Obituary: Digby Wolfe

Digby Wolfe, one of Australia’s first national variety stars, has died in the US after a short battle with cancer.

Born in 1929, Wolfe was a star of British film and television, working with comic talents such as Hattie Jacques and Ronnie Corbett, before coming to Australia in 1959. 

He became popular as the host of the variety show Revue ‘61 (later Revue ‘62).  The weekly series, from Sydney’s ATN7 and produced in association with the Music Corporation of America (MCA), is reported to have been the first Australian television production sold to an overseas network (Canada’s CTV) for prime-time screening.

Revue ‘61 won a TV Week Logie in 1962 for Best Variety Show, and Wolfe won Logies in 1961 and 1962 for Most Popular Male Personality in New South Wales.

Revue ‘62 was abruptly axed mid-year, with Wolfe moving into radio as host of a daytime program, Wolfe At The Door, syndicated across Australia through the Macquarie radio network.

His next stop was to the US where he featured in a string of shows including I Dream Of Jeannie, The Monkees, Love On A Rooftop, That Girl and The Munsters, and was a writer for the iconic sketch comedy series Rowan And Martin’s Laugh-In.

Wolfe returned to Australia in the mid-1970s and was announced as Mike Willesee’s replacement as host of This Is Your Life in 1976.  He was also intended to produce a sitcom and a big-budget variety series for the Seven Network and, in partnership with ATN7, set up the Creative Development Centre, a non-profit venture to train and develop Australian television writers and producers.  Unfortunately his return to Australia only lasted a few months as he was to make a sudden return to the US when a family member fell ill.

He had spent the last decade working as a lecturer, and later a professor, in dramatic writing at The University of New Mexico.

He died in Albuquerque, New Mexico on Thursday.

Digby Wolfe is survived by a sister.

Source: The Age. IMDB. TV Times, 27 June 1962. TV Week, 25 September 1976.  TV Times, 19 February 1977.

Obituary: Edith Bliss

Edith Bliss, a former Australian pop singer and television presenter, has died at the age of 53 after a long illness.

Brisbane-born Bliss hit the Australian charts in the late 1970s with the single If It’s Love You Want followed by two more singles and an album, Total Bliss, in 1980.

She then went on to television as a reporter for popular children’s program Simon Townsend’s Wonder World.

A decade later she was on television again as a presenter for Townsend’s other venture, ABC program TVTV.

Bliss married Mark Tanner, a sound mixer on Wonder World, and they had four children.

In 2006, under her married name Edith Tanner, she appeared as a contestant on the final episode of game show Wheel Of Fortune.

Daughter Eden had posted a message on Facebook, saying her mother "passed very peacefully early this morning and her infectious spirit will be missed by all. You're with the angels now, Mum."

Source: Daily Telegraph, Wikipedia

Obituary: Vince Lovegrove

Australian music industry identity and former television journalist and producer Vince Lovegrove is reported to have died in a car accident near Byron Bay, NSW.

The single vehicle accident involving a Volkswagen Kombi van is believed to have occurred early Saturday morning.  While police have not formally identified the victim, the Sydney Morning Herald and Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) have said it is Lovegrove.

A member of the band The Valentines in the 1960s, Lovegrove went on to become a journalist for music magazine Go-Set before progressing to television, working on programs including A Current Affair and The Don Lane Show.  He also presented the 1978 documentary Australian Music To The World.

He went on to become manager of the band The Divinyls and tour manager for Jimmy Barnes. 

In 1987, Lovegrove produced the award-winning documentary Suzi’s Story, a moving account of his wife Suzi’s battle with HIV/AIDS intended to raise awareness that it was not just a “gay disease”.  Suzi died just weeks before the documentary went to air.  Their son Troy also contracted the disease and was the subject of a follow up documentary, A Kid Called Troy.  He died in 1993 at the age of 7.

Source: Herald Sun, SMH, ARIA, Australian Screen

Obituary: Ian Turpie

Australian showbusiness has lost one of its true veterans with reports that Ian Turpie has died from cancer at the age of 68.

