Ballarat television turns 50

It was at 7.00pm on Friday, 27 April 1962 that Ballarat’s first television station – BTV6 – made its first official broadcast.

The channel was the fourth regional station to launch in Victoria and marked the completion of the first stage of the roll-out of commercial television in regional Victoria.  (The second stage, started in 1964, saw the introduction of television stations in Albury/Wodonga and Mildura)

BTV6, Friday, 27 April 1962 7pm Commence Transmission 7.01 This Is BTV Channel 6.  Documentary showing the development of Channel 6 since the station site was selected 7.15 Official Opening BTV6.  Introduced by Cr. Alan Pittard, Chairman of BTV Channel 6 7.30 BP Super Show – featuring Elaine McKenna 8.30 The Grey Nurse Said Nothing 10pm Movie: The African Queen. 1951 11.30 Close Source: TV Week, 23 April 1962.

The official opening of BTV6, led by the station’s chairman Cr. Alan Pittard, included pre-recorded greetings by national TV stars Bert Newton, Bobby Limb and Bob Dyer.  Also in attendance at the official opening was Dr J. R. Dowling, chairman of national broadcaster ABC.

After the official opening, BTV6 presented an episode of The BP Super Show, featuring Australian performer Elaine McKenna.  The program was followed by the 90-minute drama The Grey Nurse Said Nothing, written by Sumner Locke-Elliott.  The play, produced at Sydney’s ATN7 in 1960, starred Lyndall Barbour, Frank Waters, Nigel Lovell, Guy Doleman, Nancy Stewart and Ken Goodlet.

Although BTV6 was last of the first stage of regional channels to launch in Victoria, the channel did claim a number of ‘firsts’.  The channel was the first in Victoria to be equipped with Image Orthicon cameras – a more modern technology than those in use by existing television stations.  BTV was also to be the first Australian channel to have its transmission facilities co-located with ABC, which was due to open its Ballarat channel ABRV3 in the first half of 1963.

On its second day of transmission BTV6 presented its first news bulletin.  The channel, now the hub for the WIN television network in Victoria, continues to produce regional news bulletins each weeknight from the same studios in Walker Street for broadcast across WIN’s statewide network.

BTV6’s early line-up of presenters included children’s host Max Bartlett (later to gain national fame on The Magic Circle Club), newsreader Arthur Scuffins (pictured) and presenters Eric Gracie, Val Oldfield, Brenda Reid and David Bell.  Early program line-ups for the channel included Australian productions BP Pick A Box, Revue ‘62, The Johnny O’Keefe Show, The Bert Newton Show and The Best Of IMT.  And with the local ABC station almost a year away, BTV6 in August commenced the direct relay of rural affairs program Country Call from ABV2 in Melbourne, keeping viewers in Ballarat and Western Victoria up to date each week on rural and agricultural matters.

To boost its signal in the fringes of its coverage area, BTV6 later installed translator stations in Nhill (BTV7), Warrnambool (BTV9), Hamilton (BTV10) and Portland (BTV11).

As well as local news the channel maintained a steady schedule of local production over the next 30 years including children’s programs, rural affairs, daytime chat shows, sporting telecasts (including the annual Stawell Gift), religious programs, talent quests and variety programs.  Apart from News, possibly the most successful local production to come from BTV6 was the variety show Six Tonight, hosted by Fred Fargher.  The weekly program, often featuring local performers as well as national guest stars, ran for over a decade from 1972.  The program, later re-named Thursday Night Live, gained a wider audience in the mid-1980s when it was picked up by other regional channels across Victoria – giving the show a potential audience of around one million viewers each week.

BTV6 won a TV Week Logie in 1987 for its children’s production Kids Only – and the show’s host, Glenn Ridge, later became a national TV presenter as host of Sale Of The Century for over a decade.

Back in the days when country TV station staffers had to be jack-of-all-trades, Gary Rice was a musician and later sales manager at the channel.  He also read the local news and became general manager of the channel and later its parent company.  His experience in management at BTV6 led to him taking on executive roles at the Nine, Ten and Seven networks in the 1980s and 1990s.

In December 1989, BTV6 and its Shepparton-based sister station GMV6 were given a new on-air identity – VIC TV – as the two stations were soon to add STV8 Mildura to their network, and were preparing for the aggregation of regional Victorian markets which was to occur in January 1992.

Expansion across the Regional Victoria market as the Nine Network affiliate saw VIC TV dominate – the first ratings survey post-aggregation saw VIC TV outrate its competitors Prime and Southern Cross Network combined.

VIC TV became WIN Television following the takeover by the NSW-based broadcaster in 1994 but maintains studio facilities in Ballarat for the production of six newscasts – one for each region across Victoria – each weeknight.

Source: The Age, 26 April 1962.

Cable signalled a new era in television

It was fifty years ago this month that saw the completion of the installation of the coaxial cable between Sydney and Melbourne, via Canberra.

The cable was a major milestone in Australia’s developing communications infrastructure.  It was five years in the making and cost £5 million to complete.  Its prime purpose was to boost the capacity for telecommunications between the two major cities.  The cable, stretching more than 960 kilometres, was made up of three pairs of tubes, each pair capable of carrying 1,260 simultaneous telephone connections.

Ultimately the cable would allow the introduction of subscriber trunk dialling (STD) between the cities, removing the need for telephone users to have to make long distance calls through an operator.  The cable was officially opened on 9 April 1962 by Prime Minister Sir Robert Menzies in Canberra flicking the switch, followed by the Lord Mayors of Sydney and Melbourne making the first direct-dial telephone call between their respective cities.

But while the cable was primarily for use by telephony it also had a secondary purpose – to provide a link between Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra for the transmission of television programs.

Television was still in its infancy when planning for the cable had commenced in 1957 – construction had commenced in 1959 – and the ability to connect Australia’s two major cities for the new medium was to be a significant development.  Prior to the launch of the cable, connection between the two cities was limited to a network of mountain-top microwave links.  The first Sydney-Melbourne transmission was made in January 1959 when Sydney television executive Brian Wright of ATN7 greeted viewers of In Melbourne Tonight on GTV9 on the eve of the Test cricket coverage that was to come to Melbourne from the Sydney Cricket Ground.

The microwave links were used for interstate transmission of a number of sporting telecasts, including transmission of the Melbourne Cup coverage to Sydney from 1960 in a rare joint broadcast between Sydney’s three television stations – ABN2, ATN7 and TCN9.

While the new coaxial cable had capacity to carry television programs as well as telecommunications traffic, and all channels had access to the infrastructure, it was not often used apart from special events and sporting telecasts such as the 1962-63 Test cricket series.

