Copping some mixed fortunes

Aaron Jeffery , star of The Sunshine Strip. Photo / Supplied

Take one hunky actor with a shady past, add a glamorous location, gripping storylines and a romantic co-star entanglement, and you have the recipe for a top-rating TV show. At least, that's what producers must have thought when they launched Aussie crime series The Sunshine Strip.

Unfortunately, the show did not reach expectations at home, much to the disappointment of Kiwi-born, Sydney-based linchpin Aaron Jeffery. The former McLeod's Daughters and Outrageous Fortune star plays Jack Cross, a brooding detective who transfers to the Gold Coast CIB in a bid to be reunited with his wife and escape a tormenting past.

"He lost someone very near to him and he's got a few demons that haunt him, so he arrives in a pretty dark place," Jeffery says while in Auckland to visit family. "Most actors enjoy the progression of characters, and if that progression involves healing certain demons in the past it's more interesting. That's life, isn't it? We've all got demons to heal."

Never a truer word was spoken. Jeffery, 39, could have written the book, or the script, on emotional exorcism. In 2006 he was put on a 12-month good behaviour bond after pleading guilty to assaulting ex-wife Melinda, with whom he has a 5-year-old daughter, Ella-Blu. "Listen, I think that in life we all make mistakes and have regrets," he says. "Unfortunately, when you're an actor and have a profile in the public eye then that is amplified. Those things are always hard because when things are printed you don't get a chance to tell your side of the story. But in the end the people who love you know your side."

For his own sanity Jeffery has learned to balance the peaks and pitfalls of his profession with the "important stuff".

"This industry is centred to some extent on the egotistical flamboyant stuff that doesn't mean anything," he says. "I don't take it too seriously. Anyone with half a brain can see the machine for what it is, but you can't let those things worry you. The important things in life keep me grounded, like being a dad."

Fatherhood is the most common thread in Jeffery's comments. It's clear that his world revolves around his "beautiful little girl with a good heart". Although the actor's Outrageous co-star Grant Bowler has landed roles in Ugly Betty and Lost, Jeffery's desire to tackle the American market was outweighed for his love of Ella-Blu, who he shares custody of. "I had the opportunity to work in America but my daughter is more important so I'm not doing that," he says. "It's more important to be with her than chase a dream."

Neither will he be returning to the Gold Coast, where he temporarily based himself last year for The Sunshine Strip, because the show has been cancelled by network executives.

"I put my heart and soul into it, so it was disappointing," he says. "Oddly enough it outsold Underbelly overseas. "In the end there were creative differences between the producers and the network."

Even Jeffery's rumoured relationship with his co-star Vanessa Gray - which he won't confirm - was not enough to inspire bosses' confidence in the series.

"She's an amazing girl and a good friend," Jeffery says. "She was amazing to work with, and that's all I want to say." What the next few months hold for Jeffery, at present appearing in X-Men Origins: Wolverine, is unknown, but he has a contingency plan for long periods between projects: "I can throw a few bricks and I'm not bad with a hammer."

On the plus side, downtime does allow more visits to these shores.

"I love it here," says Jeffrey, who moved to Australia when he was 17. "I come back a couple of times a year and every time I come home it's like a breath of fresh air. "Everything makes sense again. If I didn't have a daughter in Australia I'd be here all the time."

* The Sunshine Strip debuts on Prime this Wednesday at 9.30pm.