Josh Anderson (Neighbours)

When Craig McLachlan quit his role of Henry Ramsay to star in fellow soap opera Home and Away, producers decided to introduce two new characters to help Neighbours recuperate. Jeremy Angerson was cast in the role of Josh, while Richard Norton was selected to play Ryan McLachlan. When Angerson was fifteen, he worked at the Adelaide Grand Prix selling souvenirs and met a casting director who worked for Neighbours. When Angerson auditioned for the role, the same casting director was responsible for hiring him to play Josh. Mark Little who played Joe Mangel took on the role of Angerson's mentor during his time on the show. Angerson was a junior speed-skating champion but had to stop his training for the role because he kept arriving on set with cuts and bruises. ==Development==

Characterisation and relationships The character is introduced into the series following his father's purchase of a local news agents. Of Josh's arrival Angerson told Chrissie Camp of TV Week that "Josh's father own's a newsagents in Erinsborough and he gets friendly with Todd and Melissa. He's a fairly intelligent, but excitable type of character." Josh is characterised as friendly, intelligent and "bright academically" with a keen interest in football and chemistry. He uses the latter to play pranks on people which often leads him into trouble. Writers gave him a best friend in the form of established character Todd Landers (Kristian Schmid) who bonded over mutual interests. In an Inside Soap feature, Angerson described Josh as "a black sheep and a bit naïve" and thought Todd was the more "heroic" of the two characters. Angerson told Hilary Kingsley from the Daily Mirror that Josh is "a nice person" who is happy at his school. Angerson liked his character, despite him being a "naïve and a bit unpredictable" but ultimately Josh is "honest". He further explained Josh's naivety, stating "he's a bit of a scammer, and doesn't see that there is ever a problem. He never thinks his romances will go wrong. But even when he's hurt he doesn't show it." Schmid believed that Josh was not a nice guy. Phoebe begins to develop romantic feelings for Josh's best friend Todd. Phoebe decides to write her feelings down on a letter to Todd. In 2023, Amenta reprised her role as Melissa. It was revealed that Josh and Melissa had been married for twenty years and have two children together. Amenta added "believe it or not [Melissa] has gone on and married her child hood sweetheart, Josh. So they've got two daughters." Stripping Josh was the first male stripper to feature in Neighbours. Josh originally takes a job as a stripper to raise money and impress his crush, Lucy Robinson (Melissa Bell). Angerson told Kingsley that he understood his character's nervousness, adding "I could never do that sexy dancing for real, no wonder Josh is nervous." Angerson was also asked to wear a black sequined G-string, but he refused to comply. He added "I had to do it in front of all the ladies, especially since most of them were about 55 - I kept trying to cover up!" Amenta later revealed that it was one of the characters' most memorable scenes. She added that "I didn't realise how iconic that scene had become until I read about it and heard about it afterwards." Angerson told Sarah Bond from the Daily Mirror that it was a "nasty accident". It was Angerson's decision to leave Neighbours because he wanted to avoid being typecast in a soap role. Following his departure, Angerson told Keith Harrison of the Staffordshire Newsletter that "I do miss the excitement of filming the show and all the build up to that. It gets the adrenalin going and is a good release for all the energy inside me." ==Storylines==