But the television industry’s biggest development in the use of the coaxial cable came late in 1963 – when the Frank Packer-owned channels TCN9 Sydney and GTV9 Melbourne entered into a two-year lease for a full-time two-way connection.  The cost to the network was estimated at £100,000 a year – described as the equivalent cost of building a major television studio every year.  The link would enable the two channels to instantly share program material and news content.  The network had expected to offset the cost of the link with improved efficiencies in transporting program content between cities and by gaining a competitive edge over its rivals (noting the imminent launch of a third commercial network) in being able to broadcast news and program content across both cities simultaneously.

The coaxial cable link was first used by the National Television Network (now the Nine Network) for live coverage between Sydney, Melbourne and Canberra of the day’s federal election results on the evening of Saturday, 30 November 1963.

From the next day, the coaxial cable was used for the instant transmission of news material between TCN9 and GTV9, with viewers in each city able to see live interstate news reports.  And a feature of both channel’s nightly news bulletins was Kevin Sanders Reports, a five-minute report from Canberra.

Over the summer of 1963-64, the cable started to be used for the instant relay of afternoon game shows between the two cities, and the two channels experimented with the link to determine future opportunities with a view to broadcasting or linking prime-time programs such as In Melbourne Tonight and Sydney’s Tonight With Dave Allen from February 1964.  The network was well aware of the difference in viewing habits and tastes between the two cities and had the challenge of overcoming those differences while making the best use of the new link – noting that Kennedy had struggled to gain a major following in Sydney in the past and it was not known how well Irish comedian Dave Allen would be received in Melbourne.  “We are going slowly on this one,” a TCN9 executive told TV Times in November 1963.  “We hope that by getting together and creating a greater inter-city awareness through the news, sport and other programs, we can gradually break down these local tastes.  We want to create a climate where Sydneysiders will accept Melbourne’s atmosphere and personalities, and vice versa.  Unless we can do this, it’s doom for live programming in Australia.  With costs so high, there’s no future for this unless you can find a really national outlet for a show.”

The two National Television Network stations also committed to sharing its cable connection with the other networks “on occasions of national importance which are not subject to commercial exploitation.  Certain major sporting relays, such as Test cricket, will be offered to the ABC and other stations, if the rights are available.  We will also release the facilities for other purposes provided we receive proper notice of others wishes and provided they do not prejudice our own expensive commitments.”

In 1965, TCN9 and GTV9 created television history with a split-screen broadcast linking their respective Tonight shows, with Kennedy in Melbourne and Don Lane (Allen’s successor) in Sydney performing a duet, live-to-air in each city.  Kennedy recalled many years later that in television terms the concept was logistically as complex as the moon landing – but it created a defining moment in the development of television.

Source: TV Times, 20 November 1963.  The Age, 10 April 1962.  Official Year Book of the Commonwealth of Australia, Commonwealth Bureau of Census and Statistics, 1962.  DBCDE.

ABC1 presents The Real Graham Kennedy

When TV looks back on the man that was Graham Kennedy, it rarely drifts from the public side of the talented performer:  The hilarious moments from In Melbourne Tonight, his comic rapport with Bert Newton, the portrayal of the mega-camp ‘Cyril’ in Blankety Blanks, and the 1980s success of Graham Kennedy’s News Show, just to name a few. 

But as well as the very public Kennedy, it was well known that there was also an equally private one.  A shy, somewhat reclusive person who rarely gave any real insight into his life away from the cameras.

In The Real Graham Kennedy, a one-hour documentary screening tomorrow (Sunday) night on ABC1, a number of Kennedy’s former colleagues, friends and employees recall some of their experiences and memories of Kennedy, giving some insight into this private persona.  Some of those appearing in the program include Val Wesley, Ernie Carroll (the man behind Ossie Ostrich), Toni Lamond, Joy Westmore, Rosemary Margan (who confessed having to ask a friend what was that word that Kennedy had disguised as a “crow call” on that infamous night in 1975), Mike McColl-Jones, Philip Brady, Pete Smith, Denise Drysdale and Susan-Gaye Anderson.

The program also includes rare home movie footage and some early comedy sketches, depicting some of Kennedy’s early comic influences, as well as audio commentary from Kennedy himself as he recalls some of his family and his early background.

The Real Graham Kennedy was produced in 2009 by Bob Phillips, a former producer of In Melbourne Tonight.

The Real Graham Kennedy.  Sunday 5 February, 10.00pm.  ABC1

GLV: Australia’s first regional channel

It is 50 years today since Australia’s first regional television station was officially opened.

GLV10, covering Gippsland and the Latrobe Valley in eastern Victoria, was opened on Saturday, 9 December 1961.  The launch was the culmination of seven years of planning, starting when a group of influential Gippsland individuals formed Gippsland Telecasters.  The group also had the support of the local print media who were keen to contribute to the proposed channel’s local news coverage.

Gippsland Telecasters then joined with other local businesses – including  newspapers, theatres and drive-ins – and local churches to become shareholders in Eastern Victorian Television, the company that would submit the application for a television broadcasting licence for Gippsland and the Latrobe Valley.

The successful application then saw the appointment of the channel’s first General Manager, Gordon Lewis, who began working from temporary offices in the former Traralgon Town Hall.  Construction then began on the station’s premises located on the Princes Highway just outside of Traralgon.

Launching five years after the advent of television in Sydney and Melbourne, GLV promised a modern and well-designed production facility – in a building designed specifically for a television station, unlike Melbourne channels GTV9 and HSV7 whose studios were converted from pre-existing buildings. 

GLV10’s opening night’s programs started at 5.45pm with a 15-minute film, Touring Gippsland, to be followed by an introduction to the station by radio 3TR announcer Don Ewart (pictured).  Unfortunately, Ewart’s opening words were never heard by anyone outside the studio as his microphone was not switched on.

Programs to follow included imports Jungle Jim, Whirlybirds and I Love Lucy before the formalities of the official opening of the station by the Chairman of the Broadcasting Control Board, Mr R. G. Osborne, accompanied by General Manager Gordon Lewis.  Opening night was also attended by a number of ‘national’ personalities including Horrie Dargie, Bobby Limb, Happy Hammond and Johnny Chester. 

Later in the evening GLV10 crossed to Melbourne’s ABV2 for a one-hour live coverage of the day’s Federal Election results before presenting a 15-minute local news bulletin and then signing off for the night.

The new channel had a staff of 35 and was planning to broadcast initially for around 30 hours a week.

