The Road Leading to Happiness

Deborah Mailman (born 1972) is an Australian actress. Mailman is best known for her roles in television series such as The Secret Life of Us, Offspring, Redfern Now, Cleverman, and Total Control. She first gained recognition in the 1998 film Radiance, for which she won her first AFI award. Her other well known films are Rabbit-Proof Fence, Bran Nue Dae, Oddball, The Sapphires, Paper Planes, Blinky Bill the Movie, H Is for Happiness, The Book of Revelation, and Wolfram. Mailman was the first Indigenous Australian actress to win the Australian Film Institute Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role, and has gone on to win seven more (now known as AACTA Awards) both in television and film. She was inducted into the Logie Hall of Fame in 2026.