Guy Pearce has revealed he slotted in a secret nod to his friend Kate Winslet during his return to Neighbours.
The Hollywood star found fame on the Australian soap playing Mike Young between 1986 and 1989.
It was recently announced Guy had reprised his role for the forthcoming finale, after the soap was axed after 37 years on air in March.
When news reached his friend Kate, she begged to come and see him on set, and while that didn’t work out, Guy found a way to make sure she was included in his scenes.
Speaking on Australian breakfast show Studio 10 this week, Guy said: “Kate Winslet is a big fan of [Neighbours]. She’s literally wetting herself that I’m back on the show. She was besotted with Mike back in the day.
“So when I told her I was coming back to do the show, she said: ‘Right, I have to be there, I’m coming.’
“And when I talked to the producer about it, he said: ‘Well maybe we could make the mother of your child, maybe she could be Kate?’
″That’s a little personal in my life, so let’s not call her Kate,” said Guy, who was married to Kate Mestitz between 1997 and 2015. “So she’s called Rose, which was Kate’s character on Titanic. So Winslet is kind of here in spirit.”
He added: “[Kate] was like, ‘Darling, I need to see the scripts. What’s going on in the storyline?’
“If she was here, she’d be on this set now pushing her way into every scene she possibly could.”
Guy and Kate starred in the 2011 HBO series Mildred Pierce together, for which they both won Emmys, before appearing alongside each other once again in last year’s Mare Of Easttown.
In the interview, Guy also revealed more about Mike’s return to Neighbours, after the character was last seen in 1989 when he moved to Perth to become a teacher.
He said: “We learn through these new episodes that I have a child and I have now moved back, me and my daughter, to Melbourne, Erinsborough.”
Guy is one of a number of much-loved Neighbours stars returning to the show for its final episodes.
Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan have reprised their roles as Charlene and Scott Robinson, while the likes of Ian Smith (Harold Bishop), Peter O’Brien (Shane Ramsay), Mark Little (Joe Mangel), Daniel MacPherson (Joel Samuels) and Natalie Bassingthwaighte (Izzy Hoyland) are also back.
Neighbours finished filming on Friday, with executive producer Jason Herbison revealing “tears were shed” as the cameras stopped rolling for the last time.
Neighbours will come to an end with a special double bill of episodes on Monday 1 August in Australia and the UK.