Two weeks after GLV10’s debut came the launch of regional stations GMV6 Shepparton and BCV8 Bendigo.

Like many regional channels in the early days GLV maintained a number of local productions.  The channel’s first news service was a daily 15-minute bulletin presented by Don Ewart, including local news and day-old national news footage that had been sent overnight by train from Melbourne.  Early local programs included children’s program GLV Teleclub, pop music program Teen Time, talent quest Battle Of The Towns, variety program Showtime, documentary series Gippsland’s Pathway Of Time, local sports coverage and Sunday afternoon programs Spotlight On Sport and Farming Today.

By 1963, GLV10 had begun the direct relay of the main evening news bulletin from GTV9 in Melbourne to supplement its own ten-minute local news bulletin.  The channel was also using the relay facility for the broadcasting of programs like In Melbourne Tonight, Homicide, Sunnyside Up, daytime game shows and VFL coverage, enabling local viewers the chance to see these programs as they were going to air in Melbourne or at least shortly after.

By the mid-1970s GLV10 had partnered with Bendigo channel BCV8 with both channels providing a common schedule across their respective areas.  Mildura channel STV8 then affiliated with the two channels and adopted their schedule and branding. 

In 1979, GLV10 had agreed to convert its call-sign and frequency to GLV8 in January 1980 in order to allow Melbourne channel ATV0 access to convert to the channel 10 frequency.

And like many regional television stations GLV provided a training ground for some that went on to careers in the wider media industry.  Journalist Malcolm Gray went on to Melbourne channels ATV0 and HSV7.  A former Miss Victoria, Simone Semmens, was a local newsreader before joining the Seven Network.  Keith McGowan, who went on to a 50-year career in broadcasting, hosted Teen Time in the 1960s.  Richard Zachariah was a local presenter at GLV before going to the Seven Network to present Seven National News and Eleven AM, and co-host ABC’s The Home Show with then partner Maggie Tabberer.  Award-winning journalist and Four Corners reporter Sally Neighbour also came from GLV8.

Showbiz veteran Denise Drysdale, a resident of the local area, presented a morning show on GLV8 during the 1980s.

GLV has endured many on-air name changes over the last few decades – from Southern Cross TV8 (1982) to Southern Cross Network (1989), SCN (1993), Ten Victoria (1994) and Southern Cross Ten (2001).

From 1992, the aggregation of regional markets in Victoria saw the Southern Cross Network of GLV and BCV expand its signal into the regions of Ballarat, Shepparton and Albury, while the incumbents from these regions in turn expanded into the areas covered by GLV and BCV.

With aggregation the Southern Cross Network affiliated with the Ten Network for the supply of programs supplemented by locally-produced programming such as maintaining local news in the Bendigo and Gippsland markets, a statewide edition of Eyewitness News with Rob Gaylard, and children’s program Surprise Surprise.

Some changes in the news format and presentation followed but the change to Ten Victoria in May 1994 saw all local production ceased and the network essentially becoming a straight relay of Network Ten’s schedule.

In 2000, GLV was forced to shutdown its Channel 8 signal in Gippsland and move to UHF Channel 37.  This was to accommodate the launch of the digital signal from GTV9 in Melbourne which was to use the 8 frequency.

From its modest beginnings with two regional channels in Victoria, Southern Cross Ten as it is now covers regional markets from Portland in western Victoria right up to Cairns in the far north of Queensland and across to Broken Hill and the Spencer Gulf region in South Australia.  Much of its on-air presentation is co-ordinated from centralised facilities in Canberra.

With the advent of digital television and multi-channels Southern Cross Ten has also adopted the Ten Network’s digital channels Eleven and One across its coverage areas.

And in Gippsland, as with the rest of regional Victoria, it was the end of an era in May this year with the shutdown of all analogue television transmissions from all local broadcasters – just a few months short of today’s 50 year milestone.

Source: TV Week, 7 December 1961.  The Age, 9 December 1961.  The Latrobe Valley Express, 9 December 1986.  Morwell Historical Society.

TV’s golden girls signing off

It was a morning of farewells as two of TV’s golden girls signed off from their respective shows today.

Over at Ten’s The Circle, Denise Drysdale (pictured) announced her retirement – marking the end of a showbusiness career that has spanned more than fifty years.

Starting as a performer in early children’s shows including The Happy Show and The Tarax Show, Drysdale worked her way up to pop music shows such as Uptight, Kommotion and Dig We Must.

Then in the 1970s she became Ernie Sigley’s ‘barrel girl’ on The Ernie Sigley Show, forming an enduring partnership that saw both of them win Gold Logies in 1975, with Drysdale winning a second Gold in 1976.

One of TV’s more versatile performers, she has appeared in dramas such as Division 4, Homicide and Cop Shop, comedies like The Bluestone Boys and The Norman Gunston Show and countless music and variety shows including Countdown, The Penthouse Club, The Daryl Somers Show, The Mike Walsh Show right through to Spicks And Specks. 

Living on a farm in Gippsland, in the 1980s she hosted a morning show for local channel GLV8, and later took over from Jacki MacDonald on Nine’s Hey Hey It’s Saturday before being re-united with Sigley to host morning shows In Melbourne Today and In Sydney Today (both shows later merged into Ernie And Denise).

In the ‘90s, Drysdale teamed up with Frankie J. Holden on the revived In Melbourne Tonight before moving to the Seven Network to host her own daytime show, Denise.

Early last year Network Ten announced that Drysdale was joining the presenting team on its new morning show The Circle.  Later in the year she was again re-united with Sigley in a segment on the show.

Although the show faces tough competition, particularly from The Morning Show on Seven, The Circle this year won a Logie for Most Popular Light Entertainment Program.

Drysdale now looks forward to taking a well-earned break and spending time with her new grandson.

Meanwhile, over at the Nine Network, there was a farewell for Kerri-Anne Kennerley whose morning show comes to an end after nine years on air. 

Kennerley was a teenager when she appeared on children’s programs on Queensland television in the 1960s and 1970s.  After working overseas for several years she returned to Australia, appearing on the soapie The Restless Years before taking over as co-host on Network Ten’s Good Morning Australia in 1981.  It was a role that she made her own for 11 years, outlasting a number of her male on-air colleagues.  She later hosted an afternoon show, Monday To Friday, and worked in Sydney radio.

In the mid-1990s, Kennerley took over as host of Nine’s Midday – giving the show a new lease on life after some years of instability.  The show wound up in 1998 and after a stint back at the Ten Network on ill-fated shows like Moment Of Truth and Greed she returned to Nine in 2002 to host Mornings With Kerri-Anne, later re-named Kerri-Anne.

