Diving Deep With Sam Fricker

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Tropfest returns this Sunday in Centennial Park and will be livestreamed globally on YouTube.

In this special episode of Diving Deep, I sit down with Tropfest founder John Polson to unpack how he
built the world’s largest short film festival from scratch and turned it into a cultural movement. For
over 30 years, Tropfest has been a launchpad for emerging filmmakers and actors long before they
became household names.

John shares what he looks for in raw talent, how he recognises
momentum before it’s obvious, and why backing creators early matters more than ever. We talk
creativity, risk, judging art, spotting future stars, and what it takes to build something that lasts.

Tropfest is back this Sunday. Watch it live on YouTube.
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On Diving Deep today I sit down with Mat Steinwede, one of Australia’s most successful real estate agents and thinkers on performance and life transformation.

Mat openly shares his early years of addiction, homelessness and brushes with the law. He talks about hitting rock bottom, the moment he chose to turn his life around, and the relentless work ethic that saw him walk the streets door-knocking every day to build his first real estate career.

We dig into how he rebuilt his life, became the number one agent in the McGrath network and a leader on the Central Coast with more than two decades in the business, and how he applies the same discipline that helped him escape addiction to his sales methods and mindset work.

Mat also shares insights on resilience and how he stays disciplined in business and life, and what success really looks like when you’ve clawed your way back from nothing.

A raw, honest discussion about accountability, transformation, performance systems and what it means to create a life worth living.
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In this episode of Diving Deep, I sit down with Charlie Viola, Executive Chair and Founding Partner of Viola Private Wealth.

Charlie has spent more than two decades at the top end of wealth management, advising high-net-worth individuals, families, and institutions. He has personally managed billions of dollars in assets and played a key role in scaling one of Australia’s leading private wealth businesses from the ground up.
We go deep into:
What it actually takes to manage large amounts of money responsibly
Long-term thinking, discipline, and risk in investing
Financial literacy and why education matters more than shortcuts
Building trust with clients at the highest level
Leadership lessons from business, sport, and life
Charlie’s passion for motorsport and racing cars, and how that mindset overlaps with investing

This conversation is about far more than money. It is about decision-making under pressure, consistency over decades, and how high performers think across completely different worlds.

If you are interested in wealth, business, performance, or learning from someone who has operated at the very top of their field for years, this episode is for you.

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Today on Diving Deep I sit down with Lisa P. Jackson, Apple’s Vice President of Environment, Policy & Social Initiatives and the former head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency under President Obama.

We dive into Apple’s biggest sustainability moves: cutting plastics, reducing carbon emissions, transforming their global supply chain, and the company’s push to make every device carbon-neutral by 2030. Lisa explains how Apple is scaling renewable energy, why sustainability is driving business growth, and what it really takes to shift a company of Apple’s size.

She also reflects on leading the EPA, working with President Obama, and the leadership lessons she’s carried into Apple.

If you care about the future of tech, climate innovation, and how the world’s biggest companies are changing, this is a powerful conversation.

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