John Jarratt

John Jarratt (born 5 August 1952) is an Australian television film actor, producer and director and TV presenter who rose to fame through his work in the Australian New Wave. He has appeared in a number of film roles including Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975), Summer City (1977), The Odd Angry Shot (1979), We of the Never Never (1982), Next of Kin (1982), Wolf Creek and Dark Age (1987). He portrayed the antagonist Mick Taylor in the Wolf Creek franchise. He voiced the protagonist's father, Jack Hunter, in an audio drama adaptation of The Phoenix Files. He is also known for his recurring role in the drama series McLeod's Daughters.

John Jarratt
Jarratt at the Sydney premiere of Man of Steel, 24 June 2013
Born	5 August 1952 Wongawilli, Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia
Occupation	Actor film producer film director TV presenter
Years active	1975–present
Spouse(s)	Rosa Miano ​ ​ (m. 1974; div. 1988)​ Noni Hazlehurst ​ ​ (m. 1988; div. 1999)​ Cody Jarrett ​ ​ (m. 2005; separated 2011)​ Rosa Miano ​ (m. 2017)​
Children	6

Early life

Jarratt was born in the Wollongong suburb of Wongawilli, New South Wales where he would grow up, and would later move to the Snowy Mountains area.[1] Jarratt's father was a coal miner, and later a concreter working on the Snowy Mountains Hydro-Electric Scheme. Jarratt comes from a family of Irish Catholic descent; however, his patrilineal ancestor George Jarratt, born 1833, came from Croxton in Cambridgeshire, England. George's son John married Mary Kelly from Ireland. On the genealogy show Who Do You Think You Are?, Jarratt confirmed that his great-great-grandfather was Chinese.[2]

While in high school, Jarratt directed and acted in a school play which was a great success and led to his school principal recommending that he pursue an acting career.[1]

Career

Early work

Jarratt graduated from the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) in 1973. His screen debut was in The Great Macarthy (1975). He also appeared in Peter Weir's Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975) and Summer City (1977) with Mel Gibson. Jarratt had the lead role in the 1979 mini series The Last Outlaw playing Ned Kelly. He played a major supporting role as a young Australian soldier in Vietnam War movie The Odd Angry Shot (1980) and We of the Never Never (1982). In the late 1980s, Jarratt recognised he had a problem with binge-drinking and related violence. He joined Alcoholics Anonymous, an organisation in which he continues to be active.[1]

Television

In the 1990s, Jarratt was a presenter on the lifestyle show Better Homes and Gardens with then-wife Noni Hazlehurst. He had guest roles in Inspector Morse, Police Rescue, Blue Murder, Water Rats and Blue Heelers in the 1990s and 2000s. He joined the cast of McLeod's Daughters in 2001, and left the show in 2006. In 2010, Jarratt appeared in a commercial for Husqvarna.

In May 2013, Jarratt filmed a guest star role in the third instalment of the ABC telemovie series, Jack Irish: Dead Point.[3]

Return to cinema

In 2005, Jarratt had a major role in the Australian film Wolf Creek, playing the villain Mick Taylor.[4] In 2007, he appeared in two films, Rogue and The Final Winter. Jarratt also had a small role in the 2008 film, Australia, as a soldier.

In 2008, Jarratt launched his own film production company, Winnah Films. Winnah's first feature film, Savages Crossing (originally carrying the working title Flood) went into principal photography outside Ipswich, Queensland in February. In 2009, he appears as the father of a teenage girl via phone in Telstra's "Next G" commercials.[5]

In 2010, Jarratt starred in the ensemble exploitation extravaganza, Bad Behaviour, written and directed by Joseph Sims.[6] In the same year, Jarratt also had a role in the supernatural horror movie Needle.

He made a cameo in Quentin Tarantino's Django Unchained in 2012, appearing as an employee of the Le Quint Dickie Mining Company alongside Tarantino himself, both appearing with Australian accents.

In February 2013, Jarratt reprised his role as Mick Taylor, filming the Wolf Creek sequel, Wolf Creek 2, with Matt Hearn producing and Greg McLean directing. The film was released on 20 February 2014[7]

In January 2014, a new thriller called StalkHer began filming on the Gold Coast, Queensland.[8] The film is co-directed with Kaarin Fairfax by Jarratt, who also stars in the production.[9] The producer of the film is 'OZPIX', a production company partly owned by Jarratt.[10] Filming was completed in February 2014, and screened later in the year.[11][12]

On 1 October 2015, Jarratt released his autobiography, The Bastard from the Bush.[13] On 19 October, a six-part television adaptation of Wolf Creek was announced, with Jarratt reprising his role as Mick Taylor. It was commissioned by streaming company Stan and was released on 12 May 2016.[14] Jarratt returned to audio drama work, after working for the ABC in the 1970s to co-star in Benjamin Maio Mackay's adaptation of The Phoenix Files in 2017. The first two instalments were released across 2017 and 2018, but as of August 26 Jarratt is no longer listed as being involved with the project.[15]

Personal life

Jarratt has been married four times. With his first wife, Rosa Miano, he had two children, Zadia and Ebony. He was married to actress Noni Hazlehurst,[16] with whom he had two more children, Charlie and William. In 2005 he married Cody Jarrett, whom he met as a producer on Better Homes and Gardens, and had a further two boys, Jackson and Riley. Cody and John separated in late 2011. He is now remarried to his first wife.

Jarratt is now living in Doonan on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, after living in the Blue Mountains, New South Wales.