The show achieved global fame in 2007 when an interview with a “jet-lagged” John Stamos went viral.

The demise of Kerri-Anne comes after recent speculation about the show’s future, sparked by Kennerley taking leave from the program and with the show featuring a number of guest hosts. 

Although the Kerri-Anne program has ended – the ‘summer series’ of best-of segments starts on Monday – Kennerley remains with the Nine Network for future projects.

Nine will replace Kerri-Anne next year with a new show to be hosted by Sonia Kruger, who is coming across after more than a decade with the Seven Network and is best known as the co-host for eleven seasons of  Dancing With The Stars.

YouTube: aussiebeachut0, Michael Shephard

Obituary: Ray Taylor

Ray Taylor, host of Australia’s first breakfast TV program, has died in Sydney at the age of 83.

Born in Yorkshire, Taylor came to Australia in the early 1950s with his new Australian wife, Lesley.  With a media background that only entailed a few minor roles with Canadian broadcaster CBC, Taylor enrolled in an announcer’s course and landed a job at radio station 2GN, Goulburn.

By the end of the decade the presenter with the cheeky streak was in Sydney, as host of ATN7’s breakfast program Today.  It was the first early morning show on Australian TV.

Taylor was later sacked from the show.  He told TV Times in 1964 that he was given no reason for the sacking but Sydney press reports at the time indicated tensions between him and the channel.

Today was cancelled three months after the sacking.

He then came to Melbourne in 1964 to join the lineup for new channel ATV0.  He hosted the channel’s opening night special, This Is It!, before launching a weekly late night variety show, The Ray Taylor Show.  The show, initially screening on Saturday nights, promised a more sophisticated alternative to the popular In Melbourne Tonight as well as an open-ended format.  “If our guests want to talk to 2.00am, and they are interesting enough, we will stay with them,” he told TV Times.

The Ray Taylor Show proved to be a frustrating experience – with Melbournians seemingly not warming to Taylor’s more mature style of humour and commentary.  “So many viewers here still aren’t mature enough to have a laugh at themselves or hear sex discussed without getting flustered.  It’s all too parochial,” he told TV Times early in 1965.

The show had also endured four different producers and a number of timeslot changes as the channel sought to gradually turn the show around into an In Melbourne Tonight-style clone.  Its last timeslot change saw it move to Monday nights directly up against IMT.

The Ray Taylor Show eventually wound up in March 1966.  The axing came just as Taylor was rehearsing for a role in an upcoming ABC play, Ashes To Ashes.

Taylor and his second wife, singer Annette Klooger, then went to the US where he was invited by a former ATN7 colleague, Digby Wolfe, to join the writing team for The New Bill Cosby Show.  He went on to then write for other American shows including All in the Family, Barney Miller, Dinah! and Cher.

He returned to Melbourne in the mid 1980s, to take on the early evening shift on radio station 3AW.  He then went to Sydney in 1987 to ABC station 2BL to present the breakfast program before retiring from broadcasting in 1990.

Ray Taylor is survived by wife Annette.

Source: Sydney Morning Herald.  TV Times, 5 August 1964.  TV Times, 24 March 1965.  TV Times, 15 December 1965.  TV Times, 30 March 1966.

Obituary: Googie Withers

Actress Googie Withers has died in Sydney at the age of 94.

Born in India to a British father and Dutch mother, she was christened Georgette Lizette but as a child didn’t like the name so she adopted the nickname Googie which became her name for life.

She went on to become a star of stage and screen in Britain and it was working on The Loves of Joanna Godden that she met her future husband, Australian actor John McCallum.

They were married in 1948 and moved to Australia in 1959 when McCallum was offered the job of joint managing director of the JC Williamson theatre company.

But while Withers is best known for her work in British films and television, she has a unique place in Australia’s television history.

She was the first presenter for what are now known as the TV Week Logie Awards.  But the awards, then known just as the TV Week Awards and presented only to Melbourne-based stars and programs, were not presented in the lavish ceremonies that are known today.

Television in Australia was little over two years old and it was early in 1959 when Withers was on the set of GTV9’s In Melbourne Tonight to hand out the awards for “Stars Of The Year” – the precursor to the Gold Logie – to Graham Kennedy and Panda Lisner and to award In Melbourne Tonight for Best Live Show.

“It was very interesting coming over to Australia from England, where we had had television for many years,” she later told TV Week.  “We were awfully interested in Graham Kennedy because he was so young then.”

Her career continued in film, stage and television between the United Kingdom, the US and Australia, including the early 1970s Australian TV series Boney and the mid-1970s British prison drama Within These Walls, until her last credited screen role in the 1996 film Shine.

She was the first non-Australian to be awarded an Officer of the Order of Australia Award in 1980.

Both Withers and McCallum, prior to celebrating 60 years of marriage, were interviewed on ABC’s Talking Heads in 2007. 

Googie Withers is survived by three children and six grandchildren.  John McCallum died in 2010.

Source: ABC, ABC, IMDB, 21 Years Of Logies (TV Week, 1979).

Obituary: Godfrey Philipp

Godfrey Philipp, the co-creator of children’s programs The Magic Circle Club and Adventure Island, has died and this week has been remembered by former colleagues at a memorial service in Melbourne.

Coming to Australia from the UK in the late 1950s, Philipp joined GTV9 as a production assistant, working on programs including In Melbourne Tonight.  He then went to NBN3, Newcastle, as a senior producer-director.

Then, back in Melbourne, he co-created The Magic Circle Club – a lavishly-produced children’s series that was one of the first productions to come from new Melbourne channel ATV0 in the mid 1960s.  The pantomime series was created by Philipp and writer John Michael Howson and starred Nancy Cato amongst a crew of characters including Fredd Bear (Tedd Dunn), Fee Fee Bear, Leonardo di Funbird, Marlena de Witch, Mother Hubbard, Cassius Cuckoo, Sir Jasper Crookley, Twaddle and Boddle and Patricia-who-wishes.

There were masses of protest from young fans when The Magic Circle Club was axed by ATV0 after more than 500 episodes in May 1967.  Philipp then went on to produce Hey You!, a short-lived sitcom from the same channel.

Philipp and Howson then went across to ABC to create Adventure Island, a similar concept and format to The Magic Circle Club that would go on to be just as popular and would run for five years before its axing was also met with outrage from young viewers.

Despite the sudden axing of the program, in 1973 Philipp was awarded a Logie for his contribution to children’s television.