Born in Melbourne in 1943, his career started as a child actor back in the 1950s working in radio and theatre productions.  He later moved to television as a performer on variety shows including Bandstand, Sing Sing Sing (formerly The Johnny O’Keefe Show) and the Melbourne-based daytime show Time For Terry.

In 1964, Turpie became the first “victim” in the iconic television drama series Homicide, playing the role of a university student who was shot dead while staging a mock bank hold-up in the opening scenes of the first episode.

He was later a host of the mid-1960s pop music program Go!!

Working as a variety and club performer during the 1970s Turpie made a television hosting comeback in 1981 on The New Price Is Right (pictured), a reprisal of the game show franchise that had last appeared on Australian TV in the mid-1970s.  The show was a hit for the Seven Network and lasted for around four years.  He was to revisit the format in 1989 when the Ten Network launched The Price Is Right as a Saturday night program.

In the early 1980s he hosted a variety program, Turpie Tonight, for Perth channel TVW7.  The program won a TV Week Logie in 1983 for Most Popular Program in Western Australia.

He also hosted game shows Press Your Luck, The Newlyweds Game and Supermarket Sweep.

Later television appearances included drama series Always Greener and comedies Club Buggery, Pizza, Swift And Shift Couriers and Housos.

He was diagnosed with cancer early last year.

Last May he was inducted into the Mo Awards’ Hall of Fame and there is now an online campaign via Facebook to have Turpie inducted into the TV Week Logie Awards’ Hall of Fame.

Ian Turpie is survived by wife Jan, three children and three grandchildren.

Source: Yahoo7, Ian Turpie, IMDB, TV Eye – Classic Australian Television, Daily Telegraph.

Obituary: Carl Bleazby

Actor Carl Bleazby, best known from the long-running ABC series Bellbird, died late last month at the age of 95.

Born in Melbourne in 1916, Bleazby was a radio announcer and actor at Melbourne station 3XY when he enlisted at the break out of World War II in 1939.  He served with the AIF in the Middle East for two-and-a-half years and rose to the rank of captain, but when his radio background was discovered he was transferred to broadcasting duties for the AIF at Radio Jerusalem.

In 1945 he returned to 3XY and furthered his acting career, leading to roles in early TV drama productions including Seagulls Over Sorrento, Consider Your Verdict and Homicide.  In 1967 he was cast as Col. Jim Emerson in ABC’s Bellbird.  It was his first ongoing TV role, but it was a series that he didn’t give much of a chance.  “I gave it about three months,” he told TV Times in 1974.  “It was surprising to me at the time that it took off the way it did but it has developed a lot since then.  I think the very ordinariness of the people helped viewers identify with them and helped its early success.”

Despite the ongoing commitment to Bellbird, production breaks allowed him to make guest appearances in other dramas such as Ryan, Hunter, Matlock Police, The Long Arm, Division 4 and Power Without Glory.

After Bellbird wound up in 1977, he made guest appearances in Skyways, Sons And Daughters, Prisoner, The Flying Doctors and Home And Away.  He also starred in films Country Town (the movie spin-off from Bellbird) and Annie’s Coming Out.

Carl Bleazby died peacefully in a nursing home in Killara, NSW.

Source: TV Times, 18 March 1972.  TV Times, 23 February 1974.  IMDB.  Radio Heritage.  TV Tonight.

2011: We remember…

Geoff Raymond

Sonia Humphrey

Noel Stanaway

James Elliott

Bob Davis

Bill Hunter

Michele Fawdon

Jon Blake

Rex Mossop

Godfrey Philipp

Googie Withers

Ray Taylor

Reg Whiteman

Paul Lockyer

John Bean

Gary Ticehurst

Ian Carroll

Sean Flannery

Harold Hopkins

David Fordham

David Jull

• 2010: We remember…
• 2009: We remember…
• 2008: We remember…
• 2007: Farewells

Obituary: David Jull

A belated obituary for former Queensland MP and media identity David Jull, who died in September this year following a battle with cancer.  He was 66.

