Don’t let the picture of Penny Cook in a wedding dress deceive you. Despite the smiles of the happy bride, all is not well in the lead up to the marriage of Beth (Cook) to Dr Steve Harrison (Michael O’Neill) in GP, as she thinks about her faith, commitment to the marriage and Steve’s desire to have a family.
Natalie’s out!
The producers of Chances have dropped a bombshell on one of its leading stars by not renewing her contract. Natalie McCurry, the former Miss Australia, is being dumped from the ailing series following her refusal to appear in frontal nude scenes. She will tape her last scenes with the series in October but will continue to be seen on air until the end of the year. Meanwhile, producers have also dumped another original cast member, Cathy Godbold, who will also tape her last scenes in October. Chances, which has struggled in the ratings since its debut earlier this year, is expected to be re-launched with an emphasis on guest stars rather than ongoing characters.
Tracey signs for Beyond 2000 Despite press reports that Tracey Curro (pictured) was set to replace Jennifer Keyte as the newsreader on Seven’s Tonight Live, she has now signed up to join the team of Beyond 2000. She will be replacing Maxine Gray who has decided to leave the program to spend more time with her family. Curro’s move to Beyond 2000 follows an unsettled period where she was dropped from reading the news at Network Ten in Melbourne and the legal action that followed. But she is excited about her new career move. “Absolutely. It’s got to be one of the best jobs in television,” she told TV Week. “It’ll be hard work with very long hours, but it beats driving through traffic to work every day.”
Briefly…
The writers of Brides Of Christ have now moved onto their next project which begins production this week. The Leaving Of Liverpool is a mini-series set in England and Australia in the years 1951 to 1953, telling the story of two Liverpudlian children who are torn from family and country and shunted to Australia as part of a child migrant program. The series will star John Hargreaves, Bill Hunter, Martin Jacobs, Frank Whitten and newcomers Christine Tremarco and Kevin Jones.
The return of former Rafferty’s Rules star John Wood to our screens has been delayed due to industrial disputes at the ABC. Production on the sitcom Dearest Enemy, which features Wood along with Bruce Spence, Linden Wilkinson and Frank Wilson, has stalled leaving all but one episode completed. With the producers and Wood now with other commitments, completion of the final episode is scheduled for November and the series, which was due to air next month, should now appear in the new year.
”Since taking over the Midday show, there have been claims that Ray Martin (pictured) has gone a bit soft and, in the process, relinquished the razor-sharp intensity of his news and current affairs days. Not so! The “old” Ray Martin is still there, and any doubters should have been watching when he interviewed Prime Minister Bob Hawke following the first Kerin Budget, and in the wake of the NSW gun laws uproar. In years to come we may well look back on this particular interview as the one that signalled the beginning of the end of the Prime Minister. Sad to say, it was an interview that cut him apart. Martin was aggressive without being rude. He pressed for answers where other interviewers would have shirked the task, and he maintained the pressure as forcefully as he could. It was the PM who buckled.”
Saturday: ABC presents the return of ballroom dancing series That’s Dancin’, hosted by Paul Newman and Maureen Delacy (pictured). Hey Dad! and Hampton Court star Julie McGregor is among the contestants on this week’s Celebrity Wheel Of Fortune (Seven). Tim Webster and Jo Pearson host the 1991 Young Achiever Awards (Ten).
Sunday: Sunday night movies are The Naked Gun (Seven), Harlem Nights (Nine) and Midnight Run (Ten).
Monday: In Neighbours (Ten), the search for Harold (Ian Smith) continues – and in A Country Practice (Seven), Lucy’s (Georgie Parker) behaviour is affected by IVF treatment.
Wednesday: In E Street (Ten), Bob (Tony Martin) is excited but apprehensive about Elly’s (Diane Craig) return.
Thursday: Ten premieres an Australian version of the tabloid US program Hard Copy, hosted by Gordon Elliott with reporters Richard Willis, Iain Gillespie, Jane Hansen and Meni Caroutas.
Friday: The SBS series Connections presents Victor Chang – King Of Hearts, documenting the life of Dr Victor Chang, heart transplant surgeon who was gunned down in July, and the progress he had made in perfecting the artificial heart.
Source: TV Week (Victoria edition), incorporating TV Times and TV Guide. 14 September 1991. Southdown Press
Hey Hey It’s Saturday host Daryl Somers (pictured) was awarded the Gold Logie for the Most Popular Personality on Australian Television at the 28th annual TV Week Logie Awards, presented at Sydney’s historic State Theatre on Friday, 18 April 1986.
In winning the Gold, Somers had beaten fellow nominees Greg Evans (Perfect Match), Ray Martin (Midday With Ray Martin) and Anne Tenney (A Country Practice). The year had been significant for all three fellow nominees. As well as hosting Perfect Match, Evans (pictured) had also hosted the previous year’s TV Week Logie Awards and a new talent quest series, Star Search, for Network Ten. Nine’s Ray Martin had made the risky move from 60 Minutes to host the new Midday program, taking over from the long-running The Mike Walsh Show which had moved into prime-time. And Tenney had made her farewell from A Country Practice with the emotional departure of character Molly Jones. She also featured in the ABC mini-series Flight Into Hell, scoring a nomination for Most Popular Actress In A Single Drama Or Mini-Series.
Seven’s long-running A Country Practice took away four Logies, including Most Popular Drama and Silver Logies for Grant Dodwell and Anne Tenney (pictured). Tenney also won a Logie for Most Popular Female Personality in New South Wales.
60 Minutes won the Logie for Most Popular Public Affairs Program and one of its reporters, Ian Leslie (pictured), was awarded Reporter Of The Year. Nine’s Sunday program won the award for Best Public Affairs Report for Jennifer Byrne’s coverage of the 1985 Tax Summit. 
As well as hosting the Logies presentation, Mike Willesee (pictured) also scored an award for Most Popular Documentary Series for his series of specials for the Nine Network. One of the most talked-about programs from the Willesee series during the year was Tommy Doesn’t Exist Any More, a sympathetic look at the lives of three transsexuals. Another program, Sink Or Swim, looked at the life of one of Australia’s leading underwater naturalists, Neville Coleman. And before the age of Big Brother, Willesee presented More Than A Game – a two-hour special which observed the behaviour of 15 people from different walks of life who were taken to a remote rural location where they had to form their own new society.
National broadcaster ABC won two awards. The comedy series The Gillies Report – featuring Max Gillies in various guises including then prime minister Bob Hawke (pictured) – won Best Light Entertainment Series, and documentary series Sweat Of The Sun, Tears Of The Moon – featuring Jack Pizzey’s travels through South America – was awarded Best Documentary. 
News cameraman Neil Davis (pictured) was posthumously inducted into the TV Week Logie Awards’ Hall Of Fame. A war correspondent for over 20 years, Davis had been gunned down in September 1985 while covering a coup attempt in Thailand. 
Most Popular Drama Series: A Country Practice (Seven) 
State-based Categories (Most Popular Male Personality, Most Popular Female Personality, Most Popular Program):
Could Ramsay Street’s most famous daughter be talking of a return to the neighbourhood?
Of course, the pop princess is known to have returned to her Aussie acting roots before – in 2004 she appeared in Kath And Kim as a grown-up Epponee-Rae Craig, an appearance that was seen as a light-hearted throwback to her former Neighbours character. After the Kath And Kim appearance (pictured) she was also reported to have expressed disappointment that she was not offered an opportunity to appear in Neighbours for its 20th anniversary in 2005, but producers claimed that any efforts to approach her management about setting up a cameo appearance fell on deaf ears.
