1979: June 23-29

Cover: Andrew McFarlane, Robert Coleby (Patrol Boat)

Timeless Land stars are cast
Michael Craig and Angela Punch will both return to Australia to star in ABC’s new big-budget series The Timeless Land, described as Australia’s own Forsythe Saga.  Production of the eight-part series, set in the 25 years following the arrival of the First Fleet in 1788, is to commence in October.

The complete guide to Paul Hogan
Paul Hogan is known to viewers as the ocker Aussie, but on a recent appearance on Parkinson it was a more philosophical Hogan that appeared – giving his insight into Australian versus British class distinction, snobbery, politics and larrikin humour.  Michael Parkinson’s interviewing style impressed Hogan: “Parkinson’s an excellent interviewer.  He’s got a pretty laid-back style.  That helps.  But it’s the way he really listens to your answers and follows through on them.  To some journos you could answer a question about your wife’s health with ‘I killed her last week,’ and their next question would still be from their notes, ‘Yes, and how many children do you have?’.  Hogan also tells TV Times about his dining habits (“Where do we eat out as a family?  Simple.  The kids want to go wherever it costs a lot!”), wines (“I drink white wines mostly”), money (“It means the same thing to me as it’s always meant.  Freedom.  The right to say no.”), travelling (“At Rome airport I found myself surrounded by about 80 Australian Italians and they all introduced me to their mammas as Luigi.”) and the topic of canned laughter (“Nothing makes me angrier than shows like Donny And Marie.  A line that should get a giggle gets a belly laugh, a roar.  That’s not real.  We’ve been accused of using laugh machines.  We don’t, except for editing purposes to bridge or integrate something.  We’ve edited more laughs out than in.”)

Don Lane’s US debut a secret
Viewers of The Don Lane Show in the near future may notice a subtle change in the program as it prepares to be taped for a proposed US TV special.  Producer Peter Faiman said the upcoming special episode will not be significantly different to routine shows but it will be seen to be less parochial.

All grown up!
After more than 15 years playing the parts of schoolgirls and teenagers, former Bellbird and Alvin Purple star Anne Pendlebury has finally been cast as a middle-aged mother in ABC’s Twenty Good Years.   “I’ve been happy the way things have been, but this role is the highlight of my career so far and I’m happy to play an older woman.”

Briefly…
Stuart Wagstaff and Noeline Brown are to play the lead roles in a sitcom being made for the Seven Network by RS Productions (producers of The Naked Vicar Show).   The program has the working title of Two-Up and is expected to go into production next month.

Production of the Seven Network’s Young Ramsay is continuing despite its failure to gain approval for a ‘C’ classification for airing in the 4.00pm-5.00pm timeslot.

Former The Box actress Judy Nunn (pictured) is returning to the ATV0 studios to appear in an upcoming role in Prisoner.

Three years after joining Young Talent Time, team member Debbie Hancock has decided to leave the show to become a teacher after being offered a job with a modelling agency and school.

Viewpoint: Letters to the Editor
”I wonder if any other viewers are as besotted as I am with Doctor Who’s helpmate K9?  I look out for him in every episode.” M. Bennett, NSW.

“I have recently noticed that no horror movies are being screened at all.  I do think many people would appreciate at least one horror movie a week, preferably on a Friday night.” M. McEachern, SA.

“I agree with J. Lewis (Viewpoint, 12 May 1979), and wonder if ATN7 Sydney knows how much CBN8 (Orange) and CWN6 (Dubbo) mutilates the Seven Big League program.  I am fortunate in that I am able to receive the League replay two nights later than Orange and it is 200 per cent better than CBN8’s version.  RVN2 (Wagga Wagga) gives League fans 60 minutes of football compared to CBN8’s 35 minutes.” J. Holland, NSW.  (TV Times responds: “A CBN8 spokesman said he had discussed the question with RVN2 and that both stations used the natural breaks already inserted by ATN7.  They both allot the same time to commercials, not adding to the breaks provided by Sydney.”)

What’s On (June 23-29):
On Saturday night and into early Sunday, ATV0 airs live coverage from the UK of the final of the Prudential Cup cricket.  Also late on Saturday and Sunday nights, GTV9 screens delayed highlights of the US Open golf championships that were shown live on ABC last weekend.

This Week Has Seven Days (HSV7, Saturday) visits DPTV10, a closed-circuit TV station broadcasting to 5000 viewers in the community of Debney Park.

This Fabulous Century (HSV7, Sunday) looks at the portrayal and role of women in Australia’s history.

HSV7 on Monday night presents a one-hour special, Parlour Games, providing an insight into operation of Melbourne’s massage parlours.

In The Wild With Harry Butler (ABC, Wednesday) goes to Tasmania as Butler shows the impact of man on the Tasmanian wilderness and the animals that inhabit its wild, wet terrain.

ABC presents the debut of drama series Patrol Boat, starring Andrew McFarlane, Robert Coleby, Danny Adcock and Margo Lee. 

Maurie Fields, Val Jellay and Smacka Fitzgibbon are some of the guests featured this week on Peter Couchman Tonight (ATV0, weeknights).

Sunday night movies: The Wind And The Lion (HSV7), Ten Rillington Place (GTV9), The Eiger Sanction (ATV0).