Jull was a radio journalist and presenter in his early career, working at Brisbane radio stations 4BH and 4IP, before moving to television.  He was the first person to appear on Brisbane channel TVQ0 when it debuted in July 1965 and he continued to serve at the channel, both on screen and in management roles, for over a decade.

Jull then went on to a career in politics as the federal member for Queensland seats Bowman (1975-83) and Fadden (1984-2007).  He was also a former Minister for Administrative Affairs in the Howard government in the late 1990s and had been a shadow tourism minister for five years.

He retired from politics at the 2007 election, two years after losing a lung due to the cancer.

During his time in politics and in retirement Jull maintained his association with the media as a presenter, patron and president of Brisbane-based community radio station 101FM.

David Jull was farewelled with a state funeral on 23 September.  He is survived by sons Stephen and Andrew, stepsons Mike and Jay Goldman, and grandsons Declan and Griffin.

Source: The Australian; Albert & Logan News; 4BH
YouTube: malmcp85

Obituary: David Fordham

Respected sports commentator David Fordham has died in Brisbane after a battle with prostate cancer and heart disease.

The 62-year-old had previously battled prostate cancer, undergoing quadruple by-pass surgery and chemotherapy.  He also battled Chronic Myeloid Leukaemia and underwent a bone marrow transplant.

Growing up in Newcastle, Fordham started his media career at regional network NBN.  He went on to present and commentate for the Seven and Ten networks in a career that included four Olympic Games, four Commonwealth Games and three Rugby World Cups.  He also covered State Of Origin, Rugby League Grand Finals and Davis Cup tennis.

For the Seven Network he presented the Sportsworld and Sportscene programs and had been a sports anchor for news bulletins at Seven and Ten in Sydney and Brisbane.

After leaving television in the early 2000s, Fordham went on to run a media consulting business with his wife Erica and became a sought after public speaker and master of ceremonies.  He also staged a number of charity golfing events, raising hundreds of thousands of dollars for aspiring Olympic athletes – with his contribution to the Olympic movement recognised with an Order of Merit from the Australian Olympic Committee.

David Fordham is survived by Erica, daughter Sally, son Simon and their families.

Source: Sports News First, NBN, Platinum

Obituary: Harold Hopkins

Australian acting veteran Harold Hopkins has died in a Sydney hospital from the asbestos-related cancer mesothelioma.

The 67-year-old actor was diagnosed several months ago and is believed to have contracted the cancer from his first job after finishing high school, where he worked with asbestos sheeting as an apprentice carpenter in Queensland in the early 1960s.

Hopkins’ acting career began in the late 1960s on the Seven Network’s daytime drama Motel (a series that also starred a young Jack Thompson). 

Early TV roles also included Skippy The Bush Kangaroo, Riptide, Delta and Barrier Reef.  He had an ongoing role in the comedy-drama The Godfathers and its spin-off series The People Next Door.

Other TV credits included Certain Women, Silent Number, Matlock Police, Homicide, Division 4, Rush, The Lost Islands and the lead male role in the 1979 series Twenty Good Years (pictured with co-star Anne Pendlebury).

He went on to appear in mini-series including Sara Dane, The Dirtwater Dynasty, True Believers, The Last Bastion, Winners, Shadows Of The Heart and Brides Of Christ.

More recent appearances have included Grass Roots, State Coroner, Blue Heelers, White Collar Blue, The Secret Life Of Us, Wildside, The Strip, All Saints and Underbelly: A Tale Of Two Cities.

Film credits have included Don’s Party, The Club, The Picture Show Man, Buddies, Monkey Grip and The Year My Voice Broke.

Harold Hopkins is survived by his twin brother, John, and five other siblings, Naomi, Michael, Gregory, Margaret and Suzanne.

