Covid 19 coronavirus: Sam Neill shares how the pandemic has affected him

Sam Neill has written about how the Covid-19 pandemic has impacted his life. Photo / Getty Images

Sam Neill has revealed the production of Jurassic World: Dominion is on hold and that he cannot return home to his South Island vineyard.

In an article published on Variety, Neill and other entertainment industry figures shared how the coronavirus pandemic has impacted his daily life.

"Suddenly, here we are. We have been cryogenically frozen, and 'Jurassic World: Dominion' is on hold," the 72-year-old actor wrote.

"And like virtually every actor in the world right now, I'm not working. Dammit."

The actor has been keeping himself busy with regular social media updates, including live readings of children's books and ukelele covers.

"I put silly stuff on social media to encourage people, to cheer them up with a message," he says.

View this post on Instagram

I can only apologise to Tom Yorke et al for murdering I song I love. But here goes nothing. I don’t know about you , but I’m finding keeping in touch face to face on FaceTime with family and friends a great comfort and a lot of fun too . I’m in Australia for the duration it seems - so staying in touch with the farm, with the family , and friends scattered around the world is really important . And having a laugh of course . Separation is hard , and throwing your arms around people would be great , but unfortunately the last thing we should be doing right now. Anyway - stay well , stay in touch , stay careful, and stay optimistic !

A post shared by SamNeillTheProp (@samneilltheprop) on Mar 28, 2020 at 3:15pm PDT

He encouraged readers to find "beauty in the everyday".

Neill owns a winery called Two Paddocks located in Central Otago, and says due to border restrictions he cannot get back to New Zealand.

"I speak daily with staff at my vineyards ... I heed the warnings. But I have stopped watching the news. This is the most seriously challenging time of my life, I do not doubt that," Neill shares in the Variety article.

He went on to speak about how tuning into Covid-19 updates was fuelling his anxiety, and he has had to limit his consumption of news.

"The ramped-up anxiety that one gets from all the soaring graphs, the doom-laden background music, the unhinged press conferences; none of it was helping."

Neill ended his piece by encouraging everyone to stay home, and admitting he still misses going to work.

"It's ironic that about the most helpful thing those of us who are unessential can do right now [and I never met an essential actor] is just stay at home, and stay the f*** away from other people."

Did I mention,delighted to be working with these old friends again? It's a dinosaur movie. I am unable to confirm whether Jeff will be taking his shirt off again, sorry. I'm a lot greyer now, but they are much the same. @JurassicWorld @colintrevorrow @LauraDern @amblin pic.twitter.com/f3u1xmoeQn

— Sam Neill (@TwoPaddocks) October 24, 2019

The third Jurassic World movie is directed by Colin Trevorrow, and was due to be released in 2021.

Neill was reprising his iconic role as Dr Alan Grant.

Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum are also set to reappear in their respective roles of Dr Ellie Sattler and Dr Ian Malcolm.