The name Julia Anastasopoulos may not ring a bell to everyone but you’d be hard-pressed to find a pop culture-savvy South African – let alone home improvement enthusiast – who hasn’t heard of YouTube phenomenon SuzelleDIY. And who could forget Tali, the character whose over-the-top wedding planning had audiences screaming with laughter in the Showmax mockumentary Tali’s Wedding Diary? Behind these two larger-than-life characters, 35-year-old Cape Town-based actress Julia is the first to call herself “reserved in comparison”, though what she’s managed to achieve says anything but.
How it all began
So what was Julia doing before teaching Internet audiences how to “arty your party”, make leopard-print bread, peel a lot of potatoes, or declutter their lives (and long before Marie Kondo did it on Netflix nogal)? “I was doing a lot of different things that definitely weren’t DIY,” she laughs. “I studied theatre and performance, and was pursuing acting in Cape Town, which is quite a stressful and erratic career choice. I then started doing a lot more illustration and design work, which I’ve always been passionate about, and that kept me going for many years. I was illustrating children’s books, doing wall murals, I worked in theatre design, set design, and eventually the happy accident of Suzelle happened – and I haven’t looked back.”
It’s apt that it was truly the spirit of DIY that created Suzelle and her “bitesize do-it-yourself webseries” in May 2014. “I never intended to be ‘a YouTuber’,” says Julia. “My husband Ari Kruger – is a director and me being an actress, we were so frustrated with having to wait for commercial work, so SuzelleDIY started as a side project. We started filming these little clips to parody the DIY movement that was happening online, deciding to come up with a quirky South African character who gives you these DIY tips. Now it’s five years later and we’re still doing DIY – and a lot of other things! It came from such a place of experimentation and play, and there was never any expectation from us, which I think lends to its success. We weren’t setting out to make a hit – we were really just us having fun.”
Turning a side project into a career
Turning a “side project” into a career came, Julia says, when they started commercialising the project, working with brands and doing events. “Suzelle became quite a hit and I realised there wasn’t time to do my other work. It sort of took over my life in many (good) ways and we thought, ‘Let’s give it all we have and see where it takes us.’ As a result, it’s opened many doors for us – having recently hit 100 episodes and with more than 143 000 subscribers. The creative duo recently started their own production company, Sketchbook Studios, for Suzelle and other content, and having collaborated with the likes of fellow revered South African alter ego, Pieter-Dirk Uys’s Tannie Evita, and Michelin-starred chef Jan Hendrik, it’s fair to say Suzelle has become something of a local hero.
In fact, Suzelle is so popular that many people think she’s a real person. “We’ll often be in a meeting about a Suzelle-related video or partnership – and someone will ask, ‘And Suzelle? Will she be joining us?’ That’s always really funny,” laughs Julia. “I also often get stalked by kids in the shops, 10- or 11-year-olds following me around. They’ll inevitably come up and ask, ‘Excuse me, but are you SuzelleDIY?’ The kids are my best.”
Juggling characters
And then there’s Tali Babes, Julia’s “love to hate” Jo’burg kugel character and Suzelle’s polar opposite bar the immensity of their personalities. “It was only a matter of time before I decided I wanted to push myself and do something new. But Suzelle’s success meant it was actually rather scary to do something new: people were either going to love it or hate it. I just had to throw myself in, which I did and, thankfully, it paid off.”
Sharing her life with the colourful Suzelle and the neurotic Tali is no mean feat. “When we were shooting Tali, I was almost crazy,” Julia laughs. “It’s so mad because firstly you’re you but then you have these two larger-than-life characters that inhabit your brain. It used to be a bit overwhelming but now it’s a bit more manageable and I can easily switch between them. It’s interesting that I’ve invented these characters so different to my normal persona. It’s great to challenge myself in those ways: to be very extroverted and out in the world.”
Keeping it real
It’s not just her alter egos that share Julia’s life. Working closely with her husband each day means making an effort to strike a balance between their professional and personal lives. “We try to leave work matters at the studio and when we get home we unplug and focus on the family. I feel very fortunate to work with Ari though. It’s so beneficial to work with a partner because we trust each other wholeheartedly and we can be real with each other, which is invaluable in our business,” she says. But within that there are several hats to wear: the actor, director, wife, mom… “It’s important to be able to switch between those roles. For the most part, we have so much fun all the time and I feel so lucky that that’s my life.”
The “mom hat” is Julia’s newest after she and Ari welcomed baby Zoe into their world in July last year.
All hints of Suzelle, of Tali, or anything else drop away as she gently soothes her daughter in her baby carrier, and when she says that being a mother has changed her in every way imaginable, it’s without the comic exaggeration that characterises so much of her work life. “It has changed me to my core, from my outlook on life to my appreciation for my own mom and for the world,” explains Julia. “It’s mind altering.”
Reminiscing on how vastly her life has changed in a few short years, Julia muses on her career highlights. “In a very broad sense, creating a career out of nothing or, rather, creating a career out of something I love and not trying to wait for the green light from someone else to make a show. It really was very organic for me – it basically was DIY. That’s a real highlight for me – that
I was able to take something I’m passionate about and turn it into a career.”
A few of Julia's favourite things
Behind the characters and catchphrases, these are a few essentially Julia things…
Best book
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
Favourite meal
Bread and cheese
Go-to beauty product
Moisturiser
Beauty philosophy
“I like to keep things really simple in every way. Simple ingredients, simple make-up…”
Must-have baby item
“I have a baby carrier with me at all times. I literally wear the baby and get on with my day hands-free.”
Best mom hack
“Yoga mats make good play mats!”
Guilty pleasure
“Also bread and cheese! And binge-watching TV shows when I have enough time.”
Most memorable holiday
“The holiday in Greece where my husband proposed to me.”
Feel-good movie
Love Actually
Secret talent
Turns out Suzelle isn’t the only one with DIY know-how – Julia says her secret skill is sewing!
Julia aka SuzelleDIY has recently launched a book, simply entitled Recipes (R280), which takes traditional SA recipes and gives them her quirky DIY twist. A must-have for anyone who loves to cook! Order it at suzellediy.com