Source: News.com.au, IMDB, The Age, ABC, TV Eye

Obituary: Sean Flannery

Veteran journalist Sean Flannery has died after a battle with cancer at the age of 69.

Born in 1942, Flannery started his radio career at 2SM but later became known for his work on the 2UE program Night Watch that aired every Sunday morning.

He later joined the Ten Network in Sydney and also read the news for Ten and Seven in Adelaide. 

Former colleague David Richardson has written a tribute to Flannery on the Today Tonight website:

“Sean Flannery was a character in the truest sense of the word.  A larrikin in the ultimate Australian sense.  A bloke who loved a beer, he was the epitome of the old school journo from the days of copy boys, cadets and hard-drinking, hard-playing journos – a bloke who was just full of life.”

News Limited CEO and chairman John Hartigan also paid tribute:

"Sean was one of the great characters of radio and TV reporting.  Funny, smart – one of the last swashbucklers of journalism."

Sean Flannery will be farewelled at a funeral in Sydney on Tuesday.

Source: Daily Telegraph, Today Tonight
YouTube: d0nkeyshines

Obituary: Paul Lockyer, John Bean, Gary Ticehurst, Ian Carroll

ABC general manager Mark Scott yesterday described it as “the saddest of days” – following the death of veteran ABC journalist Paul Lockyer (pictured), camera operator John Bean and pilot Gary Ticehurst in a helicopter crash on Thursday night.

And last night came news that Ian Carroll, who recently retired from his role as director of innovation at the ABC, has died from pancreatic cancer.

Lockyer, Bean and Ticehurst were on board a helicopter while on assignment producing news and feature stories at Lake Eyre in South Australia.  The aircraft is believed to have crashed around 7.30pm Thursday night.

It is not known what caused the crash but it is believed that there was bad weather in the area at the time.

Lockyer, 61, was a journalist with over 40 years’ experience, most of them at the ABC in various roles, including foreign correspondent postings and reading the news, but also worked for the Nine Network for more than a decade.

His reporting from the Sydney Olympic Games for the ABC earned him a Logie award for most outstanding news reporter.

In recent times he had focused on covering regional issues for ABC and reported extensively on the drought-breaking floods that have hit eastern Australia.  In 2009 and 2010 he reported from Lake Eyre on the biggest floods to hit central Australia in a generation.

He is survived by wife Maria and two sons.

Camera operator Bean (pictured), 48, had been with ABC for more than two decades, working not only in News but also on programs including Catalyst, The New Inventors, Gardening Australia and Australian Story.  He also worked at the ABC’s Washington bureau during 2009.  He is survived by wife Pip Courtney, a reporter for ABC’s Landline program.

Ticehurst, 60, had been the ABC’s lead helicopter pilot since the mid 1980s and with over 16,000 hours of flying time was one of Australia’s most experienced media pilots.  He is survived by wife Therese.

While covering the Sydney to Hobart yacht race in 1998, Ticehurst (pictured) was instrumental in the rescue of 14 crew members from stricken yacht Business Post Naiad, which lost a skipper and crew member.

ABC’s current affairs program 7.30 last night devoted its entire program to the dedicated trio, and a tribute site has been produced by ABC Online.

The national broadcaster has also mourned the loss of former executive Ian Carroll (pictured) from pancreatic cancer.

Carroll, 64, was involved in the development of ABC news and current affairs productions including Four Corners, Nationwide, The National, Lateline and The 7.30 Report and went on to be chief executive of the ABC’s international satellite channel Australia Network.

He also spent a brief period at the Nine Network. 

Since 2007 he had led the broadcaster’s innovation portfolio, overseeing the launch of two digital channels and the popular online catch-up service iView as well as mobile applications and the development of ABC Online.

He was diagnosed with cancer a year ago but continued to work up until two weeks ago.

He is survived by wife, veteran ABC identity Geraldine Doogue.

