Living in the Seventies
Despite the Seventies being the era of ‘sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll’, All Together Now star Jon English confesses that he can look back on that era without too much embarrassment, insisting that he never played up to the image of a high-profile actor-singer during that period. “I was never into that sex and drugs thing, to tell you the truth,” he told TV Week. “In the bulk of the Seventies I was appearing in the theatre eight times a week (in Jesus Christ Superstar). I watched everything in that era from the edge of the stage.” Meanwhile English’s co-star Rebecca Gibney admits that as a teenager in the that era (“14 trying to be 25”, she said) she was a big fan of the rock performer. “I wrote to Jon once but he never replied,” she said. “I loved his music, had his albums and went to his concerts.” The Nine Network sitcom has adopted a retro theme for this week’s episode as the show’s characters stage a Seventies-style “sit-in” while re-living the Woodstock era.
They might be rivals in children’s television and working in different cities, but Melbourne-based Saturday At Rick’s co-host Lochie Daddo and Brisbane-based Saturday Disney’s Sofie Formica (pictured) are denying reports that they are romantically linked. “Just good friends,” Daddo told TV Week. “I ended up doing a pilot for an afternoon show in Brisbane for Ten. We went out for dinner one night. It was like a blind date. The next four or five weeks, for some reason or another, I was up there nearly every weekend for work. So I saw a lot of Sofie. We are still very good friends.” Daddo has recently joined Saturday At Rick’s following his first professional acting role in an episode of All Together Now. “As a result of All Together Now, I was a guest on Rick’s,” he said. “Then they said, ‘Do you want to do the show?’.“ Meanwhile, Formica has recently returned from Turkey where she was an Australian delegate at the European Broadcasting Union’s international workshop for children’s television presenters, and has since started a new role as host of Seven’s children’s quiz show Now You See It.
Acropolis Now’s self-styled beauty queen Effie (Mary Coustas, pictured near right) and friend Sophie (Sheryl Munks) have decided that the cafe’s resident career woman Suzanna Martin (Nicki Wendt, far right) is in dire need of assistance. “Suzanna looks like the ‘before’ lady on the shampoo commercial,” Effie told TV Week. “She’s got very fine hairs. I want to give her a good root perm, which will stuff up her hairs for five years.”
Briefly…
Hey Hey It’s Saturday’s Daryl Somers has been busy working on two additional projects. The first is a series of one-hour specials, The Best (And Worst) Of Red Faces, highlighting some of the acts to have appeared on the mock talent quest segment since it started back in the early 1980s. “It’s been a huge job for everyone involved, endeavouring to find every segment ever done – the oldest piece dates back to 1982,” he told TV Week. The second project is a movie to star the team from Hey Hey It’s Saturday, to be filmed in Brisbane and Melbourne.
E Street’s Brooke ‘Mikey’ Anderson has been dumped from the series 10 weeks before her contract was due to expire. The young star, who had been in the series since it started three years ago, has already starting filming a guest role in rival series A Country Practice.
Lawrie Masterson: The View From Here
”It wasn’t until the Seven Network ran Blackadder back-to-back with Fast Forward that the Rowan Atkinson series gained anything more than a cult following in this country. Unfortunately, the series was long gone before an audience large enough to be commercially viable had starting lamenting it. The ABC, however, grabbed the rub-off advantage and screened the first series of the more recent Atkinson creation, Mr Bean. Be warned. A second Bean series is now set to premiere.”
Program Highlights (Melbourne, May 24-30):
Sunday: Actor, dancer and choreographer Paul Mercurio and colleague Kim Walker are guests on this week’s Sunday Afternoon With Peter Ross (ABC). Network Ten presents the second series final on New Faces With Bert Newton, while Nine’s Our World documentary series features Adventure Bound with Alby Mangels. Anne Phelan is a guest star on comedy series Late For School (Ten). Sunday night movies are Masquerade (Seven), The Freshman (Nine) and Voices Within: The Lives Of Truddi Chase (Ten). ABC’s late night series Compass features the story of religious academic John Hull, who documented his experiences as his sight gradually deteriorated from the age of 17 to middle-age when he became completely blind.
Monday: This week’s Six Pack (SBS) feature is Loulla, a story set in the 1950s of the arrival of an unexpectedly glamorous proxy bride from Greece to a rural backwater in Australia, starring Lenita Vangellis.
Wednesday: ABC presents The Comedy Festival Debate: Is Laughter Better Than Sex? – featuring Michael Corton, Brett Jones, Steve Crabb, Jane Clifton, Andrew Denton and H. G. Nelson and chaired by Campbell McComas. The first of three one-hour specials of The Best (And Worst) Of Red Faces appears on Nine.
Thursday: In Nine’s new travel series Getaway, Rebecca Harris tours the Blue Mountains on a Harley Davidson, David Reyne goes diving at Dunk Island and guest reporter, former Sale Of The Century hostess Delvene Delaney presents a tour of Byron Bay.
Saturday: Nine begins its coverage of the French Open tennis, live from Roland Garros Centre, Paris, with commentators John Newcombe, Tony Trabert and Betsy Nagelson.
Source: TV Week (Melbourne edition), incorporating TV Times and TV Guide. 23 May 1992. Southdown Press.
State of shock! 
It’s goodbye to the Valley! 
New doctors set for take-off 
Briefly… 
Sydney’s Botanic Gardens, with views of the Sydney Opera House and Harbour Bridge, is the location for the latest TV soapie wedding – but it is unlikely to ever appear on Australian screens. The British TV series Families, which stars Briony Behets (the British-born actress best known for her roles in Aussie dramas Number 96 and The Box), is filmed between Manchester and Sydney… but so far the series is yet to be sold to an Australian network. The series’ wedding is between Behets’ character Diana Stephens and cafe owner Anton Vaughn (Rhett Walton).
Actress Melissa Bell (pictured) is currently caught in a battle between Network Ten’s two soapies. Melbourne-based Neighbours’ producers are keen to renew Bell’s contract when it expires mid-year, but Bell wants to move back to Sydney-based E Street where she once had a brief role – due in part to her current off-screen interstate relationship with the son of E Street producer Forrest Redlich.
Saturday: The Seven Network presents an all-day telethon to raise financial support for the Australian team to compete at the upcoming Summer Olympic Games in Barcelona, Spain. The Olympathon starts at 7.00am, including special editions of Saturday Disney and Video Smash Hits, followed by live crosses around Australia for interviews with some of Australia’s Olympic hopefuls. The evening telecast includes a night of entertainment featuring the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, Phantom Of The Opera stars Marina Prior and Rob Guest (both pictured with Seven’s Bruce McAvaney), Julie Anthony, Grace Knight, Craig McLachlan, Vanetta Fields, Judith Durham, Simon Gallaher, Don Burrows and Peter Cupples. The telethon concludes at midnight. Nine presents all-day coverage of the Benson And Hedges World Cup cricket from Adelaide. 