Howson paid tribute to his former colleague at the memorial service:

''He did things with black and white television - pre all the wonderful digital magic that they now have - that were amazing.  'If I came up with, 'they're up on the moon and they catch a rocket there', he would work out how to do that. With one light, he'd change the whole effect of a scene. People come up to me today and say, 'oh the colours (of Adventure Island) were beautiful. I tell them, 'it wasn't in colour, it was in black-and-white'.''

In 1978, he produced another children’s series, Rainbow, for regional television station NRN11 in Coffs Harbour.  The series, comprising five episodes, featured children from local schools with each episode covering a different theme.  The program won a TV Week Logie Award in 1979 for most outstanding contribution to children’s television but was never picked up for screening by a capital city network.

Philipp then went to the Reg Grundy Organisation where he produced and directed episodes of the popular drama Prisoner.

As the years went on Howson said that Philipp – “who was not emotionally strong” – had started to “cut himself off from the world.”  It is believed that he was homeless for some time and spent the last ten years of his life at the Brotherhood of St Lawrence aged care centre in Fitzroy – the venue of this week’s memorial service.

“I will always remember Godfrey with a great deal of love and affection, great memories and gratitude for what he did,'' Howson said.

Source: TV Times, 20 January 1965.  TV Week, 24 February 1973. TV Week, 24 March 1979. The Age.

ABC boss in Queen’s Birthday honours

ABC Managing Director Mark Scott (pictured) has been named an named an officer of the Order of Australia in this year’s Queen’s Birthday honours list.

Mr Scott, head of the national broadcaster since 2006, was recognised “for distinguished service to media and communications, and to the community through advisory and governance roles with a range of social justice and educational bodies.”

Before becoming Managing Director of the ABC, Mr Scott had a background in the print media industry and has served as a board member for charities including Wesley Mission.

Other media identities to be recognised in this year’s list include sporting identity Max Walker, former test cricketer and commentator for ABC radio and the Seven and Nine networks; Peter FitzSimons, author, newspaper columnist and broadcaster; and Bob Horsfall (pictured), actor, scriptwriter and performer in radio, television and films – including eight years at HSV7, four years at GTV9, and appearances in programs including In Melbourne Tonight, Sunnyside Up, World Of Sport, Division 4, Matlock Police, Bellbird, Homicide, Prisoner, Neighbours and Blue Heelers.

A total of 376 Australians were honoured in this year’s list.

Source: Governor-General of Australia, Golden Days Radio

TV Week Logie Awards: 50 years ago

British actor Jimmy Edwards was the special guest of honour at the 3rd annual TV Week Logie Awards presentation, held at Sydney’s Chevron-Hilton Hotel on 18 March 1961. 

The Gold Logie for Australia’s most popular television personality was won by Pick-A-Box host Bob Dyer.  “This is the most exciting night of my life,” he said as he received his award.

Sydney’s ATN7 won two Logies – one for variety show Curtain Call, the predecessor to variety series Revue ‘61 and which introduced English-born Digby Wolfe to Australian audiences, and one for the play Shadow Of A Pale Horse. 

National broadcaster ABC also won two Logies – Stormy Petrel, the story of the mutiny against Captain Bligh when he was Governor of New South Wales, was awarded Best Drama Series, while the broadcaster also won a Logie for its coverage of the Davis Cup tennis which was broadcast via a special link between Sydney and Melbourne.

National awards:
Gold Logie: Bob Dyer (pictured)
Best Variety Program: Curtain Call (ATN7)
Best Comedians: Buster Fiddess, Bobby Limb (both from The Mobil-Limb Show)
Best Singer: Elaine McKenna (In Melbourne Tonight/The Graham Kennedy Show)
Best Australian Drama: Shadow Of A Pale Horse (ATN7)
Best Drama Series: Stormy Petrel (ABC)
Best Sports Broadcast: Davis Cup (ABC)
Best Actor: Brian James (Stormy Petrel)

State-based awards (Most Popular Male Personality, Most Popular Female Personality, Most Popular Program):
NSW: Digby Wolfe (ATN7), Tanya Halesworth (ABN2), The Bobby Limb Show (TCN9)
VIC: Graham Kennedy (GTV9), Panda Lisner (GTV9), In Melbourne Tonight (GTV9)
QLD: Brian Tait (BTQ7), Nancy Knudsen (BTQ7), The Late Show (BTQ7)
SA: Ian Fairweather (NWS9), Maree Tomasetti (ADS7), Adelaide Tonight (NWS9)

The presentation was telecast live to Sydney viewers in a half-hour broadcast on ABN2, while ABC stations in other states presented a delayed broadcast the following week.

Pictured (left to right): Lionel Williams (Adelaide Tonight), Ian Fairweather, Maree Tomasetti, Elaine McKenna, Bernard Kerr (sports director, ABC), Bob Dyer, Graham Kennedy, Bobby Limb, Panda Lisner, Tanya Halesworth, Nancy Knudsen, Rod Kinnear (program manager, GTV9), Brian Tait, Wilson Irving (program manager, BTQ7)

Source: TV Week, 23 March 1961.  TV Week, 30 March 1961.

1991: February 16-22

Private property!
Home And Away star Rebekah Elmaloglou (pictured) is determined to keep her professional and personal lives separate.  Unlike many fellow soap stars, Elmaloglou has refused to talk publicly about her boyfriend of twelve months and the pair have never been photographed together.  “It’s just one of those things I don’t find important to talk about,” the 17-year-old told TV Week.  “My private life is the same as any other girl of my age.  I’ve got my schoolfriends, I’ve got my family, I’ve got my boyfriend.” 

It was 20 years ago today…
Hey Hey It’s Saturday returns to air this week, starting its 20th year.  “The official celebration is in October (the show debuted on 9 October 1971), but we’re out to make this the best year ever of Hey Hey so we’re starting the celebrations early,” host Daryl Somers told TV Week.  This year the show is taking on some changes as Somers and colleague Ernie Carroll take over producing the show after last year’s split from producer Gavan Disney.  “Ernie and I are happier, and I know a lot of the people around us are feeling happier, too,” Somers said.  “I think it’s going to be a very harmonious situation for all concerned this year.”  The year ahead could also see Hey Hey head to London and even Hollywood for some special shows.  Somers is also excited to have new executive producer Jim McKay on board for the show.  McKay was the program manager at GTV9 who originally named the program back in 1971 and hired the 19-year-old Somers for the job of host.  “He came up with the name and paid me $75 a week, that was it!  It’s taken me 20 years to get him back – that’s what he’s on now,” Somers laughed.