Source: ABC, ABC, The Australian

Obituary: Reg Whiteman

Reg Whiteman, a performer from the earliest days of Western Australian television and the man who first played the role of children’s character Fat Cat, has died in Perth at the age of 82.

An inaugural member of the WA Ballet Company, Whiteman performed as part of a dance troupe on the opening night of Perth’s first television station, TVW7, in October 1959.

He also appeared on the opening night of Perth’s second television station, ABW2, in May 1960.

Although the idea of the Fat Cat character was initiated by station executives and production staff, it was designed by Judith Byrne, wife of TVW executive Greg Byrne, as television was moving from black and white to colour.  Whiteman, who had previously played the part of Humphrey B. Bear on Perth television, successfully auditioned to don the padded ginger fur costume and bring Fat Cat to life.  It was a role that he played with dedication and at times in some uniquely challenging environments, such as skiing, hot-air ballooning or paragliding – all in costume.

Fat Cat became a regular on TVW7, appearing in programs like Children’s Channel 7, Fat Cat’s Funtime Show, Earlybirds and Telethon and in the nightly segment telling children it was time to go to bed – a feature that still appears on TVW each night at 7.30pm.

The character was also extended to TVW’s sister station, SAS10 Adelaide, where it was played by different performers on programs like the Christmas telethons, the nightly bed-time reminders and the national Fat Cat And Friends series that ran from 1976 to 1992.

Although Whiteman retired from the Fat Cat role 20 years ago, he continued to be involved at TVW7 and is well remembered for his dedication and commitment in entertaining generations of junior viewers.

Source: WA TV History, The West.

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.

Obituary: Rex Mossop

Sydney football legend and former commentator Rex Mossop has died in a Sydney hospital at the age of 83.

The former rugby league and rugby union international forward had been admitted to hospital earlier this year with Alzheimer’s disease.  He was surrounded by family and friends when he died.

Although he retired from the sport in the early 1960s, Mossop maintained a high profile as a television commentator and presenter for Sydney channels ATN7 and TEN10 in the 1970s and 1980s.

Mossop also presented The Club Show for ATN7 in the 1970s and was a regular panellist on the 1990s sports-comedy show Andrew Denton: Live And Sweaty for ABC.

Source: ABC, NMA

Obituary: Jon Blake

Jon Blake, the promising young actor whose career was cut short following a road accident which rendered him paralysed with permanent brain damage, has died from pneumonia at the age of 52.

Blake was still a teenager when he was cast as Alan Archer in the 0-10 Network soap The Restless Years in 1977.  He later appeared in TV series Boy In The Bush, Five Mile Creek, A Country Practice and the landmark mini-series Anzacs.

He appeared in movies including Freedom, Cool Change, Running From The Guns and The Lighthorsemen. It was in 1986 while driving home from South Australia after The Lighthorsemen’s final day of filming that he was involved in the tragic accident, about 40 kilometres from Port Augusta, that led to him being in a coma for months and with permanent brain damage, leaving him totally incapacitated.

His compensation payout from the accident was partly calculated based on his estimated potential earnings in Hollywood.

For many years Blake was in the care of his mother Mascot until she died in 2007.  Recently, Blake’s son Dustin won a legal battle to take care of his father and also took his father to finally see a cinema screening of The Lighthorsemen.

Blake’s family have extended thanks to all the volunteers, carers and nurses that assisted in his care over the past 25 years.

A funeral is expected to be held later this week.

Source: IMDB, The Age, Network Ten, Herald Sun. TV Week, 19 September 1987.

Obituary: Michele Fawdon

Michele Fawdon, actress in film, stage and television, has died today after a battle with cancer.

Born in London in 1947, Fawdon studied in the United Kingdom before coming to Australia early in her professional career.  Following guest roles in Homicide, The Spoiler and Spyforce, Fawdon was cast as Mabel in the pilot for comedy series Snake Gully With Dad And Dave, produced in 1971, but her big break came the following year when she was cast in the original Australian production of Jesus Christ Superstar.

