Yahoo Lifestyle ‘Apple Cider Vinegar’ Stars Kaitlyn Dever and Alycia Debnam-Carey on Belle Gibson’s ‘Captivating’ Cancer Scam and How Dever Nailed That Australian Accent
SPOILER ALERT: This interview contains spoilers from “Apple Cider Vinegar,” now streaming on Netflix.
Stories about American scammers have proliferated the true-crime genre in recent years — Amanda Seyfried won an Emmy for portraying Elizabeth Holmes in Hulu’s “The Dropout,” Julia Garner played Anna Delvey in Netflix’s “Inventing Anna,” and Jared Leto and Anne Hathaway starred as Adam and Rebekah Neumann in Apple TV+’s “WeCrashed.” Now, a new Netflix miniseries from Down Under is looking to export a story that once dominated Australian pop culture in the 2010s to the rest of the world.
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“Apple Cider Vinegar,” which premiered on Feb. 6, stars Kaitlyn Dever as Belle Gibson, the disgraced Australian wellness influencer who claimed to have cured her terminal brain cancer through health and wellness. But, as it turns out, Belle had never actually been diagnosed with — and therefore had never been cured of — the malignant brain tumor that she had used to shamelessly build her online brand, which included an online blog and a cookbook, resulting in millions of Instagram followers.
Inspired by the nonfiction book “The Woman Who Fooled the World: The True Story of Fake Wellness Guru Belle Gibson,” and created by Samantha Strauss, this stranger-than-fiction series paints Gibson as a mess of contradictions: a master manipulator and compulsive liar whose narcissistic tendencies stem from a difficult childhood with an emotionally distant mother. “Fear the Walking Dead” star Alycia Debnam-Carey plays Gibson’s idol-turned-nemesis Milla Blake — a fictional character inspired by Jess Ainscough, the first Australian alternative medicine influencer or so-called “wellness warrior,” who died of her untreated cancer at the age of 29.
Over the course of six episodes, “Apple Cider Vinegar” follows the parallel stories of Gibson and Blake, with each searching desperately for something that the other seems to have. While Gibson longs for the intimate sense of community that Blake was able to foster with her online followers, Blake — who unsuccessfully turns to alternative medicine to avoid treating cancer in her arm, and ultimately ends up killing not only herself but also her gravely ill mother — cannot help but feel miffed when Gibson begins to supplant her in the online wellness space.
Below, on a joint video call with Variety, Dever and Debnam-Carey discuss the contrasting ways that they approached this retelling of Gibson’s story, how they both felt about the Phoenix-born Dever’s Australian accent — and how they have navigated the inevitable attention and scrutiny that comes with being part of major franchises with rabid fandoms.
What kind of relationship, if any, did you have with Belle Gibson’s story prior to signing on to this project? And when you did sign on, what new insights did you think could be gleaned from this fictionalized take on yet another scammer story?
Kaitlyn Dever: I didn’t know anything about Belle Gibson really at all. I knew a lot about the wellness industry and was quite obsessed with it, because my mom had Stage 4 breast cancer for many years and passed away last year. And for the last three years of her life, I became very interested in the wellness world, just because I was looking for other options outside of her conventional therapies that she was doing. But when this story came into my life, it was crazy timing just because I knew so much about the wellness world itself, and I followed so many people on Instagram that were similar to Belle and similar to Alicia’s character, Milla.
Belle’s story is obviously so gripping and so fascinating, and it’s just crazy what she was able to do and her reach. What she did was terrible. But I guess what was surprising in reading Sam’s take on it — we were just doing a fictionalized version of Belle Gibson, pretty much the whole shoot — we were calling her “Our Belle.” This story takes so many twists and turns, and I did learn so much about her, but I guess the whole thing is really just shocking. But I think the more that you unravel and peel back the layers, you discover more about her childhood and how complicated her upbringing was. She was a person that was struggling; she was a type of person that just really was craving community, family and love. I guess that was the most surprising part of Sam’s storytelling. I was really learning about Belle as I went and as I studied her for the role.
Alycia Debnam-Carey: I’m born and raised in Australia, and it was a very Australian story, so my experience was quite different. I knew a lot about Belle Gibson in the sense that she was a huge media figure here. She was incredibly impressive, and she was the era of Girl Boss, in that early social media Instagram world. It was extraordinary watching her rise. She was able to accomplish so much with her book being published, the blog, and raising money for cancer, and then obviously her app on the first-ever Apple Watch. It was an incredible rise, but of course, it was this captivating scammer story.