‘If it was me, I wouldn’t do it’
Andre Eikmeier (pictured), the 18-year-old who is probably best known to viewers as the pizza delivery boy in Kylie Minogue’s Coca-Cola commercial, has been acting for ten years but is taking on the change from child actor to young adult with a controversial role in ABC’s medical drama GP.  In an episode to air this week, Eikmeier plays the role of student Tony Wood who is suffering from stomach ulcers and the pressure of exams and finds himself under attack from his father who discovers that he has been having a relationship with a man ten years older.  For Eikmeier it was a challenging role to take on.  “It was very hard, because I’d never had any contact with gay people.  I guess I’d been sheltered from it, so I didn’t really know how to approach it.  I gave the part a lot of consideration, and my dad said, ‘Well, it’s up to you – but if it was me, I wouldn’t do it’,” he told TV Week.

Briefly…
Jeff Phillips (pictured), host of Network Ten’s new talent quest series Star Search, says he knows that shows like this can give a young star their big break.  “I was a product of this type of show,” he told TV Week.  “I drove from Perth to Melbourne in my Volkswagen to go on New Faces.  I went on the show on Sunday night, won it, and was immediately invited by Graham Kennedy to be on In Melbourne Tonight and got sudden recognition.  I was only 19 at the time.”

The Flying Doctors star Brett Climo makes his dramatic exit from the series this week as his character, Dr David Ratcliffe, attempts a rescue on a cliff face and finds himself hanging upside down from a safety rope before falling to a ledge below.  “This episode is definitely among the best moments of my career,” Climo told TV Week.

Actress Kaarin Fairfax, best known to viewers as Dolour in The Harp In The South and Poor Man’s Orange, is joining Network Ten comedy Col’n Carpenter as the show’s new female lead following the departure of Vikki Blanche.  The series will also be seen in a new timeslot – Sunday nights at 8.00pm, after The Simpsons – when it returns to screens next month.

Lawrie Masterson’s Sound Off
”On went the VCR for a first look at Chances (featuring Natalie McCurry, pictured), the new Nine Network series so heavily publicised, yet so closely guarded at the same time.  All the pre-publicity had promised adults only fare and, while this was hardly a return to the full frontal days of Number 96 or The Box, it did make it seem worthwhile checking that the little ones were, indeed, just like everyone in the show – in bed.”

Program Highlights (February 16-22):
Saturday:  Daryl Somers and Ossie Ostrich head Hey Hey It’s Saturday’s return for 1991, up against the debut of Ten’s new talent quest series Star Search, hosted by Jeff Phillips.  Seven crosses to AFL Park, Mount Waverley, for the Fosters Cup: St Kilda versus West Coast Eagles.

Sunday:  SBS begins a national screening of the twelve-part documentary series My Place, My Land, My People – a production of Queensland-based regional broadcaster QTV and a winner at the 1990 TV Week Logie Awards for most outstanding achievement by a regional television station – followed by the series return of SBS viewers’ feedback program Hotline.  Sunday night movies are Beverly Hills Cop II (Seven) and Working Girl (Ten).

Monday:  SBS debuts a new weekly music series, MC Tee Vee, and later in the evening Pria Viswalingam hosts the series return of nightly current affairs program Dateline.  Ten presents the movie-length debut of popular US series Twin Peaks.  After the late edition of Ten Eyewitness News, Ten presents US talk show Donahue, with each night’s episode repeated the following afternoon.  Ten’s overnight coverage of the Gulf war continues via CNN.

Tuesday:  In A Country Practice (Seven), Bob Hatfield (Gordon Piper) becomes a vegetarian after he is asked to kill six sheep.  Aussie actress Penny Downie (The Box, Prisoner, The Sullivans) stars in the new six-part British series Campaign which debuts on ABC.

Wednesday:  ABC presents 90-minute documentary One Australia?, a study on racism and multiculturalism in Australia and asking whether cohesion in our society can be achieved while maintaining diversity.

Thursday:  Veteran actor George Mallaby (pictured) guest stars in Nine’s drama Chances.  SBS current affairs program Face The Press and sports magazine The Sports Machine return for 1991.

Source: TV Week (Victoria edition), incorporating TV Times and TV Guide.   16 February 1991. Southdown Press.

Turning the lights out at Television City

It started life at the turn of the 20th century as a piano factory, and then a soup factory.

Then, in 1956, the building at Bendigo Street, Richmond, became part of the dawn of the new industry of television and went from producing 57 varieties of soup to a variety of a completely different kind.

For over fifty years it has been ‘Hollywood-on-the-Yarra’ as it has produced television programs – variety, drama, comedy, children’s programs, sports, news and current affairs – that are among the most loved and most popular in the country.

It was where the Victorian governor Sir Dallas Brooks (pictured, above) made his grand entrance on GTV9’s opening night – 19 January 1957 – by entering the studio in a chauffeur-driven limousine. The two-hour variety program that followed, featuring names like Bob and Dolly Dyer, Toni Lamond, Frank Sheldon, Ron Blaskett, Terry Dear and Lou Toppano’s orchestra, certainly set the tone that this new channel was going to have a clear focus on light entertainment and variety – and it certainly delivered that in the decades that followed.

A few months after GTV9’s lavish opening night, a shy radio star named Graham Kennedy made his first TV appearance and shortly after made his TV hosting debut on a variety show, In Melbourne Tonight. The show would continue for over a decade and earned Kennedy the nickname of the King of Australian TV. It is a title that nobody has dared to challenge ever since.

In 1959, Kennedy was joined by Bert Newton (pictured, right, with Kennedy in 1964) – a personality from rival channel HSV7 who had resigned from his employer on-camera before making the move to GTV9. For his debut at GTV9 he was placed next to Kennedy to present a commercial during IMT. It was the beginning of a long-running professional partnership and a personal friendship that would last decades.

In 1964, with a new rival TV channel – ATV0 – about to debut, GTV9 expanded its premises to a new state-of-the-art studio, Studio 9. It was a studio built specifically for IMT but would go on to host a list of productions in the years that followed – including New Faces, The Graham Kennedy Show, The Don Lane Show (pictured), The Ernie Sigley Show, Hey Hey It’s Saturday, The Paul Hogan Show, Family Feud, Sale Of The Century, The Daryl Somers Show, Tonight With Bert Newton, Blankety Blanks, All Together Now, The Price Is Right, The Footy Show, Burgo’s Catch Phrase, Don’t Forget Your Toothbrush, Starstuck, Who Wants To Be A Millionaire, Temptation, Bert’s Family Feud and Millionaire Hot Seat.