Source: TV Times (Melbourne edition), 23 June 1979.  ABC/ACP

1979: June 9-15

Wishing on a star
TV Times asked six TV stars to nominate the secret role they’d most love to play.  Victoria Nicolls (The Restless Years) said she would love to do musical comedy roles.  “And if they were making The Ann Miller Story, I’d be desperate to play her.”  Michael Beecher (The Young Doctors) nominated the role of King Lear: “but unfortunately I don’t look old enough yet.”  Former Prisoner actress Carol Burns has a yearning to play Sally Bowles, the lead in Cabaret.  Bert Newton (pictured) sees Napoleon Bonaparte as his ideal fantasy role.  “Napoleon seems to me to have been a great personality and even today there is a great mystery about it.”  The Norman Gunston Show’s Pamela Gibbons would love to play a Marlene Dietrich-style role: “I’ve always admired Marlene Dietrich’s quality and charisma.  She was courageous in her era, introducing the trans-sexual look, which she virtually created in The Blue Angel.”  And Michael Caton, from The Sullivans, would like to play Fagin from the musical Oliver: “Fagin was an opportunist – a great character to play!”

Second century for Luck
The Seven Network has commissioned a further seven episodes of the documentary series This Fabulous Century.  This now brings the show’s tally to 37 episodes, starting with the 24 that were originally commissioned by Seven and six that were added later.  Producer David Salter said there will be no problem in filling the additional episodes on order: “There are some episodes we’d done some work on, then put aside in favour of other subjects.  We can move on to developing this material again.”  Also since the series had first gone to air, people had contacted the production company, Peter Luck Productions, offering more film footage from private collections.  Some of this ‘new’ footage has also been added to the national film archive.

Our China series big hit overseas
This week Australian TV networks will be vying to buy The Human Face Of China, the Film Australia documentary series acclaimed by buyers from 23 international territories at the MIPTV market in Cannes in April.  The series of five half-hour programs was researched and filmed in China over five months last year – the first time a non-socialist western film crew was allowed to film in China since 1949.  The program has already been picked up by US broadcaster WNET as well as broadcasters in Hong Kong, Thailand, Taiwan and Denmark.  There are still negotiations taking place with broadcasters in the United Kingdom, Finland, Israel, French Canada, Sweden, Norway, South Korea, Japan, Greece, Italy and France.

Variety’s the spice of Kathy’s life
I’m Looking At The World Through Rose-Coloured Glasses was the first song Kathy Lloyd (pictured) sang after her son was abducted.  She had to – it was already scheduled for her next Sound Of Music TV show.  After she was awarded custody of her son, Perry, her former husband took the boy to the US without her knowledge or consent.  That was eleven years ago and Lloyd hasn’t seen her son since.  Work offers for the singer dried up after news of the divorce and abduction was splashed across the media – though Lloyd is making a TV comeback with a role in the ABC series TV Follies, though it wasn’t without its own problems.  She was bruised when she fell two metres off the set of the show and landed on her back.  She “took five,” had a drink of water and went back to work.  The show must go on, she says, whether it’s after a fall or a personal tragedy.

Briefly…
Children will have the chance to become “earth watchers” when a new ABC series, Earthwatch, goes to air later this year.  The series of 26 half-hour episodes aims to educate on the natural and man-made environments and will incorporate a club which viewers will be able to join.

Debbie Hancock, a cast member of Young Talent Time, was runner-up in the recent Victorian Miss Teenage Quest for 1979 – raising more than $7000 for the Royal Women’s Hospital in Melbourne.

The Survivors, a four-part children’s series telling the story of a group of teenagers who become lost while on a camping expedition, has been produced by ABC in Tasmania.  The series debuts this week in Tasmania and will air in other States later in the year.

Viewpoint: Letters to the Editor:
”Why must SAS10 Adelaide insist on trying to shove Steve Raymond’s show down our throats?  They deliberately swapped their two very good “soaps,” The Young And The Restless and Another World with Raymond so that Another World, and NWS9’s Days Of Our Lives are in competition with each other.” L. McKenzie, SA.

“Sometimes I am horrified when I hear people say ABC is the worst channel on TV.  An informative, musical, scientific, action-packed, dramatic or professional line-up of night and pre-evening screening is shown every night.  Along with a comprehensive coverage of sport with no advertising, cheap publicity, false images or plastic imitations, it makes me shake my head in bewilderment at the automatic criticising of this down-to-earth station.” W. Stevens, SA.

“Are we so short of things to laugh at that we have to be fed Norman Gunston’s interview with Lee Marvin, prior to the latter entering a court of law.  He reminds me of the boy who passed wind in class and somebody laughed, thus realising an ambition to become a comedian.” L. Barton, QLD.

What’s On (June 9-15):
This Week Has Seven Days (HSV7, Saturday) looks at ten-pin bowling – how to do it and also to see how a bowling alley works.

This week’s TV Follies (ABC, Saturday) tells the passions and human drama of life behind the scenes in Hollywood in the remake of Death At Copacabana.  Starring Kathy Lloyd and Normie Rowe.

On Saturday night and into the early hours of Sunday, ATV0 presents coverage of the 1979 Prudential Cup one-day cricket between Australia and England, live from Lords, England.   Richie Benaud heads the commentary team, with local commentary from Phil Gibbs, Bob Simpson and Tony Greig.  The Prudential Cup continues on Wednesday night with Australia versus Pakistan.

This Fabulous Century (HSV7, Sunday) looks at the media with a collection of film clips and interviews with the stars of radio and television.

On The Paul Hogan Show (GTV9, Wednesday) the tax man pays Hoges a visit, with hilarious results when Hoges unveils his latest deduction.  Hoges also offers his views about dentists, and the job of a receptionist will never seem the same.

ABC presents the series debut of In The Wild With Harry Butler, this week looking at South Australia as Butler shows the many moods of the desert.

Sunday night movies: Love And Pain And The Whole Damn Thing (HSV7), A Good Thing Going (GTV9), You Only Live Twice (ATV0).

Source: TV Times (Melbourne edition), 9 June 1979.  ABC/ACP