50 Years of Television in Australia

by Nick Place

  > Mike Whitney – Who Dares Wins – From making opposition batsmen hop around on the crease, Whitney went to making average Australian citizens perform outrageous stunts on national TV.

  > Gus Mercurio – Cash & Co – A former boxer, the gravel-voiced Mercurio took to the small screen in this story of two men framed for murder in gold-rush-era Australia. He also appeared in the movie Crocodile Dundee 2.

  2005

  We have another year of record-breaking TV in 2005. Old favourites like Neighbours reach milestones, and bold programming at SBS sees it grab its best ratings ever. But it is also the year Graham Kennedy, the King of Australian TV, makes headlines for the last time.

  King of Australian TV passes away

  It’s fair to say Australian TV will never see another star like Graham Kennedy. There may be others who share his razor-sharp wit and his instinct for live television, but what makes Kennedy special is that he, in many ways, invented Australian television.

  It all started in 1957 when Kennedy began hosting In Melbourne Tonight, a riotous nightly variety show on which he built the foundations of his long and decorated career.

  With Kennedy in the host’s chair, IMT became a hit for GTV-9, in part by pushing the boundaries of what the new medium offered, particularly when it came to the sponsor’s products. Live ads became comedy routines, giving advertisers more than they bargained for and station bosses the odd headache. Through it all, however, Kennedy’s gift for television shone through and the viewers, the final arbiters of his work, loved it.

  By the mid-seventies, Kennedy was entrenched as television royalty. His Logie count was climbing rapidly as The Graham Kennedy Show premiered in 1975. Controversy followed and Kennedy quit the following year after the infamous ‘crow call’ incident.

  Unbowed, Kennedy turned his attentions to drama. He appeared in Power Without Glory and Don’s Party before being picked up by Channel 10 for Blankety Blanks, a game show which was as much about the game as it was about kennedy’s ability to wring humour from the most obvious, and often adult, double entendres.

  During the 1980s Kennedy continued working in drama (The Club, The Killing Fields, Travelling North) before launching the Graham Kennedy News Show (later Coast to Coast), with Kennedy cast in the unlikely role of newsreader.

  When he returned in 1990 on Graham Kennedy’s Funniest Home Videos, his career was in its twilight stages, with his final TV appearance in 1994 on the Ray Martin-hosted Graham Kennedy’s 60th Birthday Special.

  When Kennedy died in May this year, aged 71, a flood of tributes filled television and the print media, with colleagues, friends, TV producers and stars offering their memories. Bert Newton, whose partnership with Kennedy began on In Melbourne Tonight, is perhaps best suited to have the last word on his long-time friend and workmate, and the biggest star Australian TV has known.

  ‘They talk about Elvis and they talk about other people being the king, but for us, here in Australia, Graham Kennedy was the king …’

  Millionaire finally delivers

  October: After six years on our screens, Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? has finally made someone seriously rich. Contestant Rob Fulton became the first person in the Australian version of the show to take home the major prize.

  Yet it might have been the worst-kept secret in Australian TV for all of 2005. Due to host Eddie McGuire’s football commentary commitments, episodes of Millionaire have to be filmed up to five weeks in advance. That’s a long time to keep the lid on a million-dollar secret.

  Rumours of the prize began circulating hours after the show finished taping. The next morning on Melbourne’s 3AW, radio host Neil Mitchell asked callers if they’d been in the audience. Three people phoned to confirm the rumour.

  Remarkably, having taken six years to produce its first millionaire, the show created another – Sydney computer analyst Martin Flood – four weeks later.

  That capped off a big year in payouts for local TV shows. In March, Melbourne mum Joanne Servedio won over $645,000 in cash and prizes on The Price Is Right.

  Neighbours turns 20

  March: After two networks, the second most watched wedding on Australian TV and more drama than most suburban streets see in a hundred years, Neighbours is celebrating its 20th anniversary.

  It all started on 18 March 1985 when the residents of Ramsay Street appeared on the residents of Ramsay Street appeared on Channel 7, but only after Nine turned the show down. Moving to Ten a year later, the families of Ramsay Street continued on their record-breaking run. In reaching its milestone, Neighbours has become the longest running series on Australian television and still draws over a million viewers a night. It screens to over six million people in Britain, is shown in 60 countries, and according to The Australian pulls a daily audience of 120 million around the globe.