As well as variety and light entertainment shows, 22 Bendigo Street – or ‘Television City’ as it became known – was home to several drama series including Emergency, one of the earliest TV drama series ever made in Australia, Division 4, The Sullivans, Starting Out, The Flying Doctors, All The Way, Chances, Halifax fp and Stingers.

Eric Pearce (pictured) and American Jack Little formed Melbourne’s (if not Australia’s) first newsreading duo, later making way for others including Brian Naylor, who read the news from Bendigo Street for twenty years, Peter Hitchener and Jo Hall. Mike Walsh hosted a 1960s version of Today, and Tanya Halesworth (and later Mickie de Stoop) hosted a daytime current affairs program, No Man’s Land, in the 1970s.

This Saturday night, the Nine Network pays tribute to the stars and the shows that have come from the famous studios as it prepares to move out from the building.

After Daryl Somers and his team sign off from the final episode of Hey Hey It’s Saturday for 2010 from Studio 9, Nine will cross to Bert Newton and Eddie McGuire in Studio 1, back where it all began with Sir Dallas Brookes and the early days of IMT, to present Lights, Camera, Party! – Television City Celebrates.

The two-hour special will feature some of the people, programs and magic moments that have featured from the legendary television studios over the past 53 years. The studio audience for the program will be made up entirely of past and present Nine Network personalities.

The building at 22 Bendigo Street was purchased by Vivas Lend Lease earlier this year with a plan to redevelop the historic site as a residential and retail precinct. The building’s original red brick exterior is heritage protected but the remainder of the site, including extensions such as Studio 9, will be redeveloped and will include some design aspects that will acknowledge the site’s significant heritage.

GTV9 has entered into a long-term agreement with the inner city Docklands Studios for future large scale productions – while other functions of the channel will be relocated to new premises in the Docklands precinct nearby.

Somers, whose TV career began as host of Cartoon Corner and Hey Hey It’s Saturday in the early 1970s, had previously suggested that part of the redevelopment be reserved for a TV museum and he has now been reported to be considering producing a documentary on the history of the famous studios.

Lights, Camera, Party! – Television City Celebrates. Saturday 27 November, 9.40pm. Nine (Melbourne – other areas check local guides)

Source: Herald Sun

The Circle reunites Ernie and Denise

It was a reunion of one of TV’s most popular partnerships when The Circle co-host Denise Drysdale was joined by guest Ernie Sigley on the show.

The pair were a hit with viewers in the mid 1970s on The Ernie Sigley Show, with both of them (pictured, with Hollywood legend John Wayne) winning TV Week Gold Logies in 1975 as the most popular personalities on television.  Drysdale went on to win another Gold Logie the following year.  Their popularity also saw their cover version of the 1960s hit Hey Paula hit the top of the charts in 1974.

Their career paths have crossed numerous times in the years that followed, including several years co-hosting the Nine Network’s In Melbourne Today and sister program In Sydney Today, before both programs were amalgamated into Ernie And Denise.

Sigley then returned to radio, presenting the afternoon program on radio 3AW for over a decade, while Drysdale went on to the 1990s revival of In Melbourne Tonight before hosting her own morning show, Denise, on the Seven Network.

The appearance of Sigley next to Drysdale on The Circle – showing that they still have that comic chemistry alongside each other – leads up to a series of live shows to be performed by the duo.

The Melbourne Cup: 1960, 1970, 1980

The running of the 100th Melbourne Cup, on 1 November 1960, was a significant one for television. It was the first time the race was telecast direct to Sydney in a rare co-operative effort between Sydney’s three TV channels – ABN2, ATN7 and TCN9. The direct telecast, scheduled to run for about half-an-hour, included the race, the presentation of the Cup and interviews with the winning jockey, trainer and owner.

ABC’s Michael Charlton hosted the coverage and the commentary of the race was given by ABC’s Joe Brown – whose commentary was also broadcast through ABC radio nationally and overseas through Radio Australia – with TCN9’s Ken Howard presenting the post-race interviews. The telecast was directed and produced by Ron Davis of Melbourne’s GTV9.

Meanwhile, Melbourne viewers – denied the chance to see the race live on television until the late 1970s – would have to make do with delayed coverage of the race during the evening news bulletins on ABV2, HSV7 and GTV9. The film of the race would also be shown during In Melbourne Tonight (GTV9) and Sports Cavalcade (ABV2) and after The Bobby Limb Show on HSV7.

But, being the centenary running of the Melbourne Cup, ABV2 and HSV7 presented special programs devoted to the history of the event. ABV2’s The Cup – 100 Years was screened on Cup Eve and tracked the history of the event from Archer’s win of the very first Melbourne Cup in 1861. The special, which required more than three months of research, also included film footage of the 1897 Melbourne Cup.

HSV7 presented a one-hour Cup Eve special. The program, hosted by Michael Williamson with racing commentator Bill Collins, included newsreel footage of past Melbourne Cup races, dating back to the 1930s, and covered the important races leading up to the current event. The program also featured commentators from local and interstate newspapers with their selections for the day’s races.

Ten years later, the 1970 Melbourne Cup was televised live to interstate viewers but continued to be a delayed telecast within Victoria. ABV2 and ABC regional stations in Victoria presented delayed coverage of the race at 6.00pm and again at 8.00pm. GTV9, which presented a ten-minute Cup preview the night before, also had its delayed coverage at 6.00pm. HSV7 – always keen to get one above its main rival – scheduled its delayed broadcast for 5.55pm. All four Melbourne channels featured the race in their main evening bulletins.

By the time 1980 came around, the telecast of the Melbourne Cup was a major television event. The Ten Network, presenting the Cup coverage for the third year running, started its day’s coverage with a 90-minute preview before crossing to Flemington Racecourse for six hours of live broadcast. The host broadcaster, ATV10, had seventeen cameras placed at strategic points around the track. Their coverage was headed by Phil Gibbs, with races called by Clem Dimsey, with the six-hour telecast also featuring Ray Warren (from TEN10 Sydney), Rob Readings (TVQ0 Brisbane) and John O’Neil (SAS10 Adelaide). Everyday co-host Annette Allison (pictured, below) hosted the fashion and celebrity interviews.

Network Ten’s 1980 coverage was also relayed direct to New Zealand, and remote areas in Australia saw the coverage via ABC through a special arrangement made with Ten. With nationwide coverage, it was at the time reported to being the largest sporting telecast ever undertaken in Australia.

Network Ten continued to cover the Melbourne Cup every year up until 2001. This year’s Melbourne Cup will be broadcast live tomorrow (Tuesday 2 November) through the Seven Network.