Legal issues

In August 2007, Jarratt filed a lawsuit against the Seven Network over a story which ran on the current affairs show Today Tonight. He claimed the story defamed him. The story told of Jarratt in a dispute with his tenant and how he had made attempts to intimidate and evict the tenant.[17] The story accused Jarratt of echoing his character Mick Taylor from the film Wolf Creek in his intimidation, described an answering machine message left by him to his tenant saying "I have always been a winner - a winner". A lawyer for Seven told the court that the story had not portrayed Jarratt as a "psychopathic killer". The case was adjourned until 12 October 2007.[18]

On 25 August 2018, Jarratt was charged with rape after a woman came forward to report an alleged 1976 incident.[19] Jarratt pleaded not guilty and his trial began on 1 July 2019. After a five-day trial, Jarratt was found not guilty on 5 July 2019.[20] After his acquittal, Jarratt launched a lawsuit against the Daily Telegraph over their reporting of his case. He dropped the case after a month, but then restarted it after the Telegraph posted an article saying that he "got away with rape." The suit was settled out of court on 22 December 2019, with the Telegraph posting an apology on their website.[21]

Filmography

Year	Film	Role	Notes
1975	The Great Macarthy	Macarthy
	Picnic at Hanging Rock	Albert Crundall
1977	Summer City	Sandy
	The Sound of Love	David
1978	Blue Fin	Sam Snell
	Little Boy Lost	Vic Tanner
1979	The Odd Angry Shot	Bill
1980	The Last Outlaw	Edward 'Ned' Kelly
1982	We of the Never Never	Dandy
	Next of Kin	Barney
	Fluteman	Fluteman
1984	The Settlement	Tommy Martin
1985	The Naked Country	Mick Conrad
1987	Dark Age	Steve Harris
	Fields of Fire	Jacko
	Australian Dream	Todd
1988	Top Enders	Jack
	Fields of Fire II	Jacko
1989	Fields of Fire III
1991	Inspector Morse (TV Series)	Sergeant Scott Humphries	Episode: Promised Land
1995	All Men Are Liars	Barry
1996	Dead Heart	Charlie
2001–07	McLeod's Daughters	Terry Dodge
2005	Wolf Creek	Mick Taylor
2007	Rogue	Russell
	The Final Winter	Colgate
2008	Australia	Sergeant
	Not Quite Hollywood: The Wild, Untold Story of Ozploitation!	Himself	Documentary
2010	Needle	Paul the Coroner
	Bad Behaviour	Ricky
2011	Savages Crossing	Phil
2012	Django Unchained	Le-Quint Dickey Mining Company Employee
	Shiver	Franklin Rood
2013	Wolf Creek 2	Mick Taylor
	100 Bloody Acres	Burke
2014	Jack Irish: Dead Point	Sen. Sgt Laurie Olsen
2015	Frenzy	Benjiman Lightbriger
2015	StalkHer	Jack	Also co-director.[9] Produced by OZPIX (Jarratt is a part-owner).[10]
2016–	Wolf Creek	Mick Taylor	TV series 2 Seasons
2018	Boar	Ken
2022	Wolf Creek 3	Mick Taylor	In-Development

References

1. "Interview with John Jarratt". Australian Story. 21 October 2005. Retrieved 4 June 2014.
2. Dolle, Kiri Ten. "John Jarratt uncovers skeletons in family's closet". Sunshine Coast Daily.
3. Jarratt digs in his nice heels | The Age 7 June 2013. Retrieved 12 June 2013
4. "BBC - Movies - interview - John Jarratt". www.bbc.co.uk.
5. "Wolf at the Door". 24 October 2005 – via www.abc.net.au.
6. Moore, Debi (27 March 2013). "Hannibal Cooks Up Some New Stills from Episode 1.02 – Amuse-Bouche". Dread Central.
7. Outback serial killer takes the Mickey | The Age 9 February 2013. Retrieved 12 June 2013 Archived 5 June 2013 at the Wayback Machine
8. "STALKHER".
9. Bochenski, Natalie (27 January 2014). "Wolf Creek star directing new thriller on Gold Coast". Sydney Morning Herald. Fairfax Media. Retrieved 24 February 2014.
10. Russo, Caroline (15 August 2014). "John Jarratt to direct and act in GC film Stalkher". Hush Hush Biz. Hush Hush Gossip. Retrieved 24 February 2014.
11. Potts, Andrew (7 February 2014). "Aussie actor John Jarratt has been filming his latest film StalkHer at Alamanda Private Hospital". Gold Coast Bulletin. News Ltd. Retrieved 24 February 2014.
12. "John Jarratt's Directorial Debut StalkHer Gets a Poster". Dread Central. 30 December 2014.
13. Jameson, Julietta (21 August 2015). "Five places that made me: Actor John Jarratt". Traveller.com.au. Retrieved 20 October 2015.
14. Thomas, Sarah (19 October 2015). "Wolf Creek TV adaptation under way with John Jarratt, Lucy Fry and Deborah Mailman". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 20 October 2015.
15. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 10 May 2017. Retrieved 11 June 2017.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
16. "John Jarratt - Interview : Wolf Creek : Movies : Entertainment : Web Wombat". www.webwombat.com.au.
17. "Jarratt sues Channel Seven over 'killer portrayal'". ABC News. 14 August 2007. Retrieved 18 November 2017.
18. Braithwaite, Alyssa (14 August 2007). "John Jarratt sues Today Tonight". The Courier-Mail. Retrieved 18 November 2017.
19. "John Jarratt, Wolf Creek star, charged over rape allegation from 1970s". ABC News. 25 August 2018. Retrieved 1 July 2019.
20. Press, Australian Associated (5 July 2019). "Actor John Jarratt found not guilty of rape" – via www.theguardian.com.
21. Whitbourn, Michaela. "John Jarratt settles defamation case against The Daily Telegraph". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 17 January 2021.

External links

• John Jarratt at IMDb
• John Jarratt's Film Oz Profile