Lives are put at risk next week when Holly Hoyland follows her latest man into the Outback, expecting a weekend of romance (and aubergine emojis), but finding that when some of her friends and neighbours follow her, it turns into something far more deadly.
Since the show returned last September, Holly has been kidnapped by both her ex-boyfriend and a maniac doctor, almost drowning in a swimming pool after getting caught up in a Christmas Tree, as well as getting caught up in catching a computer hacker and a serial poisoner.
We sat down with Lucinda Armstrong-Hall, who plays Holly Hoyland, to talk about the amazing week of episodes ahead and why Holly keeps finding herself in traumatic situations. Is she completely blind to the red flags that these men display?
“In the case of Heath, she knows he is a player. She’s aware.” says Armstrong-Hall, talking about her latest playboy, Heath Royce, who has been exposed as having a criminal past.
“She knows what’s going on, but she decides that it’s just going to be a bit of fun anyway.”
Of course, Holly knows that Heath is a player and she also knows that whilst seeing her, he is also dating Tess, Heath’s boss from SinCast, half-owners of Lassiters. But she is completely unaware that Tess and Heath are in the process of embezzling millions of dollars from SinCast.
“Unfortunately she just keeps finding herself in these bad situations with these bad boys. She loves a bad boy, what can I say?”
Holly’s return to Erinsborough was because of one of these bad boys, Eden Shaw. She was travelling across Australia with her then-boyfriend when they bumped into another traveller, Krista Sinclair.
Behind Holly’s back, Eden was sleeping with Krista and both of them got involved with drugs.
Of course, that situation lead to the supposed murder of Krista at the Lassiters rooftop pool, an incident which caused shockwaves through the local community, resulting in the end of Melanie’s marriage to Toadie, Paul jilting Terese at the altar and also the catalyst for David, Aaron, Nicolette and Isla to leave Erinsborough. So yes, Eden was definitely a bad boy.
Holly’s DNA may have something to do with her attraction to bad boys, as her mother is Izzy Hoyland. If you are not familiar with Izzy, there is far too much for us to go through, but the last couple of times she visited Ramsay Street was to steal sperm samples from Dr. Karl and then she came back with her lover (and Karl’s son), Malcolm, only to ditch him and run off with multi-millionaire Shane Ramsay.
“She definitely has a lot of traits from Izzy that she has picked up from growing up with her and I think it’s definitely a guilty pleasure that comes out. I think it would be really fun to explore these sides of Holly, because they’re so impulsive and fun and they get her into so much trouble.”
Lucinda’s co-star, Ryan Moloney, plays Toadie Rebecchi who is a big part of the Outback Week alongside Holly and he also acknowledges Holly’s similarities to her mother.
“I think it would be wonderful to see Holly trying to be good and reach this level of almost acceptance and resignation of ‘You know what? This is me.’ and then just go full Izzy!” Laughed Moloney. He is now part of the show’s directorial team and so many have some pull in future storylines for Holly.
“Yeah, that would be cool!.” Lucinda completely buys into Ryan’s idea.
“I think that’s what she struggles with, the push and the pull of the Karl and Izzy in her. She wants to be good, so bad, but she is so impulsive and always has this forward impetus from Izzy and she always has to go and get more and do more… it’s fun to play with.”
Another character who is very similar to Izzy in her manipulative ways is Chelsea Murphy, who we saw manipulate her way into Paul’s life. With Holly’s experience with Izzy, does Lucinda think that she should have had more scenes with Chelsea?
“I was actually talking to Viva (Bianca) who plays Chelsea about it and I was like ‘I think our characters would get along really well!'”
Who knows, Chelsea could return to Ramsay Street one day and become a partner in crime for Holly, presuming that she makes it back alive from the Outback, of course.
Make sure you catch up on this week’s episodes of Neighbours to see Holly fall deeper in with Heath, before the epic ‘Death in the Outback’ week which begins on Monday, with episodes streaming Monday-Thursday from 7am on Amazon Freevee and Amazon Prime Video.
We know at least one person won’t be returning to Erinsborough…
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