Netflix‘s wildly popular Australian teen series Heartbreak High is getting ready for graduation. The show’s producers revealed last week that shooting has officially begun on the third and final season of the hit high school comedy-drama. To mark the occasion, The Hollywood Reporter visited the show’s Australian sets earlier this month to chat with the cast and creators about how they’re feeling as the kids of Hartley High prepare to say “goodbye” to school and “hello” to adulthood.
A remake of a hit Australian show from the 1990s, Heartbreak High famously follows a diverse group of students and teachers as they navigate teen romance, angst and the race and class tensions of contemporary Australian high school life. The show has become a phenomenon worldwide for Netflix, with the second season ranking on the company’s top-10 list of most-watched series in over 53 countries, spanning the U.K., Europe, Africa and Asia. It also won the international Emmy for best live-action kids show.
Heartbreak High famously shoots at a real-life Australian high school — Maroubra Bay High School in New South Wales — and on the day of THR’s set visit, the production had roped off and taken over approximately one-third of the school’s facilities, with a regular day of classes and activities in session everywhere else on campus. Despite the show’s popularity, the real Maroubra students were mostly indifferent to the now-famous teenage cast members prowling around their school between takes, having grown accustomed over the past few years to watching the mechanics of television production all around them.
Each season of Heartbreak High has been anchored by an overarching theme, according to executive producer Carly Heaton, and the final season will be no different. The first batch of episodes explored the issue of consent, while the second season took on the topic of toxic masculinity. Teasing the third season, the producer says each character’s arc will touch on the universal experience of standing at the precipice of adulthood as high school comes to a close — but with an Australian emphasis.
“It is really that coming-of-age story. We are really crossing that threshold with all of our beautiful cast from childhood to adulthood,” Heaton says. “The unique thing, I think, in Australia, is that idea that at 17 you have to pick a course at university — if you’re going to university — that is very specific and narrow. You don’t have that buffer, like you do in the U.K. or the States, of doing a generalist degree first. There’s a lot of fear and tension around those end-of-year exams everywhere around this country. And [the show portrays] how they deal with it — and [also asks], ‘do you need to have it all sorted out at that age?'”
Heaton adds: “And, of course, we’ll be giving a nice ending to all of our beautiful relationships in the show.”
Heartbreak High has impacted the careers of its young key cast — virtually all newcomers to big-budget series television — in a manner similar to the transformative passage of high school, Heaton adds.
“One of the most exciting things for us is we never anticipated the success of the show, she says. “You always strive to be part of the culture, and we’ve done that in a multitude of ways.”
The show has found special resonance on TikTok, with react videos and character fan edits racking up over 2 billion views under #HeartbreakHigh. Much of the social chatter has centered on the unique slang of Aussie teens too.
Heartbreak High‘s creator, Hannah Carol Chapman, consulted with the show’s young actors on everything from how they speak to where they envisioned their characters ending up.
“For the cast, it was also important to be able to tell a story and have input in their characters as well,” Heaton says. “Hannah really made sure that everything was authentic to that audience. I think that’s why it was just so well received. Because, you know, it wasn’t just someone guessing or presuming [how kids spoke] on a playground.”
Heartbreak High star Ayesha Madon, who plays Amerie, says she believes that some of the show’s freshness and authenticity stems from the fact that so many of the cast and crew were first-timers.
“We were all new, even some of the crew, and [our producer] Sarah Freeman. I feel like what was so cool — and why we had that lightning in a bottle moment here — was because [the creators] were willing to take a chance on new talent,” Madon says. “For a lot of the cast, it was our first role and we almost learned to act on camera, which was so vulnerable but amazing.”
“Heartbreak High has been a learning experience for us,” adds co-star James Majoos, who plays Darren. “We’re graduating with these characters and moving on into the unknown, and I think there’s a lot of that uncertainty that we can bring into this season.”
Majoos adds: “It’s been really special and I think we’re never going to have another job like this… We’re such a close ensemble cast, and it’s really set the standard, I think, for whatever the next job will be.”
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