EXCLUSIVE: Lincoln Younes reveals the “brutal” moment that changed him as an actor after Home And Away fame

Lincoln Younes’ voice is almost being drowned out by the squeaking of a dog toy.

“I just ducked back to see my mum,” the 30-year-old actor tells TV WEEK over the phone.

“I had a day off and flew to Melbourne and I’m sitting here with her dog, so I’m quite happy right now. I haven’t seen her all year, so it’s been really relaxing.”

It’s no wonder Lincoln hasn’t had time to get back to Melbourne much recently.

He’s gone from one big TV role to the next: laidback farmhand Tom in the final season of Doctor Doctor, troubled American surfer Buddy in Barons, and shallow real estate agent Ollie in After The Verdict.

Currently, he’s shooting Last King Of The Cross in Sydney, where he’s starring as John Ibrahim.

Lincoln says playing such different characters was “always the dream”.

“You get to lose yourself in different roles,” he says. “The biggest compliment someone can give me is, ‘I didn’t recognise you.’ That’s the best thing. I love anonymity.”

That might seem a strange thing to say for an actor who’s starred in American as well as Australian shows. But Lincoln never set out to be famous.

When he decided on acting as a career, he was a schoolboy in Bendigo in Victoria, watching movies and reviewing them for the newspaper edited by his mum.

“I could go to the movies for free if I reviewed the movie for the paper,” he explains.

“So every third day I’d go, watch it by myself, usually, and then write the review. It became the most wonderful escape.

“I was a shy, introverted kid and I felt understood when I’d watch movies. That ability to affect people in a positive way was the basis for why I got into acting.”

Lincoln was 17 when he started playing Romeo Kovac in Tangle, and from there it was on to Casey Braxton in Home And Away.

But while it might look like he’s had a dream run, he says it’s a “brutal” industry.

“I had a constant stream of jobs for a while and then didn’t work for years,” he explains.

“Then I adjusted and learnt things about myself and then went into theatre, and did that for a year, and then there wasn’t any work, and then out of nowhere, I got an American job.”

After a season in Eva Longoria’s Grand Hotel, Lincoln was cast as the lead in the series The Lost Boys. But production was halted on the first day of filming because of COVID.

“The highs are high, but the lows are incredibly low in what we do,” he says.

“You try to make sense of missed opportunities, but I think the most calming realisation I had is that sometimes it just doesn’t make sense.”

Returning to Australia turned out to be positive for Lincoln.

“That last year in America with COVID and the riots and the divisive nature of the politics and everything was really traumatic, and coming back to Australia was healing,” he explains.

“Then doing that first job back here, Doctor Doctor, with such lovely supportive people, was what I needed at that time.”

The friendships forged on the Doctor Doctor set made it hard for Lincoln earlier this year when he was presenting the TV WEEK Logie Award for Most Popular Drama.

“Both Doctor Doctor and Home And Away were nominated and the alliances were blurry and I was like, ‘Oh, I don’t know what’s going to be the best outcome here,'” he remembers with a laugh.

“But it was a really fun night. After the last few years, you appreciate when you run into good people.”

Lincoln’s current role in After The Verdict is giving him a chance to show his funny side, which he appreciates after playing some “quite dark and serious” roles over the years.

“I enjoy making a fool of myself,” he declares. From the outset, he hit it off with Magda Szubanski, who plays fellow juror Margie.

“We annoyed and adored each other in equal parts in a very lovely way, so she’d try to rile me or I’d try to annoy her, and it would create a very funny dynamic on screen,” he says.

“I’d move her scripts around or hide any snacks we’d taken. It became a bit of a prank set, which was fun and much needed, because we were filming during the height of one of the COVID waves.”

More recently, Lincoln has enjoyed changing his look to play John Ibrahim. It’s involved having to pack on “quite a bit of muscle”.

En route, he’s nailed a personal goal of lifting 200kg in the gym. “I’m mentally happy and balanced when I have a physical goal I’m working towards,” he explains.

“That really helps my mindset, and when I achieve that, I try to think of something different: now, I’m working towards a marathon in October.”

For Lincoln, it’s “wonderful” that international borders have opened up and he can head back to the US if he wants to. He’s not in a big rush, though.

“There are things in the pipeline for later this year, so I’m just seeing where everything’s taking me,” he says.

“I’m enjoying each day and then, hopefully, it all works out afterwards.”