  With that sort of reach, Neighbours has created stars out of many of its cast – most notably Kylie Minogue, Natalie Imbruglia, Jason Donovan, Guy Pearce and Delta Goodrem – and produced some of Australian TV’s most memorable moments.

  Not bad for a show its creators believed would only last a few years.

  Tsunami breaks down network barriers

  January: The horror of the Boxing Day tsunami has led to an outpouring of charity across the globe, with vast sums of money being collected for those in need. It has also led to a rare moment in Australian television history: the three commercial networks setting aside competition to co-produce and broadcast a tsunami telethon.

  With personalities from Seven, Nine, and Ten appearing alongside one another, and the telethon broadcast simultaneously on all three commercial networks, the event was a runaway success, with the Australian public pledging millions of dollars in aid.

  ON DEBUT

  > The Surgeon – drama series focusing on the cases and conflicts faced by a young recently qualified surgeon

  > Talking Heads – early-evening interview show

  > Answered by Fire – mini-series tracing the lives of members of the Australian peace-keeping force in East Timor

  > Australian of the Year – mockumentary revolving around the six nominees for this title, all portrayed by Chris Lilley

  > Australian Princess – reality program hosted by Jackie O, in which a group of young hopefuls vie for the crown of princess

  > Beat the Chef – hybrid cookery program cum game show in which two celebrities compete against a chef

  > Blue Water High – drama series following the adventures of seven teenage surfers in a surfing scholarship program

  > The Colony – three families (from Australia, England and Ireland) recreate a pioneer settlement as it was in the early 1800s

  > Drive – motoring program, TV counterpart to the supplement of the same name featured in Fairfax newspapers

  > Headland – soap set in a small coastal town where the secret lives of the locals aren’t always what they seem

  > Holiday Airport – reality series following the goings-on at Sydney’s Kingsford-Smith Airport

  > Any Given Sunday – Sunday afternoon sports and entertainment program featuring Garry Lyon, James Brayshaw and Sam Newman

  > Holly’s Heroes – children’s comedy drama series about a junior basketball team

  > Mortified – drama series for kids about a gauche teenage boy

  > The Memphis Trousers Half-Hour – with Roy and H.G.

  > Amazing Medical Stories – surgery transforms patients with physical deformities

  Australia’s top 50 all-time TV shows

  September: The list of Australia’s top 50 all-time TV shows is in. Perhaps not surprisingly, In Melbourne Tonight and The Graham Kennedy Show topped the list, closely followed by The Paul Hogan Show, the opening ceremony of the 2000 Sydney Olympics, and The Mavis Bramston Show.

  To decide which shows made the grade, a panel of current and retired performers, producers, directors, and entertainment reporters, all of whom were independent of the major networks, was organised to wade through a short list
of 300 shows.

  The final list has been the cause of much debate, with long-time TV writers, like the Green Guide’s Ross Warneke, penning their own lists in response.

  1 In Melbourne Tonight/

  Graham Kennedy Show (9)

  2 The Paul Hogan Show (9)

  3 Sydney 2000 Olympic Games Opening Ceremony (7)

  4 The Mavis Bramston Show (7)

  5 Brides of Christ (2)

  6 Kath and Kim (2)

  7 The Don Lane Show (9)

  8 60 Minutes (9)

  9 Number 96 (10)

  10 The Sullivans (9)

  11 A Town Like Alice (7)

  12 Homicide (7)

  13 Bandstand (9)

  14 A Country Practice (7, 10)

  15 Power Without Glory (2)

  16 The Mike Walsh Show (9, 10)

  17 Australian Story (2)

  18 Four Corners (2)

  19 The Dismissal (10)

  20 Blankety Blanks (10)

  21 Bangkok Hilton (10)

  22 Frontline (2)

  23 Enough Rope (2)

  24 My Name’s McGooley

  – What’s Yours? (7)