So watching that rise and fall from a very regional local perspective was fascinating. I think a lot of Australians are very familiar with Belle’s story, and have since then always wondered what happened and the fallout and how it all came to be. I remember Kaitlyn and I both talking about this “60 Minutes” interview that she did, and it was a really iconic moment. And that scene that Kaitlyn did an exceptional job of recreating is burned into my memory as a kid watching that — with her pink fuzzy sweater and the glossy lips. It’s a really distinct moment in Australian pop culture.
But what was really fascinating for me with the more general scope was the rise and fall of the wellness influencer. The wellness influencer was also a huge figure in the early 2010s, and it was just when I had gotten a phone and downloaded Instagram. Instagram was proliferated with social media influencers, and that wellness culture was really, really strong. I remember following a lot of young women that were already in the health and wellness space, and it felt like this huge extension of the world that you’d already known — it was a completely different moment.
Kaitlyn, although British and Australian actors are usually able to nail American accents, that doesn’t always seem to apply the other way around. But in your case, your ability to capture the intonation and inflection of Belle’s Australian accent is almost uncanny. What did all of that accent work help you unlock in the character?
Dever: Oh my God, there’s so many breakthroughs I had with this accent. I think it felt like unlocking certain levels or something. I had worked with an incredible dialect coach. Her name is Jenny Kent, and I really couldn’t have done the accent without her. Getting the offer to play this kind of character is really, for me, just a dream come true, because I love accent work. I love what accent work can do, and it does very much so open a lot of doors in terms of character work and really feeling like you are just a completely different person. So it definitely helped me find Bell’s nuances and her quirks, and how she takes on a different persona around different people in order to gain something. She is definitely a chameleon in that way, so the accent really did help me bring that aspect of Bell to life. But yeah, it was the hardest accent I’ve done to date, I will say that.
Debnam-Carey: Which is — and I’ll keep saying this — the best Australian accent I’ve ever heard a non-Australian do. The amount of people that have come up to me — friends, family — they’re just blown away by it. It is phenomenal.
Dever: That’s very sweet.
Debnam-Carey: Watching it, I completely forgot that you were American. Seriously. It’s fantastic, and it is one of the most impossible accents to do. We put vowels in places where there are no vowels.
Dever: You’re abbreviating everything. The O’s are gone, the R’s are gone.
Debnam-Carey: The O’s are gone, the R’s are gone, but then they’re there in other places that maybe they shouldn’t be.
Dever: Right, exactly. Well, that’s very sweet of you. Thank you. It was very difficult, but what a great acting exercise for me. Yes, I was nervous, obviously, to take on the role, but overall, it was super exciting to have this kind of opportunity.
Both of your characters are living in an alternate reality where they desperately cling on to the belief that alternative medicine can help cure cancer and various illnesses — but for very different reasons. There is something very confronting and discomforting about each of their interactions, because they are essentially mirrors of each other’s most unsavory qualities. How would you characterize the evolution of their relationship in these six episodes?
Debnam-Carey: It’s a fascinating dynamic for sure, and I think one of the reasons I was really so compelled by the scripts and the story. I think for Milla, Belle is her competitor in a space that she feels very protective of and one that she really believes in. I think that is the defining quality, really, for Milla. She really believes this way of healing through holistic and alternative medicine until the end — right up until she’s confronted with the fact that her mother’s died, and this is no longer going to work, and she’s wrong. But she really, really believes it.
I think that is why this dynamic with Belle, when she’s really finally confronted with it, is so frustrating and angering, because not only is she so believing in this space, but she can see how Belle is doing better in this space of health and wellness than she is. So as much as it’s coming from a good place for Milla, it’s also grinding her gears — the fact that she’s watching someone do it better than she is. It’s really personal and egotistical but found in quite a genuine place that’s so fascinating to watch. So when the two of them come together, it’s that kind of competitor, frenemy, Girl Boss, influencer, aspirational dynamic. It’s strange and also really, really fun. But I think for Milla, watching someone do it better, but also believing that there’s something off there, is really that defining characteristic.
