The Aussie Streaming Stars Taking On The World, Deadites & Unscrupulous Executive Producers

Acting is a very competitive gig, so landing any role is cause for celebration. But for Australian actors, there's a certain extra something about getting a part in an international production - I dunno, maybe it's the sheer thrill of snatching it away from one of those damn foreigners (insert smirky 'just kidding' emoticon here), but I would say it's the validation that comes with competing and succeeding on a larger stage. Taking on the world and winning, so to speak.

Australian actors have been doing this for decades, of course, but lately it appears more and more homegrown performers are making names for themselves on a global platform. And for every heavily muscled superhero like Thor: Ragnarok's Chris Hemsworth and highly touted awards-season contender like I, Tonya's Margot Robbie, there are a few other Aussie actors hot on their heels, landing eye-catching supporting roles on pay-TV productions and streaming-service series.

Take former Home And Away star Samara Weaving, for example, and her wickedly charismatic performance in Netflix's horror movie The Babysitter. Or Lucy Fry, who went from tangling with outback madman John Jarratt on the first season of the Wolf Creek TV series to tangling with orcs and elves alongside Will Smith and Joel Edgerton in the hit Netflix fantasy Bright, which already has a sequel in the works.

And this month, two young Australian actors will be seen in prominent roles on popular shows returning for their third seasons - Arielle Carver-O'Neill on the gruesome horror-comedy Ash Vs Evil Dead and Kassandra Clementi on the caustic reality-TV satire UnReal.

Let's begin with Carver-O'Neill, whose name alone makes her a natural for the Ash Vs Evil Dead cast, who frequently find themselves carving up hostile hordes of 'Deadite' monsters. However, the Melbourne actor, whose credits include Neighbours and Worst Year Of My Life, Again!, initially had some misgivings about auditioning for the show.

"This is very embarrassing but I was traumatised by Scary Movie when I was 13 - and I know it's a comedy!" she laughs. "But I actually had nightmares for a week and a half, so that turned me off horror for a bit. But when I found out I was auditioning for Ash Vs Evil Dead, I thought I'd better check out the show and I really braced myself, thinking it would be this huge ordeal. And from episode one, I was laughing my head off! The comedy of it all makes the most violent and horrific parts really entertaining. I mean, it's disgusting but it's not nasty or anything."

Carver-O'Neill's character Brandy Barr has one goal: get accepted to a good college and get the hell out of her small town of Elk Grove, Michigan. But she's destined for something far more important (and far bloodier): it turns out that she's the daughter of demon slayer Ash Williams, played by Bruce Campbell.

"So throughout the season she goes on this amazing and very messy journey once she discovers this father she never knew she had," says Carver-O'Neill. "There are definitely similarities between Brandy and Ash, although she's in denial about them to begin with! To put it mildly, she's stuck with this creepy, borderline-alcoholic guy with one hand who keeps saying things like, 'It wasn't me who did it, it was the demons!' That's gonna take some time for her to warm up to. But they discover some similarities - they're both incredibly stubborn and they have the same sense of humour, which was so much fun for me and Bruce to play."

"When I found out I was auditioning for 'Ash Vs Evil Dead', I thought I'd better check out the show and I really braced myself, thinking it would be this huge ordeal. And from episode one, I was laughing my head off!"

Campbell's a big personality, on and offscreen, but the Ash Vs Evil Dead newcomer quickly found herself in sync with his style.

"It was amazing," says Carver-O'Neill. "He's a master at what he does - I've never seen it before, where someone can walk onto a set and just nail it the first time. And then you can either move on from there or have fun and play around with it. And we had so much fun with it, especially once the relationship between Brandy and Ash improves and you come to see that they're alike in some ways. I would finish filming for the day and call home because working with Bruce made me miss my own dad so much. I have a lot of love for Bruce."

What's more, Carver-O'Neill also quickly got into the swing of how one conducts themselves in the world of Ash Vs Evil Dead.

"The first thing I did was start brainstorming what my weapon would be," she smiles. "I had so many different ideas, and I won't tell you what I came up with - because it's special - but it's very cool and I do get to use it a lot. I will tell you, though, that at first I really wanted a baseball bat with embellishments, and by embellishments, I don't mean glitter and shit. I mean nails."

There was a different kind of female empowerment in store for Adelaide actor and Home And Away alumnus Clementi, who plays Crystal on the third season of UnReal, which looks at the behind-the-scenes machinations on the fictional Bachelor-esque TV series 'Everlasting'.

Clementi's character is the new girlfriend of Everlasting creator Chet, played by Craig Bierko, and the sizeable age difference between the two prompts many people to view Crystal as, in Clementi's words, "his midlife crisis choice of partner".

Add to this the tension stemming from the romantic history between Chet and Everlasting's unscrupulous executive producer Quinn (Constance Zimmer), and the mood gradually reaches boiling point.

"Crystal is very friendly, maybe naively so," says Clementi. "She thinks Quinn will be a friend and maybe even a mentor... and of course she is wrong."

Wary of divulging possible spoilers, Clementi is guarded about discussing Crystal's part in the big picture of UnReal's new season. But she's is effusive when talking about what made her want in.

"A lot of what attracted me to Crystal was in fact UnReal itself, and the fact that it was created by two women and the two lead characters, Quinn and Rachel [played by Shiri Appleby], were so strong and complex," she says.

"In this current climate of the entertainment industry, and the world, calling for unity and change, it's so important to keep breaking barriers and creating strong, diverse, capable and real female characters... which is what UnReal has been doing from the start. Both Quinn and Rachel are multi-faceted, and I think film and television should accurately represent the diversity and quality of women in the real world - their strengths and their imperfections in all their glory."

Indeed, the strong female presence behind the scenes on UnReal, with series stars Zimmer and Appleby and series co-creator Sarah Gertrude Shapiro among the many women directing episodes this season, made it "my favourite production to have been a part of", says Clementi. "It was an incredibly safe and equitable set, with a lot of great women and men involved."

Ash Vs Evil Dead, Season 3, airs from 26 Feb, and UnReal, Season 3, airs from 27 Feb, on Stan