SAMUEL JOHNSON TALKS UP SEX WITH STRANGERS By Andrea Loiuse Thomas With his Cheshire cat grin and consummate charm, actor, Samuel Johnson has one of Australia’s most recognised film and television faces. He’s equally well known for his dulcet toned voice over work and for setting a world record riding a unicycle around Australia (15, 995 km!) raising money for breast cancer research/awareness through Love Your Sister an organisation he and sister Connie created after her breast cancer
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diagnosis. In 2009, Johnson co-founded Straightjacket Productions with director Lucy Freeman. Currently they are touring Laura Eason’s Sex With Strangers. Funny, insightful and sexy too, the play stars Johnson and Tottie Goldsmith. It’s about the relationship between a Gen X academic/author and a best-selling Gen Y blogger. I chatted with Johnson before the show comes to Shirley Burke Theatre, Parkdale.
MINT: Tell us a bit about Sex with Strangers… JOHNSON: It’s essentially about a guy and a girl. Tottie is playing the conservative - an older professor of literature who hasn’t quite jumped on the tech wave yet. I’m the young scallywag who pretty much relies on digital communication. I’m really proud of this show. Laura Eason, who is arguably the best writer on House of Cards (Netflix), wrote this play. It’s done great things in America and I
thought it was really important that we see it here. MINT: Originally written for an American audience, were any changes necessary to make it more accessible here? JOHNSON: None at all. We’ve been very true to the script. We’ve got accents and we haven’t localised it at all. It’s my first attempt at an American accent after 23
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