She went on to appear in many television productions in the years that followed, including Ryan, Matlock Police, The Unisexers, Flashez, Loss Of Innocence, Young Ramsay, Winners, The Flying Doctors, GP, A Country Practice, Marshall Law, All Saints, MDA, Fergus McPhail, Bastard Boys and City Homicide. 

Her last TV role was in the mini-series Killing Time which is yet to be screened in Australia.

Her role in the 1979 movie Cathy’s Child won her Best Actress awards at both the AFI Awards and the Australian Film And Television Awards (The Sammys).

Michele Fawdon is survived by partner Geoff Jenkins and daughter Lulu.

A memorial service is to be held next Monday.

Source: IF, TV Tonight, IMDB, TV Eye

Obituary: Bill Hunter

Bill Hunter, one of Australia’s most recognisable and prolific actors, has passed away in Melbourne at the age of 71.

The actor had been admitted to a Melbourne hospice early last week with inoperable cancer.

Born in Ballarat, Hunter went on to a career spanning 50 years with more than 100 roles in various film, stage and television productions. 

Early television roles included appearances in Hunter, Skippy The Bush Kangaroo, The Long Arm, Riptide, Dynasty, Catwalk, The Spoiler, Spyforce and King’s Men as well as appearing on multiple occasions in Division 4, Homicide and Matlock Police.

He later appeared in series including Prisoner, Golden Soak, Young Ramsay, 1915, Scales Of Justice, The Dismissal, Eureka Stockade, The Flying Doctors, A Fortunate Life, Stark, Seachange, All Saints, Pizza, Stingers and Two Twisted.

Hunter had an extensive film resume, including iconic Australian titles Stone, Newsfront, Gallipoli, Strictly Ballroom, Muriel’s Wedding, The Adventures Of Priscilla: Queen Of The Desert, Australia and Finding Nemo.  He also starred in films The Shiralee, Ned Kelly, Far East, Street Hero, Crackerjack and Bad Eggs.  He had recently played the role of racing legend Bart Cummings in the to-be-released film The Cup, recreating the 2002 Melbourne Cup.

He also featured in a number of commercial roles, including recent campaigns for ‘Grain Wave’ chips and the AFL.

Source: The Age, ABC, IMDB, Mark Morrissey

Obituary: Bob Davis

Geelong Football Club identity and former commentator Bob Davis has died at the age of 82.

A player for the Cats from 1948 to 1958, Davis later became captain and coach of the then VFL club.  He coached the team to their premiership in 1963 – their last Grand Final win for over 40 years.  He lived to see the team take the premiership in 2007 and presented the team with the premiership cup when they won again in 2009.

He was inducted into the AFL Hall of Fame in 1996.

But Davis’ contribution to football wasn’t just on the field, he was also a passionate commentator and was a key figure in the development of television coverage of the game.  Joining the commentary team at HSV7 in the late 1950s, Davis went on to many years as part of the World Of Sport team and, with Lou Richards and Jack Dyer, presented the late night favourite League Teams.

He later appeared on Sportsworld and Seven’s Footy Panel before leaving Seven in 2001.

Lewis Martin, General Manager of HSV7, said that Davis was a television pioneer:

“Bob Davis was not only a great football personality on Channel Seven, he was a television pioneer and his legacy can be seen today in sports entertainment television.  He was and always will be a beloved member of the Seven family from who we learned a great deal.  Bob will be sorely missed. Our thoughts and prayers go out to his wife Margaret and the Davis family.”

AFL chief Andrew Demetriou paid tribute to the Geelong legend:

"He coached his beloved club to a premiership in 1963, but perhaps his greatest contribution of all was to take our game into lounge rooms every weekend, as television developed in this country, and forged a powerful bond between our players and our fans.  On behalf of the AFL and our clubs, I wish to pass on our deepest sympathy to Bob’s wife Margaret and his family, and the Geelong Football Club, and to thank them for Bob’s wonderful service to our game."

Source: The Age, Throng