Morgana O’Reilly is one of New Zealand’s most successful acting exports. As well as starring in Neighbours for several years, Morgana wowed fans in the cult comedy horror Housebound, and was the lead in the Emmy-winning series INSiDE. Morgana has since appeared in the third series of The White Lotus and is now starring in Paramount’s spine-chilling Playing Gracie Darling.
My full name is Morgana Le Fay Naomi Jane O’Reilly, although my legal name is Morgan, which my parents found in the phone book.
When my parents told my great-aunt my name, she asked if it was for Morgana le Fey from the King Arthur stories. So they added le Fey, which means fairy or faith. Naomi is for my grandmother on mum’s side, Jane is from mum’s name and O’Reilly is dad’s last name.
I was quite a tomboy in primary school.
I had short hair, and because people called me Morgan, they often thought I was a boy. When I was about 10, I was at a brunch to celebrate women’s suffrage. I met Helen Clark, who leaned down and said, ‘You must be the only bloke allowed in here.’ So when I started intermediate school, I asked Mum to enrol me as Morgana, which she did. No questions asked.
I’m often asked why I chose to do Neighbours, but actors don’t choose their roles.
We go after every audition, but mostly, we don’t land the job. So I just auditioned. Then when push came to shove and I was offered the role, it was initially for three years and I wasn’t sure I wanted it. So my agent, bless her, had to go back and say, ‘Morgana doesn’t want to do three years.’ They said, ‘How about 18 months?’ I then said I wanted to take my show to the Edinburgh Fringe during my contract, and they said, ‘Okay, we’ll give her two months off.’ Then I found out what I’d earn each week and I was in!
Never in my life have I felt more famous than when I was in Edinburgh with my show and onscreen in Neighbours at the same time.
In Australia, I could totally forget about it because no one there cares. To the point someone once asked me for a photo, and I thought they wanted me to take a photo of them. But they were like, ‘No, we want a shot with you in it.’
I came to really value Neighbours – and not just because it helped sell tickets in the UK – but I learned so much.
Aside from the steady income, it was amazing to act every day, then I got pregnant halfway through. As an actor, when you first get pregnant, you think your career is over. So it was good to have job security, even though it was scary.
I’ve only ever been on Shortland Street as an extra. It was in 1993 and I was one of a group of tap-dancing elves in a Christmas episode. It was thrilling to be on set.
Nancy Brunning, who played Jackie Manu, bless her soul, was so nice to us when we met her in the canteen. Then Maggie Harper, who played Jenny Harrison, came over and said, ‘Hi, Morgan, fancy seeing you here.’ She must have known my mum, and holy moly that gave me some street cred.
It was more the fails that made me want to be an actor, including an audition when I was about eight.
I had to look to the horizon and say a line, but I got into the room and I totally froze. That haunted me for ages. I also didn’t get cast in the intermediate school production. So much of my career has been about showing that drama teacher that I am good enough. Mr [name redacted as Morgana is too nice to shame former teachers], if you’re reading this, I did okay!
At school, I was very sassy and headstrong, so a big shout-out to Western Springs College.
It was such a good school for me as I’d have kicked up against more rules or authority at a stricter school. The Smokefree Stage Challenge was also a passion. It was this thing where schools put on massive dance pieces at the Aotea Centre. I participated in the third and fourth form, and in forms five to seven, I was one of the choreographers. We came second in seventh form and that’s still one of the best moments of my life.
That’s the paradox of teenage Morgana.
I was a brat and a party girl. I wagged school and was quite naughty, but when I chose to dedicate myself to something, I gave it my all. At prizegiving in my final year, I won the trophy for Contribution to Performing Arts and it sits proudly next to my Emmy.
I did three plays with The Silo straight out of drama school and when they finished, I was freer and more aimless than I’d been since I started school aged five.
It felt like someone had pulled the rug out from under me. I also ended a six-and-a-half-year relationship, which I’d been in from the ages of 15 to 21, and I learned a lot. I stuck around for another year or so, then I travelled. I ended up in New York and I was so broke at the end of that trip, I had to work at foot fetish parties to make my airfare home.
I had a crazy sequence of near misses after Housebound came out, including being asked to put down an audition for a pilot written by Jenji Kohan, who made Orange is the New Black and directed by Gus Van Sant.
I was in India with my husband and I was pregnant when we filmed the audition in a mud hut in the Thar Desert in Jaisalmer. We were heading home from Edinburgh, going back to Neighbours, and I was getting close to this big HBO pilot with all these fancy people. Then I had to tell them I was pregnant and they said that’s all right, we can cover that. Then I asked Neighbours about getting out of my contract and they said no.
To be fair, I might not have got the role, but saying no to HBO felt horrible.
So I called Danielle Cormack and she said all the right things, but it still hurt. I’ve also had near misses on shows with Melissa McCarthy and Elizabeth Banks. I can handle the straight nos, but the maybes, they really hurt.
I’m not saying woe is me, as no hard thing is ever lost and being knocked down isn’t all bad.
It’s like an action movie when the hero is up against it and the baddie is winning, then something happens inside and you come out all guns blazing. So in 2023, I told myself I would be my most authentic self at every audition – without kissing anyone’s butt – and that has made a huge difference, to face auditions with more authenticity and less obsequious desperation.
I now have more faith in my abilities, which is easier said than done, but it’s important to remember that what you have is different to what everybody else has.
Although telling myself that is more of a survival mechanism than ego. Like with White Lotus, I put down that audition thinking there was no way in a million years I’d get it. But I showed them my version of who I thought Pam should be. My agent said she took great satisfaction in calling to tell me White Lotus had gone my way.
I recently turned 40 and like most people, I feel I’m not doing enough. Ziggy just turned seven, and Luna is 10, and while I’m really enjoying this nice quiet moment, I feel like a bit of a failure because I’m not fielding offers left, right and centre.
Although I am also trying to generate work and I’m writing a book. It’s like a social commentary in the vein of my solo show Stories About My Body. So it’s a series of essays, essentially my thoughts
and feelings about being a person with arms and legs in the patriarchy.
It was a huge deal to be offered the lead in Playing Gracie Darling, which I don’t think I’d have got if it wasn’t for White Lotus.
It’s a scary show and filming in a sub-tropical rainforest felt so alive. There were leeches everywhere, and a lightning storm where we had to down tools and gap it, and winds so high we couldn’t shoot. At one point, we had a smoke ceremony in the forest to appease the deep nature.Although we shot the séance scenes in a studio, which was fine, filming in a visceral nature, whether a rom-com or a horror, adds logistical challenges and can make things feel magically spooky. But I loved the work and I’m really proud of what we made.”
Playing Gracie Darling premieres on ThreeNow, Sunday, November 2, and on Three on Sunday, November 9 at 9.30pm.
