Kate and Annie take charge in Ten Pound Poms Season 2

Ten Pound Poms Season 2 takes us back to 1957, with a group of people who left post-war austerity Britain for the promise of work and land in sunny Australia – for the mere cost of a £10 ship ticket (£350 or R8 250 in today’s money). It was meant to be a fresh start for Annie Roberts (Faye Marsay) and her children Pattie (Hattie Hook) and Peter (Finn Treacy), and hopefully an end to her husband Terry (Warren Brown) wasting his wages at the pub. For nurse Kate Thorne (Michelle Keegan) it was a chance to find her missing son Michael (Alastair Bradman), who was taken from her by the Catholic church’s care system, and adopted by an Australian family without her knowledge. But what waited for them after six weeks at sea was a pack of lies and hardship, hidden behind the cheerful pamphlets and posters. 

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Watch the trailer for Ten Pound Poms Season 2

As a wrap-up to Women’s Month, Michelle Keegan and Faye Marsay gave us a sneak peek at what to expect from Kate and Annie’s storylines – and women helping women – in Ten Pound Poms Season 2. “Kate leant on Annie a lot throughout in series one; Annie was there as a confidante and a best friend, and Kate really valued Annie’s friendship, especially as she came to Australia on her own. This series though we see Annie lean on Kate more when she shares a big secret with her in confidence, it’s something that she’s never told anyone before and really shows how she has so much trust in Kate,” hints Michelle. Annie will need Kate’s expertise, too, when Pattie, as a single mom, winds up in a similar situation to Kate.

What about Kate?

Kate in Ten Pound Poms S2

“My favourite thing about Kate is that she has no fear – she fights for what she believes is right and even being a woman in the 1950s can't stop her!” says Michelle. “This season is really about Kate trying to expose the fact that her and her son have been separated against her wishes, which happened to so many families and to so many women in the 1950s, it's absolutely heartbreaking. Kate is not just trying to help herself and Michael, but she wants to help others as well and put a stop to families being unnecessarily separated.” 

“We saw Kate go through so much in the first series, so the piece of advice I would give to her going into series two is ‘Don’t be so reckless, your actions do have consequences and although you feel what you are doing is right as a mother, those actions also affect your son Michael as well as the people around him.’ Kate needs to think more before she acts,” warns Michelle. And as we see Kate stealing another woman’s identification papers so she can kidnap Michael and run away to New Zealand in Season 2, episode 1, it seems Kate really does need to check her impulses … or talk to Annie, fast! 

Despite all Kate’s struggles, though, Australia’s beauty touches her. “We’ve returned to the camp Galgownie location in Scheyville, which is an hour and a half drive each morning from Sydney, but it's worth it because it’s so beautiful,” says Michelle. “We've filmed a lot around Sydney, but my favourite location this season has to be the Blue Mountains. I've seen so many photographs, but when you experience them in real life, the scenery is just breathtaking. We filmed really high up on a cliffside that overlooked the landscape – it was definitely a pinch me moment! If it wasn't for Ten Pound Poms, I probably wouldn't ever have travelled to Australia because it's so far from the UK.”

Kate’s reawakening comes through in her wardrobe, too. “We’ve got an amazing costume team who obviously do a lot of research before we start filming,” says Michelle. “Kate wore a lot of men's clothes in the first season and she was quite dowdy; she didn't want to put herself on show in any way because she wanted to blend into the background. This season, we’ll see a much more traditionally feminine side to Kate – she's wearing dresses a little more, and she’s in heeled shoes. My favourite costume is the pink dress Kate wears in the ‘not Christmas Party’ scene with Robbie (Nic English); it’s the first time we've seen Kate in pink, and that scene is such fun – it's great to play Kate having a good time. She’s been on an emotional journey since she’s been in Australia, so it’s nice for her to let her hair down, have a laugh and just have fun.”

Annie is a bikini granny!

Annie in Ten Pound Poms S2

“Ten Pound Poms Season two brings a massive change for the Roberts family,” says Faye. “We have a new addition in baby Mary, Pattie’s daughter, so for the whole family it's about adjusting to this part of their life that wasn’t the plan. Annie thought she was finished raising young children, and could move forward and propel her career and her sense of independence. But now Annie and Terry are tackling the kind of restrictions that a new baby in the family brings, with Pattie being a young, single woman in the 1950s,” reveals Faye. 

As we saw in Season 1, though, Annie has exactly the pioneer community spirit that her family needs to survive Down Under. And this season she’s not stopping at organising peaceful protests (it’s not her fault it turned into a riot); she’s here to take down the system. “Annie's major journey throughout this season is about her trying to establish herself as independent and the breadwinner of the family,” reveals Faye. “She wants to have a successful job. She wants to have a successful business. She wants to expand the experiences that she's privy to, being a woman in 1957 – like wearing a bikini and running Marlene’s store – totally new experiences for women. Annie's ultimately trying to carve out a place where she feels valued away from the family unit and her identity as a mother, grandmother and a wife.”

While Kate’s exploring her new life in a dress, her bestie Annie is stripping down! “Wearing bikinis was banned in Australia for most of the 1950s,” explains Faye. “Women were given fines on beaches in Australia for wearing them because they showed too much flesh. Meanwhile, men could be in their trunks, almost completely naked, and that was acceptable. For Annie, that double standard is unfair. Her view is that people should be able to express themselves however they like and so she advocates for that and bravely puts herself out there – which is quite a gutsy thing to do.”

Kate and Annie in Ten Pound Poms

What makes Annie and Kate’s friendship so important to them is finding a kindred spirit who’s kicking back against the world they grew up in, and the demands of their society that just seem wrong to them. “I don’t think any of these challenges break down Annie’s rebellious streak, they only serve to ignite her frustrations and she sees injustice everywhere,” says Faye. “She's just lived through a World War; she feels life truly needs to be lived and needs to mean something. She is at the forefront of women trying to take control of their destiny.”

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