Source: TV Times (27 October 1960), The Age (27 October 1960), TV Times (28 October 1970), TV Week (1 November 1980), The Age (30 October 1980)

• 1959: The race that stopped a station

1990: November 3-9

The year of living famously!
Former The Flying Doctors star Rebecca Gibney (pictured) reflects on a hectic year since leaving the popular Nine Network drama.  She starred earlier this year in the ABC mini-series Come In Spinner – a role which won her an AFI award recently – and has recently appeared in Nine’s mini-series Ring Of Scorpio.  Gibney has also completed a special for World Vision and is starring opposite Jon English in an upcoming series, with the working title Rhythm And Blues, which is set to debut in the new year.  “I have to keep reminding myself how fortunate I am,” Gibney tells TV Week.  “Some people tend to get caught up in the hype of the business and think they’re indispensible, but they’re not, nobody is.  I’ve been very lucky.”

Julie spins into new sitcom!
The Seven Network and Gary Reilly Productions are trying to keep it under wraps, but Hey Dad! actress Julie McGregor is set to star in a spin-off to the popular sitcom.  A pilot for a new sitcom, Hampton House, was taped at Seven’s Sydney studios recently.  The new series is set around a group of young people who have left home to move into a share house.  Former Home And Away star Adam Willits is believed to also be a contender for a role in the series should it get the green light.

E Street goes for the matron
Former A Country Practice star Joan Sydney (pictured), who recently declined an offer to return to the popular series, is believed to be joining the cast of E Street.  The popular actress is set to play the role of Mary Patchett, a British cousin of Aunty Vi (Bunney Brooke).  But producer Forrest Redlich, a former producer for A Country Practice, is stopping short of confirming Sydney for the role.  “I have enormous respect for Joan,” he told TV Week.  “If she appeared in this new role it would be for quite a long run.”  Sydney joining the show would also reunite her with former A Country Practice cast members Penny Cook and Kate Raison.

Briefly…
Network Ten racecaller Dan Mielicki, 21, is set to call this year’s Melbourne Cup for the network after making history last year as the youngest to have ever called the famous race.

Hey Dad! star Robert Hughes and former Family And Friends star Ross Newton are guest stars in this week’s episode of GP.  Hughes, currently on a four-month break from Hey Dad!, plays the husband of a woman stricken by multiple sclerosis (MS).  The episode is scheduled to coincide with national MS week.

Some of the great names in showbusiness – including Mike Walsh, Gwen Plumb, John Ewart, Ron Shand, Jeanne Little, Nancye Hayes and Elaine Lee – gathered in Sydney recently for the launch of showbiz veteran Toni Lamond’s autobiography, First Half.  Lamond (pictured, with former TV Week Gold Logie winner Hazel Phillips), a veteran of early variety shows including In Melbourne Tonight, is currently starring in the Sydney production of 42nd Street and recently starred in the ABC telemovie How Wonderful.

Seven Network host Derryn Hinch has predicted his exit from radio station 3AW.  The station’s former top-rating morning presenter currently presents a daily ten-minute commentary piece as well as a weekly interview program, Hinch The Other Side.  But Hinch says that the station is headed for a cost-cutting purge and that his $100,000 a year price tag (plus $25,000 for a landline to his home) will be too much for the station to afford.  “I’d like to be here,” he told station presenter Neil Mitchell.  “But I betcha I won’t be.  They can’t afford me.”

Lawrie Masterson’s Sound Off
”I remember vividly the first time I met the man who now has the toughest and most unenviable job in Australian television – chief executive of Network Ten.  It was, ahem, years ago and I was working for a once great Melbourne newspaper and Gary Rice was manager of BTV6 in Ballarat.  I was dispatched to Ballarat to compile a story on a locally-produced tonight show, which had been running for yonks.  Rice turned out to be not only a most obliging station manager, but was also the saxophonist in the tonight show’s resident band.  Between numbers he would down his sax, leap out of the band set and operate a boom mike!  Versatile and not afraid of hard work… he’s going to need an abundance of those qualities and more now as he wrestles with a network which doesn’t just have mind-boggling debts.  Ten also has a huge problem with public image, or lack of it.  Ten’s comedies are struggling and its old faithfuls – notably Neighbours – are showing signs of wear and tear.  Ten does have rights to some new product which has been successful in the US – such as Twin Peaks and The Simpsons – but experience with shows such as Roseanne and Thirtysomething is proof enough that what Americans love doesn’t necessarily grab Australians.”

Program Highlights (November 3-9):
Saturday:  ATV10’s coverage of the Melbourne Cup Carnival starts with Derby Day with coverage starting at 12pm and continuing through to 5.30pm.  Then the channel’s Saturday night movie is Archer, starring Brett Climo, Robert Coleby and Nicole Kidman, telling the story of the first ever Melbourne Cup winner when the race was first run in 1861.

Sunday:  GTV9 crosses to Adelaide for the Australian Formula One Grand Prix, starting at 11am, hosted by Ken Sutcliffe with commentators Alan Jones, Jackie Stewart, Murray Walker, James Hunt, Darrell Eastlake and Barry Sheene.  ABC’s Sunday Afternoon features a guest appearance by Helen Wellings.  Sunday night movies are Jekyll And Hyde (HSV7), Beetlejuice (GTV9) and Dominick And Eugene (ATV10).

Tuesday:  ATV10 crosses to Flemington for ‘the race that stops a nation’ – the Melbourne Cup.  The telecast, hosted by Tim Webster with racecaller Dan Mielicki, starts at 9.30am and continues through to 5.30pm.  Also featuring on Ten’s coverage are John Letts, Graeme Kelly, Peter Donegan, Gai Waterhouse and Bob Maumill, and morning ‘Til Ten host Joan McInnes presenting the fashion interviews.

Wednesday:  Former E Street star Marcus Graham is guest star in GTV9’s The Flying Doctors.

Thursday:  Another day of horse racing from Flemington with ATV10’s coverage of Oaks Day, starting at 12pm and continuing through to 5.30pm.

Friday:  The three commercial channels – HSV7, GTV9 and ATV10 – all participate in a simultaneous broadcast, Cartoon Allstars To The Rescue, which helps young children understand the dangers of drug and alcohol abuse.  The half-hour special, which attracted more than 33 million viewers when it aired in the US, features cartoon characters from rival companies.  The Australian screening of the program will be introduced by Prime Minister Bob Hawke.

Source: TV Week (Victoria edition), incorporating TV Times and TV Guide. 3 November 1990. Southdown Press.