Bridie McKim and Yazeed Daher on Playing "Positive" (and "Hormonal") Teens on "The Heights"

"It’s quite a cathartic experience."

Bridie McKim and Yazeed Daher aren’t students anymore, but they still play them on TV.

NIDA graduate McKim stars as Sabine in the ABC’s soap The Heights, a character she describes as “a sassy, sassy teenager who’s living her best life”. Secondary to that, Sabine, like McKim, has cerebral palsy. But even more key to the character is how she "always manages to get up to mischief".

Daher plays Cam, "a hardworking kid… trying to make a better life for him and his [refugee] family". He was also recently seen in SBS’ acclaimed series The Hunting as a troubled teen who gets caught up in a case of image-based abuse.

Together, they’re just a few of the students in the world of The Heights, which follows a diverse community within a fast-gentrifying suburb, with Cam’s family in a crowded apartment and Sabine living in a larger space with her mum (Roz Hammond).

Student Edge caught up with Bridie and Yazeed on set as they filmed Season 2, to find out what life’s like for young actors who (at least for now) have to keep pretending they’re still at school.

"I think it’s so easy to get into the mindset of an angsty teen," Bridie says of her first professional gig.

"[Sabine’s] always annoyed and always angry, because she’s a teenager and hormonal. But I remember being a teen and I think [that's] because I get quite overexcited about things, and I think sometimes teens innately do [as well], because they’re experiencing things for the first time.

"She doesn’t have a chip on her shoulder, even though she could and a lot of teens have—and she does a little bit, because she’s human. But that sense of experiencing things for the first time and being open to it, and also trying to be an adult—feeling like you’re an adult when you’re not an adult, I think is an innate teenage experience."

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McKim reckons The Heights is a particularly strong show when it comes to teenage representation, which makes things easier for her and the other young performers.

"The teens in The Heights, they’re positive influences on each other," she says.

"None of them are perfect, which is amazing, because none of us are, but they’re positive people and they want the most out of life and they want the best out of each other. I find it really wholesome and really lovely."

There’s another reason McKim has a ball playing Sabine.

"She’s so cool and so sassy, so it’s quite a cathartic experience," she laughs.

"She’s 16. I’m 22. She’s got quite an interesting dramatic life. I kind of live vicariously through her sometimes, because she’s just a bit of a badass."

Daher, however, finds he ends up relying on previous life experiences to play Cam.

"It’s a strange sort of vibe to be in, because obviously it is very unnatural [to play a teen again], and you’re trying to make a natural performance," he says.

"I like to use events that have happened to me to personalise the character. 'What would I do in this situation if I was the character?'"

However, in one way, Yazeed is still in student mode in real life too.

"I’m very much of a crammer as well [when] learning dialogue," he says.

"It’s usually the night before that I learn my dialogue. That’s sort of my process."

The Heights returns to the ABC and iView on 12 March 2020, airing Thursdays at 8pm.

Header Image: ABC