Hell Hath No Fury
Meet the women of chilling new Australian drama Lambs of God

What’s inside the July issue of Foxtel magazine?

The wind is howling and it’s bitterly cold when Foxtel magazine visits the Blue Mountains set of Foxtel Original drama Lambs of God. Within minutes, the heavens open, which only adds to the eeriness.

In the heart of Mount Wilson, we find the most magnificent, perfectly aged monastery ruins, complete with lush gardens overflowing with vegetables. It’s mind-boggling to think that it was purpose-built for the visually stunning four-part drama – a twisted fairytale based on the book by Marele Day – making its debut on FOX SHOWCASE this month. Foxtel magazine’s cover star Essie Davis is almost unrecognisable, sporting an unflattering wig and a single spooky white contact lens as the mysterious, partially blind Sister Iphigenia. “I always like playing a character that I don’t feel like I’ve played before,” she explains, adding: “Initially, we were going to shave off my hair and it was all going to be really good fun! But because of what I have coming up next, we ended up with these [wigs] with all our hair shoved up under it.”

Currently wowing in her Emmy-winning role as Aunt Lydia in The Handmaid’s Tale, Ann Dowd was the only person considered to play Sister Margarita, so producers were beyond excited when she finally signed on. “I read [the script] and it was so intriguing and so unusual. My only hang-up was to be away from my family,” New York-based Dowd explains, adding of Margarita: “She was very, very intriguing. Some characters, you get a sense pretty quickly of who they are. Others, you really have to spend time with. This is one of the latter.” The full article from page 10.

The ‘Lawyer X’ saga has it all. From the underbelly of Melbourne, the tale of the double-crossing barrister unmasked as Nicola Gobbo earlier this year is “the biggest legal scandal in Australian history”, says seasoned news reporter Peter Stefanovic, who fronts two-part documentary Lawyer X: The Untold Story on Sky News this month. “She was a puppetmaster who very much enjoyed pulling the strings.”

This year marks two decades since Australia’s ICC Cricket World Cup triumph in the UK. With the team in England seeking to repeat that feat as the current competition ends, Darren Lehmann – who hit the winning runs in 1999 – reflects on his role in sporting history. “We really won on the back of Shane Warne and Steve Waugh,” he says. “They played amazingly – Steve played superbly to get that hundred against South Africa, and then Shane took over in the semifinal and final. To go undefeated in World Cups over more than 10 years is really unbelievable.”

Foxtel Magazine July Issue hits Australian subscriber homes from this week,

-Brad