{"id":636043,"date":"2026-10-20T07:04:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-20T07:04:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/636043\/"},"modified":"2026-10-20T07:04:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-20T07:04:11","slug":"kiwi-actor-amelia-reynolds-on-landing-east-of-eden-role-and-balancing-motherhood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/636043\/","title":{"rendered":"Kiwi actor Amelia Reynolds on landing East of Eden role and balancing motherhood"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cI\u2019ve always been a big advocate for having lots of strings to your bow because I believe it makes you a stronger artist,\u201d explains Amelia, although she adds that being a self-employed creative made it a difficult decision when or even if to start a family.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had some anxiety about being a mum and what it might do to my career because I\u2019d be sad if I wasn\u2019t creative. I also worried if I could even have a child, so the road to parenthood was a slow-burn for me.\u201d<\/p>\n

Luckily, in 2021, Amelia met Chilean industrial designer Emiliano, 35, on Tinder and quickly saw he\u2019d be a \u201cwonderful dad as he\u2019s such a beautiful, loving, committed, sweet, hilarious guy\u201d.<\/p>\n

\"AmeliaAmelia with Emiliano and Alma. Photo \/ Robert Trathen<\/p>\n

She continues, \u201cAfter three years together, we started talking about trying for a baby<\/a>, but we assumed we\u2019d be trying for at least a year, so we made all these other plans.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, the fortunate couple conceived relatively easily, so a much-anticipated family holiday through the US, Mexico and the Caribbean had to be worked around Amelia\u2019s pregnancy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m nervous to share that part of our story as not only was conception and pregnancy uncomplicated, but the birth was also relatively easeful,\u201d says Amelia. \u201cI know it\u2019s not like this for everyone, but we did a hypno-birthing course, which really worked for me.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wonder if it had something to do with the intensity of acting that I was able to surrender myself to a moment and almost enjoy it. Perhaps it\u2019s good for people to hear positive stories about fertility and labour. For me, birth was beautiful. Yes, there was pain, but with this really cool prize at the end!\u201d<\/p>\n

\"AlmaAlma is now five months old. Photo \/ Robert Trathen<\/p>\n

Her daughter Alma is now five months old and \u201cwonderful, very alert, social and chatty\u201d, says a smitten Amelia. As to whether her little girl will follow in her mum\u2019s famous footsteps, that remains to be seen.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow I have my own baby, I know exactly what my mum meant when she\u2019d tell me she was proud of me for just being me,\u201d she smiles. \u201cShe didn\u2019t mind what I did, so long as I was happy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Incredibly, Amelia initially declined to audition for her role in East of Eden<\/a> as her Masters thesis was due in the first few weeks of filming. But when the casting team asked her to reconsider, the actor gave in because Ethel was such \u201ca rich character \u2013 a full, complicated human, rather than just a prostitute\u201d.<\/p>\n

Learning lines while also finishing her thesis was a challenge, but Amelia says, \u201cI\u2019m at my best when I have many things on the go. I didn\u2019t have the time to feel nervous. I was having two of the best creative experiences of my life happening at the same time and I feel really proud of both of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

East of Eden is now streaming on Netflix.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cI\u2019ve always been a big advocate for having lots of strings to your bow because I believe it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":636044,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[3376,28358,103859,95,56767,27126,430,3806,8142,156,31125,311756,1888,41629,71,1019,296,194,15028,1432,2891,1094,111,139,69,1118,90,35478,210642,89525,5129,131151,205,58153,13172,42327,87980,1961,30534,3457,377],"class_list":["post-636043","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-actor","tag-alongside","tag-amelia","tag-and","tag-balancing","tag-break","tag-celebrities","tag-east","tag-eden","tag-entertainment","tag-epic","tag-fashionista","tag-first","tag-florence","tag-from","tag-international","tag-into","tag-kiwi","tag-landing","tag-model","tag-motherhood","tag-netflix","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-of","tag-on","tag-plays","tag-prostitute","tag-pugh","tag-reynolds","tag-rodeo","tag-role","tag-showbiz","tag-spotlight","tag-stepped","tag-tender","tag-this","tag-wearableart","tag-western","tag-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/636043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=636043"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/636043\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/636044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=636043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=636043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=636043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}