Josh is first seen in the Coffee Shop on Todd Landers' 16th birthday and they quickly become friends after learning that Josh is new to the area and will be starting Year 10 at Erinsborough High with Todd and they share a common interest- soccer. Todd invites Josh back to his home for his birthday dinner, but when Josh reveals that he asked Melissa out on a date, it doesn't sit well with Todd. Josh realises Melissa still likes Todd and backs off. Josh begins dating Cody Willis, who had previously caused Todd and Melissa problems in their relationship and they begin going out for several months. However, Cody is still attracted to Todd and promptly dumps Josh without explanation. Meanwhile, Josh finds himself becoming more and more attracted to Melissa the more time they spend together studying. The teens soon realise they are all dating the wrong people and agree to swap partners. When Todd falls in with local criminal Gary "Boof" Head (Stephen Hall), Josh tries to make Todd see sense. One evening when Todd is attacked by Boof for informing the police, Josh comes to his friend's aid and subdues Boof with a few kick-boxing moves. Josh agrees to help Melissa in her scheme to expose Lassiter's for using frozen tuna and they sneak into the kitchens and head towards the fridge where they find the tuna but a kitchen hand shuts the door, leaving Josh and Melissa trapped. Josh quickly stops the fan from freezing them but Melissa is in danger due to suffering from epilepsy and not having her medication to hand. The couple are saved but Paul Robinson (Stefan Dennis) is unimpressed with the damage to the fridge and demands payment for the damages. When Josh begins violin lessons and constantly talks about a woman named Katrina Riley (Jane Conroy), Melissa is quick to accuse him of cheating on her with another girl. Melissa tracks down Katrina and realizes she is much older than Josh and has worried for nothing. After a runaway truck ploughs into the Andersons' newsagents, Josh and his family are left homeless and jobless with the prospect of having to return to Mildura, which Josh does not really want as he has made friends and is settled in Erinsborough. Jim Robinson (Alan Dale), Todd's uncle agrees to let Josh stay at Number 26 and share a room with Todd. When Josh is subpoenaed to testify against Helen Daniels (Anne Haddy), Jim's mother-in-law, who is suing a hotel after a fall, He is torn between perjuring himself or making Helen look bad on the stand. Under pressure, Josh flees and retreats to his old garage. School principal Dorothy Burke convinces Josh to return to the Robinsons. Shortly after Melissa and her family move to America, Josh finds himself attracted to Lucy, Todd's cousin, who is home from boarding school. Josh is shocked and appalled when he realises that Lucy is attracted to her new-found half-brother, Glen Donnelly (Richard Huggett). Josh later supports Lucy in the ensuing fallout. Josh continues to woo Lucy by buying her expensive gifts, and even going as far as hacking into Erinsborough High's computer system to change her grades. When Josh owns up to Dorothy about the hacking and takes the rap, Lucy admits she changed the grades herself after Josh backed out and left the computer on. One day while working on a surfboard in the garage, Josh accidentally splashes some acetone in his eyes, rendering him temporarily blind. While out with Todd and Brad Willis (Scott Michaelson) one day, Josh wanders into the road and is narrowly missed by a car. Lucy agrees to help Josh until his sight returns. When it does, Josh doesn't hurry to let anyone know and keeps up the pretence of being blind to enjoy Lucy's affections. When Josh finds himself short of money, he takes a job as a stripper using a gladiator's costume to disguise him. When one of the bookings is for Helen's hen party, Josh panics at first but then realises no-one will recognise him. At the end of his act, Josh's helmet is removed by Caroline Alessi (Gillian Blakeney) and his identity exposed, leaving him embarrassed. However, Josh's confidence is restored when his friends tell him not to be ashamed of his body. Josh later asks bookish classmate Phoebe on a date, but she is upset when it is revealed that the only reason Josh has done so is because of a bet he lost with Todd and Brad. Josh does fall for Phoebe for real when they are cast in the Year 11 production of Beauty and the Beast. They begin dating but Phoebe's father, Arthur (Barry Hill) disapproves of Josh and warns him off. After Arthur suffers a heart attack, he lets Josh continue seeing his daughter. After returning home from spending Christmas 1991 in Surfers Paradise with Brad and Lucy, Josh discovers that Todd and Phoebe have fallen in love with each other and he refuses to have anything to do with either of them. Josh dates Phoebe's arch-enemy, Trish Longley to prove that he doesn't care that his feelings are hurt. Trish later plants an exam paper in Phoebe's locker as revenge, which Josh gets the blame for causing more friction between them. However, after a talk with Jim they eventually patch up their differences with Josh before he leaves Erinsborough to return to his parents in Mildura. In 2023, it is revealed that Josh and Melissa married some 20 years prior. ==Reception==

To celebrate the 20th anniversary of Neighbours, the BBC asked readers to nominate their 20 favourite obscure characters. Josh came in second place and the readers said "All I can remember is that something happened to cause him to lose his sight and then he tried to pinch Todd's girlfriend". In 2020, Adam Beresford writing for HuffPost opined that Josh, Melissa, Todd and Cody formed one of the "show's best teen groups". Neil Bonner from The Stage believed that Angerson's talents exceeded his Neighbours role as they were "far in excess of his Ramsay Street requirements." In 1993, an article in the Staffordshire Newsletter stated that "Josh-mania" had taken over the town of Stafford in England. Angerson was in the town performing in a pantomime and switched on the town's Christmas light display. David Whetstone from the Newcastle Journal opined that Josh had a "tangled love life" and unlike Josh, Angerson had a "steady girlfriend". Another reporter from the newspaper chose the episode featuring Josh pursuing a relationship with Trish in their "pick of the day" feature. A writer from the Chester Chronicle branded Josh a "Neighbours pin-up". Kathryn Ellison from Stafford Post branded Josh the "wide-eyed, innocent and cheeky schoolboy we love to hate." She believed that it was wrong that children learned about strip poker and could watch the scene. She also accused the character of Helen as not taking the "incident at all seriously". ==References==