Jack Thompson on David Bowie, the climate crisis and posing nude: ‘I didn’t need persuading’

‘I was appalled by the black summer fires. It was devastating’: Jack Thompson. Photograph: supplied by National Geographic

Before he became one of Australia’s best-loved actors, Jack Thompson had already been many things. At the age of 15, he became a jackaroo in the Northern Territory, working on the remote cattle station of Elkedra. There, he says, he observed a life that no longer exists. At camp, he was the only white person among the adult Alyawarra men.

It was fine preparation for his cinematic work in the 1970s and early 80s when he became an icon of the Australian New Wave, taking leading and supporting roles in classics including Sunday Too Far Away (1975), The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith (1978), Breaker Morant (1980) and The Man from Snowy River (1982).