  25 Hey Hey, It’s Saturday (9)

  26 Parkinson in Australia (2, 10)

  27 Norman Gunston (2, 7)

  28 ANZACS (9)

  29 Sea Change (2)

  30 Fast Forward (7)

  31 This Is Your Life (7, 9)

  32 Young Talent Time (10)

  33 Mother and Son (2)

  34 Bobby Limb’s Sound of Music (9, 10)

  35 Blue Murder (2)

  36 Burke’s Backyard (9)

  37 Blue Heelers (7)

  38 Skippy (9)

  39 Geoffrey Robertson’s

  Hypotheticals (2)

  40 Countdown (2)

  41 Sylvania Waters (2)

  42 Graham Kennedy’s Coast to Coast (9)

  43 Media Watch (2)

  44 Naked Vicar Show (7)

  45 Aunty Jack Show (2)

  46 Neighbours (7, 10)

  47 Foreign Correspondent (2)

  48 Sunday (9)

  49 Play School (2)

  50 The D-Generation (2, 7)

  SBS the big winner

  November: The multicultural broadcaster has had a huge year in 2005, with Australia’s second World Cup qualifier against Uruguay and the Ashes series from England delivering bumper audiences to SBS. After the commercial networks decided against buying the rights for the Ashes, SBS grabbed them and watched as the series became one of the greatest of all time.

  By the end of the second Test at Edgbaston, SBS had already recorded its highest ratings ever. The final day of the last Test at Lords broke that record again.

  The ratings gods were again smiling on SBS for the return leg of the World Cup qualifier against Uruguay as the station recorded a 36.4 per cent share of the 6 pm to midnight viewing slot. To put that in perspective, SBS’s previous best was 21 per cent from the final Ashes Test.

  GMA gone!

  October: Bert Newton is again in the headlines with the axing of Good Morning Australia and his departure from Ten.

  ‘Fourteen years is a long time for any television show and this one was very special to me,’ Newton told the Herald Sun. ‘In making my decision, I felt with the show going to end, it made sense for me to make the break, too.’

  The move is just the latest in a career that parallels the history of Australian TV. Newton made a name for himself on In Melbourne Tonight in the late 1950s. He’s worked on all three of the commercial networks and been involved with some of our most iconic shows.

  Now that GMA has been cancelled, Newton is poised to return to Nine and continue his history-making journey through Australian TV.

  Blue Heelers makes history – maybe

  September: Despite persistent rumours Blue Heelers may be axed, Channel 7 has announced that production has started on the 13th series of the popular drama.

  The decision is not only good news for fans, but will see the show become Australia’s longest-running weekly drama, snatching the title from Homicide. When the program’s 510th episode airs, Heelers will overtake the 509 episodes of Homicide shown in Australia.

  Or will it?

  TV historians say that although Homicide’s last episode was numbered 509, there were actually 510 shown. They say the pilot episode, which appears as number 24A in the schedule, is always forgotten in calculations.

  So if Blue Heelers wants the record, they might have to squeeze out at least one more show.

  MEMORIES

  > Acerbic Australian Idol judge Ian ‘Dicko’ Dickerson is lured across to Channel 7 to be part of My Restaurant Rules.

  > Breaking with tradition, this year’s Logies ceremony is hosted by stars from the three commercial networks: Rove McManus, Eddie McGuire and Andrew O’Keefe.

  > With a $15 million dollar budget, Mary Bryant becomes the most expensive Australian-produced mini-series so far.

  > The winner of reality TV hit Big Brother takes home $1 million this year, instead of the $250,000 the previous three winners have earned.

  > When Craig Stevens gives an exclusive interview revealing his decision to let Ian Thorpe replace him in the Olympic 400 metres freestyle, Today Tonight tops the ratings in the mainland capitals.

  > A study finds that Aussie kids are exposed to at least 77 junk-food ads a week, which is a cause of the increasing rate of obesity-related disease in children.

  > The war never ends on TV and this is a year for 60th anniversaries: Auschwitz, Dresden, VE Day, VJ Day, Nagasaki and Hiroshima.

  > Crown Casino denies responsibility for alleged unchecked drug use in the toilets of the Palladium during the Logies awards event.

  > Australia’s favourite romance robot, Dexter from Perfect Match, is now a popular attraction at Moorooduc’s TV World: The Australian Museum of Modern Media.

