AusCelebs Forums

You almost expect Alan Fletcher, marathon TV medico, to have the obligatory stethoscope around his neck when he arrives for lunch. Even his two kids call him "Doctor Dad" and Fletcher himself has to remind himself every now and then – "I'm an actor, not a doctor". He's been fully employed in a daily job for over two decades as Dr Karl Kennedy on Neighbours – and, unlike many thespian unions, happily married. "Coming up for our 26th anniversary this year," he says. "But it is pretty easy with someone who's so adorable. And it IS my second marriage – you've got to practise."

His wife is Jennifer Hansen, former TV newsreader who is now doing breakfasts on Smooth FM radio. As it it happens, Hansen was launching her first novel, Making Headlines, at the Brighton Hotel the week after our lunch. I went along – there were former TV people everywhere and Fletcher was taking loads of photos with a professional camera. That's another string to his bow – he is an accomplished photographer. "I went to Iceland last January to take photos and found out half the population watches Neighbours," he says. Which opened up an opportunity for Fletcher's third skill – he is a singer with bands in Australia and in England. "So I took my band up there to Iceland and we had a very successful gig up there in the middle of winter," he says.

Fletcher's father, Ted, now 89, was an industrial chemist, as is his brother. Fletcher was heading that way too, with impressive marks in science, but in 1977 – when he set his sail for the rocky seas of showbiz – there was barely a parental ripple. Says Fletcher, 58: "That's because, as I found out later, my drama teacher at school had gone to dad and said that if I ever showed any interest in acting professionally, consider it seriously. So when I did, dad didn't utter a whisper. And by that stage my parents had separated and my mother, Ivy, was living in a commune in the Porongurup mountains in WA. Mum is a spiritualist. She taught me to be very independent and was completely chilled about me being an entertainer. 'Whatever you want to do, son'."

Fletcher moved out of the home in Perth when he was 17 and now, as a father, is watching his own children, Tom and Veronica, nearing that stage. "They are still at home," he says, "but Tom is very independent. He's just turned 18 and going to Melbourne Uni. Daughter Veronica is almost 21 and doing very well as an apprentice patisserie chef. They're the light of my life and I want to keep them close. But I'm a little bit of a helicopter parent I have to say."It was back in 1994 that Fletcher landed his role as Dr Karl – however the worldwide Neighbours fan club knows that was not his debut on the show. Six years earlier he had played mechanic Greg Cooper for three weeks. Even when he landed the role as Dr Karl it was only a one-year contract. That turned in to a daily job which is still going 22 years later.

He is heading off from this lunch to the daily shoot. "You learn your lines the night before," he says. "It's about maintaining a discipline. But it's not just about learning your lines, it's actually making sense of them in your own head because if not, they won't stick."As with all filming, the actor's lot is 80 per cent waiting around. "Actors often say the waiting is the thing they most remember about their career," he says. "A friend says he acts for free, he gets paid for the waiting. The hardest thing about the waiting is that someone is going to turn up and go: 'You're on'. And you have to be absolutely on the money. There's no warm-up time on Neighbours so you have to keep yourself in a state of agitation." The rock band he started in 2004 is called the Waiting Room for that reason – although the name also has convenient overtones of his other life as Dr Karl.

At which point it is time to get serious about lunch. "I have to say one of my favourites here is the prawn gyoza," says Fletcher, who knows his way around Riva restaurant. According to the menu it comes with sesame oil and soy dipping sauce so we team that up with entree-sized calamari and chilli mayonnaise. For mains, the TV doc chooses the healthy barramundi. "I always eat the porterhouse," he explains, "but I have to grow up and stop having the same thing over and over again."

His long innings as a TV doctor has cast an aura of medical expertise over Fletcher that he is the first to dismiss. "I actually have to be careful because I pick up medical stuff on the show and I don't even pretend to know anything in real life. If someone fell down here I would be asking someone else to perform CPR." Nevertheless, Fletcher's high profile – he has more than 45,000 Twitter followers for a start – has been useful in promoting men's health. Among other causes, he has taken on an ambassadorial role on bowel cancer because, he says, it is a "good luck story" even though it is the second-biggest cause of cancer death in Australia. "If you catch it early," he says, "more than 90 per cent of cases can be cured." An awareness campaign this month carries the slogan "Don't wait until it's too late". So the message from the TV doc is: set yourself a date each year and get a test. "It does not discriminate on age," he says.

Mental health has been another cause for "Dr Karl". With around 65 per cent of entertainers earning less than the average wage, there is a much higher level of depression among their ranks than in the general population. "Hours are erratic, in many cases entertainers earn less than $20,000 a year from the industry," Fletcher says. He is on the national performers committee of the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance and union rep for the Neighbors cast members.

In a role-model sense, Fletcher has also been a fair spruiker for happy marriage with his real-life wife Jennifer – and his TV wife Susan Kennedy (played by Jackie Woodburne) whom he once described as "the perfect woman – strong-willed, open-minded and great with the kids". Even Dr Karl's on-screen affair with a secretary some years ago provided a salutory lesson. As he told one magazine: "It was a really interesting storyline and almost Shakespearean, this notion of betrayal and guilt and what it does to people."

So, husband-times-two, union rep, photographer, actor, health spokesman – it must be a squeeze getting all those various interests into one life.

At the opening of the musical Ghost last weekend, I noticed Jennifer attended with friends – Alan was singing with the Mordialloc Jazz Orchestra at a local park. It was the third year he had done it – not a paid gig, just something he enjoys. "The goal is to be a triple-threat," he says. "Like Hugh Jackman – act, sing and dance. Hugh is extraordinary, of course, but look, I hold my own." This is not to say the road has been easy for Alan Fletcher. "Keeping your head together in this industry can be quite difficult," he says. "I've seen a lot of people suffer from it, I've suffered myself at times, anxiety, insecurity and so forth when I was younger. Ultimately you survive on the notion of who you are – your status as a performer, your skills."

If you want advice on arts and culture, Dr Karl's your man: "So often we hear these economic arguments – we need to pare back this, pare back that, because we can't afford it. And I just wonder what sort of world we are talking about. Where everyone tries to get as rich as possible, consume and die. The arts and culture are an important component of living. They promote wellbeing and give purpose to life."