1990: March 24-30

Kate bows out on a high
A fear of heights and a brewing thunderstorm ensured that Kate Raison’s final scenes in A Country Practice would be her most terrifying.  The wedding between Raison’s character, Cathy Hayden, and new love John Freeman (William McInnes) was filmed on a clifftop with a wild storm headed its way.  Producers almost had to abandon the wedding scenes as the storm hampered progress with filming.  “It certainly wasn’t a glamorous ending for my days on A Country Practice,” Raison (pictured, with co-star Georgie Parker)told TV Week.

Annie’s left holding the baby!
TV Week has a sneak peek at the upcoming Seven Network mini-series Jackaroo, starring former Neighbours star Annie Jones.  Jones plays Clare Mallory, a spoilt, rich, city kid who falls for Jack Simmonds (David McCubbin), the overseer of her family’s property, and the couple have a child.  The romance is a controversial one, as Simmonds’ indigenous heritage puts him at odds with Clare’s conservative parents who are against their daughter having a mixed-race marriage.  Simmonds is thrown off the family property and Clare, with baby in tow, is sent away.  Simmonds then embarks on a dramatic search for his lover and child.  Jackaroo is set to air on the Seven Network later in the year.

It’s a Forties triple treat!
Rebecca Gibney, Kerry Armstrong and Lisa Harrow head the cast of ABC’s new mini-series, Come In Spinner, set in Sydney in 1944 and following the lives and loves of three women who work in a beauty salon.  Also starring in the series are Justine Clarke, Zoe Bertram, Gary Sweet, Rebecca Smart and Bryan Marshall.  In auditioning for the role of Guinea Malone, Gibney (pictured) was so determined to get the part that she borrowed one of Grace Sullivan’s old dresses from the Crawford Productions wardrobe and also enlisted the help of the make-up artist from her former series, The Flying Doctors, to give her a genuine 1940s look.  “I’d have loved to have really lived in that time.  The Forties were my favourite era, and I love the movies from those days.  They had real stars back then,” Gibney told TV Week.

Briefly…
There’s romance on the set of Neighbours with Stefan Dennis said to be an “item” with co-star Gayle Blakeney, who joined the series last year with twin sister Gillian.  The off-screen romance comes as an upcoming storyline in the series will have Paul Robinson (Dennis) moving in to share a house with the twins and the three falling into a complex romantic triangle. 

Pop princess and former Neighbours star Kylie Minogue (pictured) is believed to have bought a million dollar property in a leafy, east Melbourne suburb, sparking off a lot of gossip and speculation by her future real-life neighbours.  Locals have spotted the pop star checking on progress on renovations to the older-style house.  It is not known if Minogue will move into the house with her boyfriend, rock star Michael Hutchence.

Network Ten is funding the development of a new series which it hopes will rival the success of the hit US series The Golden Girls.  The series, based on the stage comedy Lipstick Dreams which has recently played in NSW and Victoria, is set to include Lorraine Bayly (The Sullivans, Carson’s Law) and Felicity Soper (Richmond Hill).  The pilot episode for the series will be filmed in the coming months.

John Laws says…
”Just when Kerry O’Brien’s Lateline program has begun to find its feet comes the news that it has aroused a wave of resentment among some ABC staffers.  At the core of the problem are the allegedly excessive costs of mounting the Lateline program.  The joke around the ABC canteens is that program should be called ‘Wasteline’.  I’m surprised that Lateline, which has a basically simple format, should cost a lot of money.  After all, only one subject is tackled on each program three nights a week, 90 minutes in all, and most of it committed to interviewing one or two people in the studio.  How can this cost a lot of money?”

Program Highlights (March 24-30):
Saturday:  ABC, HSV7 and GTV9 all devote most of Saturday evening to coverage of the Federal Election from the National Tally Room in Canberra.  Andrew Olle heads ABC’s coverage, with Dennis Grant and Derryn Hinch on Seven, and Jim Waley and Ray Martin on Nine.  ATV10’s election coverage is limited to fifteen minutes after Bill Collins’ Golden Years Of Hollywood movie, and SBS presents brief updates in between regular programs throughout the evening.
Sunday:  GTV9’s Sunday current affairs program presents a special post-Election edition.  Sunday night movies are Deadly Pursuit (HSV7), Suspect (GTV9) and Best-Seller (ATV10).  ABC, in a rare move, screens a Sunday night movie, a Swedish-language (with English subtitles) drama, My Life As A Dog.
Monday:  With the Federal Election now over, Andrew Denton presents the final edition of The Party Machine.
Tuesday:  GTV9 presents a delayed telecast of The 62nd Academy Awards.  Nominated for Best Picture are Born On The Fourth Of July, Dead Poet’s Society, Driving Miss Daisy, Field Of Dreams and My Left Foot.
Wednesday:  Daryl Somers hosts the return of talent quest series New Faces on GTV9.  ABC presents the first episode of World War II mini-series Come In Spinner (pictured).
Thursday:  ATV10 presents a one-hour documentary, Teenage Sexuality: The Best Years Of Our Lives, hosted by Brad Robinson.  Teenagers openly discuss their first sexual experiences and attitudes to contraception and promiscuity.

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

Bill Collins joins Logies’ Hall of Fame

TV Week has announced Bill Collins as the 26th inductee into the TV Week Logies Awards’ Hall of Fame.

For over forty years, Collins has shared his passion for movies with many thousands of magazine readers and TV viewers.  Formerly a lecturer at the Sydney Teachers’ College, Collins began presenting movie reviews on ABC’s afternoon program, Roundabout, in the early ‘60s. 

From 1963, Collins started writing movie reviews for TV Times magazine and later moved to commercial television to review and introduce movies – first at TCN9 and then at ATN7 Sydney, where he also presented movie reviews on the Sunday night news!

By the early ‘80s, Collins had moved across to Network Ten where his movie presentations, with passionate and often unscripted reviews that were almost as epic as the movie titles he was presenting, became a long-running staple of Saturday night television across the country.   As well as The Golden Years Of Hollywood, there was The Bill Collins’ Picture Show, and many midday and weekend movie matinee presentations for Network Ten.  Also during the ‘80s, Collins reviewed movies for TV Week and his weekly column, You Asked For It, ran for several years.

In the mid-‘90s, the advent of pay-TV saw classic movies appearing less and less on free-to-air TV – so it was inevitable that Collins would move The Golden Years Of Hollywood to Foxtel where it currently appears on the Fox Classics channel.

The TV Week Logies’ Hall of Fame was introduced in 1984 to recognise the achievements of those who have made significant contribution to the Australian television industry.  The first recipient was legendary TV producer Hector Crawford.  Over the years, the Hall of Fame has welcomed actors and actresses, producers, executives, presenters and even programs that have made extended contributions to television.

Bill Collins will be inducted into the TV Week Logie Awards’ Hall of Fame at this year’s awards presentation on Sunday 3 May.

Source: ABC, TV Week