SPOILER ALERT: This interview contains major spoilers from “Untamed,” now streaming on Netflix.
Eric Bana wouldn’t mind a change of pace in his more than 30-year career.
Known for high-stakes drama and action movies such as “Black Hawk Down,” “Troy,” “Hulk” and “Munich,” most don’t know — or have forgotten — that the 56-year-old actor started in comedy.
Along with starring in the sketch comedy series “Full Frontal” in the mid-1990s in his native Australia, he also hosted a short-lived talk show, “The Eric Bana Show Live.”
“Most of what I get sent is quite dark and dramatic, and I’ve really enjoyed doing the lighter stuff when it comes along,” Bana tells me during an appearance on the “Just for Variety” podcast. “So it would be fun to do more lighthearted stuff for sure, but it doesn’t grow on trees on my desk. There’s a lot of darkness on my desk.”
In his latest project, Netflix’s thriller series, “Untamed,” he stars as Kyle Turner, a horse riding special agent for the National Park Service investigating the death of woman who dies after falling off of El Capitan in Yosemite National Park.
The six-episode murder mystery finds Kyle being haunted by his past while battling a drinking problem and his complicated relationship with his ex-wife Jill (Rosemarie DeWitt). The cast also includes Sam Neill as Kyle’s boss and best friend and Lily Santiago as a former Los Angeles police officer who moves to the mountain to work for the park service.
In her review of the series, Variety TV critic Aramide Tinubu praised the “deeply layered and gripping” show and described Bana’s work as “exceptional.”
This Q&A has been edited for length and clarity. Listen to the full conversation on “Just for Variety” above or wherever you find your favorite podcasts.
How did you get involved with “Untamed”?
I got involved quite some time ago. I was sent the script back in 2019. I read it and loved it. I just thought it was such a fantastic combination of the thriller genre, the suspense, the murder mystery, but most importantly in the most incredible setting. I think the idea of following someone who’s trying to solve a crime, knocking on doors and driving a car, I’ve seen that so many times. To see someone in a national park do it on a horse just seems so much more interesting and much more fun to do. I just really loved the character of Kyle Turner. I attached myself immediately. I just got the elbows out and said, “Can we make this happen? And can I be Kyle and what do we need to do?
Did you film in Yosemite?
No, we filmed in British Columbia. We couldn’t get the kind of access that we would’ve needed, particularly in summer to Yosemite. So we stitched a lot of things together and we were in a beautiful, beautiful part of Canada. Just absolutely stunning.
What’s it like acting with a horse?
Oh my God, he was such a sweetheart. I wanted to steal him and take him home, but he was beyond my luggage allocation, most certainly. Pippin his name was. I fell in love with him straight away. He was kind of like my best mate on the shoot. You just are pinching yourself when you’re on a horse every day or every second or third day out in the mountains, breathing in the fresh air, playing a kind of dream role. I’ve obviously ridden before and ridden in other roles, but I hadn’t ridden in this kind of terrain on film, so that was really, really special.
You first learned how to ride horses when you did “Troy”?
That’s correct. It was quite different because they amazingly let us ride bareback and without stirrups on that film. I found it quite different some years after that I did “The Other Boleyn Girl” and was back on a horse in a traditional saddle and stirrup. I found it quite limiting. It was almost like a, “Hang on, what are these things for?” So every horse you ride in a different country, I find the styles a bit different. The way that you control the horse is very subtly different.
When you were reading the script for “Untamed,” are you like, “Oh, I did not see that coming?”
I’m trying to remember how much Mark had told me beforehand because when we signed on we only had the first episode written. It took us a long time to go from episode one to “Here’s the green light, off you go.” It took many, many years. The second episode would come in and then Mark would go off and work on another project and come back and start working on the next. I knew there were going to be some really clever twists and turns, so I didn’t underestimate him, but I was pretty blown away. I was thrilled with the journey of the character and the story and the twists and turns and the opportunities within the rest of the cast to have all these amazing characters and amazing actors as well.
Your character is grieving the death of his very young son. How hard is that as a dad to go there mentally, emotionally?
They’re always difficult. I mean, they’re easy in a way, how can I put it? It’s like they’re easy because they’re difficult. Some of those things when they’re well-written and when you read them and when you are moved as an audience member or as the reader, you realize, well, this is not going to be difficult. It’s going to be sad, it’s going to be uncomfortable, but it’s not going to be difficult. I always found it very, very moving, and it’s a real privilege as an actor when you read something, you think, “Oh, I’m going to go on a little journey here, and it’s going to be a little bumpy and it’s going to hurt a little bit, but that’s fine. That’s part of the job.” It’s a huge privilege to be given that opportunity by the writer. It’s like, “OK, I’m going to become your guy, so I better be good.” Because you’ve done this character justice on the page, now we’re going to have to make him work on camera. There’s always that fear that you’ve got to live up to what the writer has in mind.
Do you ever watch clips from your talk show?
I don’t remember much about that because that was just a brief second. But the sketch comedy show that I worked on for a long time, I do think about that a lot, only because that’s just kind of how my brain works. Even today when I’m reading a script, it’s like I’m reading the drama, but my brain works as a sketch comedy performer writer. Whether I’m meeting someone for the first time, whether I’m observing people, whether I’m breaking down a script, I see things in sketches. I can’t change the wiring. There’s plenty of times where I’ve been on set and I have to remind myself that, “Oh, it’s the real deal. We’re not doing a sketch of a movie now. This really is ancient Troy and I’m on a horse, we’re not taking the mickey out of some guy being on a film set.”
Was there moment in your career when you said, “I’m going to make it in the business.”
Never. It was never really a thing for me because I never had any expectations. I always had short-term plans, like six to 12 months, two years. I never looked down the road. Had I done that, I would never have had the career that I’ve had. I would’ve failed dismally because I would’ve made choices that would’ve derailed me along the way. I think if you’ve got stars in your eyes, you can come unstuck pretty quickly.
Was there ever a time when you told your team, “Remember comedy, hello?”
No. In fact, I’m probably as much to blame because I remember when things started to go well, I was like, “You know what? The last thing I want to do is try and prove people wrong. I don’t have the energy to try and convince them that I can be fun. It’s like I’ve done that.” I was actually quite burnt out of comedy by the time I came here to do drama. So there was no part of me that was like, “Oh, I got to show them this. I got to show them I can juggle. Goddammit, they don’t know I can juggle.”
Will there be an “Untamed” Season 2?
We’ll have to wait and see.
Have you guys discussed it?
We spoke about what would happen to Kyle after this, in theory. So you never know.
What did you think when it was revealed that Jill hired someone [to kill their son’s abuser]?
It’s Rosemarie DeWitt. I just thought it was so fantastic and her performance in that episode is just so good.
When she says to her husband, “There’s something I got to tell you and it may change everything.”
I thought that was very powerful. I love the fact that it was her doing and not Kyle’s, right? It’s a great little twist, it’s just like, “What? Really?”