  > Millions of viewers watch Room for Improvement host and former carpenter Tom Williams take out the prize in Seven’s Dancing with the Stars.

  > Gold Logie: Rove McManus

  > Hall of Fame: Neighbours

  > Most Outstanding Comedy Program: The Chaser Decides

  FLOPS

  In its desperate bid to find the Next Big Thing and scoop the ratings, Australian TV has presented us with some real stinkers over the years, which isn’t all bad of course; there’s a perverse pleasure in watching the mighty flounder, the expensive flail, and the unfathomably awful crash and burn.

  Sorry, but we won’t be renewing

  It’s the big question surrounding any new show: will it flop? A stroll through the crowded cemetery of Australian TV will tell you that it’s a hard thing to gauge, with many of the grandest headstones bearing an epitaph for TV’s biggest names.

  While Graham Kennedy eventually became this country’s TV King, his national shows in the early 1960s fell flat with Sydney audiences, who found his Melbourne sensibilities unappealingly coarse. In 1962, Bert Newton’s national venture also fizzled out after only four months, while the failure of Don Lane’s country-inspired, big-budget variety show Shivoo ended his partnership with TCN-9.

  Similarly, the big production houses have had a few hiccups along the way. Crawford’s Hotel Story (1977) earned the unfortunate honour of being axed before even going to air; Prime Time (1986) copped the cruelly ironic blow of premiering in a graveyard slot, and the best thing to come out of the costly Holiday Island (1981) was the set, which was later re-designed as Lassiters in Neighbours. Grundy’s also had a run of drama flops with Taurus Rising (1982), Waterloo Station (1983–84), Starting Out (1982–83), and Punishment (1981), a ‘male Prisoner’ which, despite a pilot starring Mel Gibson, soon copped the death penalty.

  Dog’s Head Bay (1999) wasn’t the seachange that star Gary Sweet was hoping for, and if a flock of good-looking bods in bikinis couldn’t save Echo Point (1995), Paradise Beach (1993–94) and Breakers (1997–99), then Anne Semler’s generous bust had no chance of preventing Arcade fr
om mounting the pedestal in TV’s Hall of Shame. In 1980, Ten spared no expense on their first in-house serial, with over $1 million alone spent on a purpose-built shopping mall in their Sydney studios. When Arcade was axed after just 30 episodes, it became Australian TV’s most expensive and notorious drama flop.

  Australian comedies have had their fair share of misfires too. Ten foolishly commissioned a second series of the write-off Bingles (1991) before the first went to air, while The Comedy Sale (1993) soon found itself in the clearance bin. Who could have guessed that a sitcom seen through the eyes of the family dog would fail (The Bob Morrison Show, 1994) or that Bullpitt (1997) would so closely resemble the play-on-words it alluded to? More recently, Let Loose Live hit an all-new low, surviving just two weeks in 2005.

  Funny for all the wrong reasons were many of the recent reality flops. Aussie versions of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy and What Not To Wear lacked the charisma of the originals, while The Resort proved to be far from a tropical paradise for Ten, closing halfway into its 12-week run. The Hot House was coolly received by audiences, and Playing It Straight made disguising your sexual orientation into prime time sport and was justly punished.

  Game shows are meant to be all about winning, but some have turned out to be real losers. In 1989, Larry Emdur and Family Double Dare went missing after just four weeks, and Larry was made no happier by the strangely western Cash Bonanza in 2001. People rushed to erase Tim Ferguson’s Don’t Forget Your Toothbrush (1995) from their memories, while Seven’s $Million Chance of a Lifetime (1999) raised the cash stakes but little audience interest. Greed (2001) proved why it’s considered one of the seven deadly sins, and in 2002 meanie Red Symons got a taste of his own medicine when Shafted lived up to its name after only a month.

  Of course, there have also been some news and current affairs stinkers. The ABC’s much-touted Australia-wide news service The National failed in its attempt to replace the regionalised 7.30 Report in 1985, while Alan Jones Live (1994) was dogged by poor ratings and dropped after just three months. Inconsistent ratings turned out to be the least of Witness’ worries, with differences between host Jana Wendt and Seven having to be resolved in court not long after the axe fell in 1997.