama. Within the first episode, heroine Sybylla Melvin squats for a bush wee and flashes her knickers at a drawing room full of toffs while dancing to a Rod Stewart cover. The series, starring Philippa Northeast, launches worldwide on 13 August.
A Spirited, Teen-Lensed Retelling
“It’s bonkers,” admits Northeast, who plays Sybylla. “You really see this world through a teenage lens – which is true to Sybylla’s spirit and Miles’ age at the time she wrote the book … it reads like a teenager’s diary entry, pretty much.”
Northeast researched the role at the State Library of New South Wales, reading Franklin’s diaries to understand the woman behind the story, which was substantially inspired by her own life. Franklin wrote the novel as a teenager and published it in 1901 at age 21. Previous adaptations include Gillian Armstrong’s acclaimed 1979 film starring Judy Davis and Sam Neill, plus stage and musical versions.
A Timeless Story of Female Rebellion
“It is a timeless story; everything it speaks to is still relevant,” Northeast says. The series follows Sybylla, a budding bush poet, from impoverished drudgery toward artistic fulfilment and financial independence, navigating torturous match-making attempts.
“It’s about being a woman and trying to forge a creative life, and contending with society’s expectations,” Northeast adds. Having made her name on Home and Away, she struggled to land complex roles. “When the way you feel rebels against those expectations, trying to carve a way forward can be incredibly frustrating – but also essential to your own survival.”
An All-Female Creative Team
The adaptation, created by an all-female team, portrays Sybylla as wild, passionate, and indomitable – dancing with demon energy, screaming at the sky, and experiencing her first oyster and orgasm as epiphanies. The soundtrack mixes female folk pop, glam rock, and indie, including tracks by Wet Leg and Ecca Vandal, covers by Thelma Plum and Isabella Manfredi, and originals by Kate Miller-Heidke and Beckah Amani.
“We thought, we’re unashamedly going to make a show that is intended for women,” says creator and lead writer Liz Doran.
Reimagining Harry and Expanding the World
This adaptation is the most ambitious to date, reimagining love interest Harry Beecham as Chinese-Australian (played by Christopher Chung) and adding First Nations characters and a gay subplot. Doran says the writers room asked, “who is living in Australia in 1900, who wasn’t represented in the book,” and fleshed out characters with “story, agency, a life”.
Chung, who returned from the UK for the role, praises the script’s forward-thinking approach: “It’s not colour-blind casting … and it’s not tokenism.” He notes the subtle nods to heritage, like removing shoes at the door in honour of Harry’s late Chinese mother. “This show is a really incredible example of how well the Australian industry is shifting towards … navigating inclusivity in a truthful way,” he says. “My hope is that it continues to foster more work within Australia and show what is possible and what stories resonate with audiences.”
