Deborah+Mailman

﻿(There's a bear in there; And a chair as well! If you know that tune, you'll probably recognise Deborah Mailman, who appeared on Play School numerous times.)

Deborah Mailman was born in Mount Isa on the fourteenth of July, 1972. She was one of four kids, with a Maori mother and Aboriginal father. She grew up at rodeo grounds fifteen kilometres out of Mount Isa - Aboriginal Kalkadoon country. The rodeo grounds had plenty of space, with horses and cattle. Mailman's father was a rodeo champion. He told her to be proud of being an Aboriginal, but she was still shy at school. Sometimes the kids called her a coconut - they thought she was black on the outside but white on the inside because they felt she had white values and beliefs. Because of this, Mailman didn't like school, and avoided it. She was also overweight, which mustn't've helped her self-esteem issues when she was teased. When she got to year nine, Mailman decided to take drama classes. She liked her teacher and the class. Deborah Mailman's first major role was Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz, while she was at high school. She graduated from Queensland University of Technology's Academy of the Arts in 1992.

Since then, she has been in Play School, hosted Message Stick and also acted in The Secret Life of Us, in which she played a non-Aboriginal character, and for which she won two Logies.

Deborah Mailman appeared in Bran Nue Dae and the televison series Offspring. She has been nominated for five Australian Film Institute awards (four of which she won) and was the first Aboriginal to win the Australian Film Institute award for Best Actress in a Leading Role, which she won for 'Nona' in Radiance. She also won two Deadly awards. Mailman appeared in the movie Rabbit-Proof Fence as 'Mavis' and participates in both theatre and film. She still has weight troubles. Deborah Mailman loves acting. I consider her a great role-model (especially for teenge girls) because she is living proof that even if you are overweight or culturally different, you can still be successful and widely loved. Aboriginals should consider her a good example, as should we all.