Aloha! Summer Bay holiday

12 years ago Cameron Welsh started with Home and Away as an actor in the role of Mitch McColl. After rising through the ranks he has now been Series Producer for five years.

This week as the Seven soap whisks its viewers off to a three-episode Hawaiian wedding,  he promises more of the show’s teenage passion but with a more alluring setting.

“We tried to capture the romance and beauty of Hawaii. By taking the characters of Romeo (Luke Mitchell) and Indi (Samara Weaving), who are gorgeous young things, and placing them in that environment it lent itself to being a romantic story,” he says.

“The premise is Romeo and Roo (Georgie Parker) go to Hawaii for a tourism expo and Romeo brings Indi along and they get a bit swept up in the place and decide to get married. Roo lets Sid (Robert Mammone) know and he decides to drop everything to try and stop them. So I guess the question is will he be able to get there in time?”

The production drew upon local crews to capture the scenes, many of which contrast to the usually-isolated shoots the show enjoys in Australia.

“Because we shoot so much on empty beaches, shooting in Waikiki you had never seen so many people in such a small space,” he laughs.

“We had to employ Honolulu police to run a bit of security for us. There were some complicated sequences where we had to lock-down some blocks of traffic at rush hour.”

One city sequence even saw them fighting for space with the crew from Hawaii Five-0.

“We were shooting in a building in the city and they use a building next door. And that was the day they decided to get their helicopter stock shots of it. So we were trying to shoot and this helicopter kept circling for an hour, wreaking havoc,” he says.

“Oahu is a small island and it’s probably not got quite enough to sustain a fulltime industry, so some of our crew were working with us and the next day working on Hawaii Five-0. So there was a bit of crew sharing.

“They’ve had a number of series in a row and just when it looked like they might be in trouble, Hawaii Five-0 came along and secured a bit more work for everybody.”

But while there was no sign of Alex O’Loughlin, Welsh did bump into another Aussie, who happened to be one of Summer Bay’s many international graduates, Nick Bishop, currently appearing in the Dana Delaney drama Body of Proof.

“I saw him sitting quietly in a Laundromat but I thought, ‘There’s no way Nick would be in Hawaii.’ Later that night I was at a bar and sure enough in he walks,” says Welsh.

“He was on a break and just happened to be there on holidays.

“He was very surprised to see us there!”

Now in its 23rd year, Home and Away continues to deliver for Seven in terms of ratings and media attention. The show has been a springboard for many careers and is a staple of soap magazines, frequently leading to numerous Logie Awards.

Welsh says the show still has the original premise of foster children at the centre of its universe.

“The heart of the show is about youth and teenagers who are growing up in what is an uncertain world and they seek the guidance of the people around them. So people like Alf, Irene, Roo are there to help steer them around,” he says.

“I like the idea when Home and Away started of foster children coming in a bit damaged and spending a few years in Summer Bay and then going out the other side put back together again, and I think it still applies.

“We still see young characters coming in with troubled pasts and they spend time in Summer Bay and come out of it with a better experience. So I think that still holds.”

In recent years the show attracted some attention for its darker storylines with serial killers and a criminal element in its PG timeslot.

“I think that was true of a couple of years ago. It did get particularly dark. All that I have described was going on but it was probably taking a bit of a backseat to some darker storytelling,” Welsh admits.

“But last year and definitely this year we looked to turn that around, and we got the focus back onto characters and relationships and pulled back on that stuff. This season has seen a lot of the River boys and yes they are a bunch of rogues, but it’s a different tone to the crazed gunmen and stalkers. They still provide a sense of danger and can be antagonists but not at the same tonal level.”

Later this year the show will a feature a week in which a major storm hits Summer Bay and Welsh promises “life and death stuff” for the annual cliffhanger.

Meanwhile he admits to taking a look at the latest competition, The Block on Nine, with surprisingly generous words.

“I only saw the second half hour of the first episode. It’s obviously a well-made show and I get into those shows because I’m going through some renovations at the moment. My wife particularly loves those kinds of shows. So I have to say yes, we got into it,” he says.

“It’s going to be tough competition for however long The Block is there.”

Home and Away‘s Hawaiian episodes air 7pm Monday-Wednesday on Seven.