Acclaimed Australian actor, star of Cop Shop and Underbelly, dies ...

8 days ago

The Sydney Morning Herald

Acclaimed Australian actor star of Cop Shop and Underbelly dies

Nicholas Eadie starred opposite a young Nicole Kidman in the wartime miniseries, Vietnam, as well as having roles in A Country Practice, Halifax f.p. and The Henderson Kids.

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Australian actor Nicholas Eadie, who won an Australian Film Institute award for his role in the 1987 miniseries Vietnam opposite Nicole Kidman, has died in Sydney.

The 67-year-old’s death was announced on Facebook yesterday by fellow actor Will Conyers, who wrote, “I send my deepest sympathy to all those that were touched by this very special artist and human being.”

Conyers added: “I am paralysed. He welcomed me to my time in Sydney in the ’80s. Such a generous soul.”

Eadie, a NIDA graduate, was well known for his roles in the TV shows Cop Shop, The Henderson Kids, in which he starred as Uncle Mike, A Country Practice and Medivac. He also starred opposite Sigrid Thornton in the film The Man from Snowy River II.

Alison Whyte, who worked with Eadie at Melbourne’s Malthouse theatre company, wrote on Facebook, “Devastated – such a beautiful human”, while Geraldine Turner, who starred opposite Eadie in a production of Don’s Party, wrote: “No no no … love him”.

Theatre producer Michelle Guthrie said it was “incredibly sad”, while former arts editor of The Sydney Morning Herald Bryce Hallett wrote, “I really can’t believe he is gone. Such a talent … and such a gorgeous fun-loving soul”.

In the Kennedy-Miller miniseries Vietnam, then 27-year-old Eadie played Phil Goddard, who was conscripted to fight in the war and became traumatised after his unit was ordered to destroy a South Vietnamese peasant village. Eadie also won a Logie Award for most popular actor in a single drama miniseries, while the miniseries was named most popular.

Eadie was again nominated for an AFI Award for his roles in the 1988 film Fragments of War, in which he played Oscar-winning World War II photographer and cinematographer Damien Parer, and for a 2002 episode of Nine drama Halifax f.p. His final screen role was in 2011 when he starred in Underbelly Files: The Man Who Got Away.

On stage, Eadie worked with every major Australian theatre company, including on the musical Mamma Mia!, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof for the Melbourne Theatre Company and the original production of Tommy Murphy’s Holding the Man for the Griffin Theatre Company.

On a 2021 episode of the podcast Stages with Peter Eyers, Eadie said acting was “in my blood, it’s in my veins. My father [ABC radio announcer Mervyn Eadie] was an actor, and I was very, very lucky that my father adored films and theatre and dance and ballet and opera”.

He talked about being obsessed as a young man with Jesus Christ Superstar and how a trip around the world with his parents to Europe, London and Broadway “gave him a love and thirst … for theatre.”

A cause of death has not been revealed.

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Louise Rugendyke is national TV editor, editor of S in The Sun-Herald and M in the Sunday Age, senior culture writerConnect via Twitter or email.