Dever: Yeah. It’s interesting that you use the term “mirrors of each other,” because I think that that’s very true. Throughout the entire series, they are parallel storylines that we go back and forth between. But something that we were saying throughout the shoot in regards to their relationship is that we were always wondering if Belle is just inspired by Milla, or just really jealous of her — or just wants to be her best friend. Or at the end of the day, she just wants to be her and become Milla.
There are very few face-to-face moments between them in this series because most of the time Belle is just obsessively stalking Milla’s every move on social media. I guess the arc between the two of them is that Milla is someone that Belle just so badly wants to hang out with and learn from at first. She just completely worships Milla. But then it’s interesting to see how that starts to tear her apart. And by the end of the series — and what was interesting for me in taking on this role and [examining] the core of Belle and who she is and what drives her — she is someone that’s really wanting community and love. I think that Milla is a physical representation of what Belle really wanted, and Milla had everything that Belle wanted. That I think is really twisted and heartbreaking and sad, and it’s amazing how Sam was able to go between these two very different but also similar stories in such a seamless way.
You both now share the distinction of being part of hugely popular franchises — Alycia in “The Walking Dead” and “The 100,” Kaitlyn in “The Last of Us.” Kaitlyn, your “Last of Us” co-star Isabela Merced revealed last year that you needed extra security while filming the new season because there are some fans who genuinely hate your character Abby, who — sans spoilers — plays a critical role in the trajectory of the video game. Do you feel prepared for the onslaught of this huge fandom and the potential ramifications of playing such a polarizing character when the season premieres in April?
Dever: Well, firstly, I have to say, actually, that’s not true, and I didn’t ever personally say that. I know that was said a while ago, and it is not true. But moving forward and being a part of such a big and very, very loved franchise, it is something that I haven’t ever done before, and I’m learning every day just how to move forward in this new world that is the “Last of Us” fandom. I think it is always hard stepping into that, especially because it’s already had its [first] season and I’m the newbie to the world. But I think that I’m almost treating it and approaching it like I do with everything, which is just wanting to come at it with authenticity and honesty and trying to be as organic as I can when approaching the role and bringing my own sort of energy to it, if that makes sense. I want to do the character justice, and I hope that people enjoy what I do with that.
Alycia, you’re certainly no stranger to fervent fandoms, and people still talk about your character Lexa’s tragic fate on “The 100” to this day. Now that you have had some time and distance away from that show, how do you feel now about the intense love and devotion that viewers felt for “Clexa” and the backlash surrounding the end of that same-sex relationship? What did you take away from that formative period of your career?
Debnam-Carey: It was a very informative time, and I think I learned a lot. I was very young. I think I was on “The 100” when I was 20, maybe, and then when I started “Fear the Walking Dead,” I think I was 21 or 22. So I was really young when I was a part of two huge fandom shows. One thing I will say is what really makes those shows is actually the passion that the fans have. I think what I really did learn is how beautiful that is. It can be really intense and sometimes jarring because you are torn between wanting to do, as Kaitlyn was saying, justice to these characters, but also wanting to protect yourself and the characters in the show at the same time. And so it is an interesting line to walk — especially when you’re quite young.
I really do think for “The 100,” that kind of fallout was really the first of its kind when that uprising happened. The backlash, in many ways, while it was a heartbreaking end to that character, the silver lining I always look back on is that it changed things for the better. It meant that a lot of people felt empowered and felt like they could really speak up about it. And I think at the time, the best I could do was really be a vessel of love and share that kind of empowerment for people. But it was very intense, tricky and emotional, and I had spoken to so many fans and people who loved the show and just tried to support in the way that I could.
It’s a very interesting dynamic working on shows that are huge in that way, but also the reason they are that way is because the fans are so passionate and incredible. And then watching how these characters and shows go beyond just what the original filmmaking process is — the communities that have been created from them, the bonding experiences, the different fan fiction and art. It’s extraordinary. It’s amazing. I think it’s helped inform me as a person and as an actor going forward, and I loved being a part of those shows so much. But I think what’s really nice for me now is also trying to do really different things. That was a huge part of my 20s — it was kind of all of my 20s — and so now I am really trying to explore very different worlds, genres, characters, time periods. But I feel very, very lucky and blessed to have been a part of those two shows, for sure.
This interview has been edited and condensed.
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