Ten HD becomes One HD

For those of you who have enjoyed watching your favourite Network Ten programs in high-definition - shows like House, Thank God You're Here, Rove, Neighbours, Australian Idol and even Ten News, Neighbours and 9am - your days may soon be numbered because, while Ten are no doubt grateful for your support, from April next year it appears Ten will turn over its high-definition channel entirely over to sport.

In launching Australia's first 24/7 free-to-air sports channel, TenHD will become OneHD, so named because '1' is the digital channel number for the HD channel.  OneHD will also be simulcast on a separate standard-definition digital channel.

The new channel is part of the relaxing of multi-channel restrictions currently placed on the commercial broadcasters.  Up until 2007, none of the commercial channels were allowed to provide multiple programming options via digital, and only from last year it was possible to have dedicated high-definition programming. 

From 1 January 2009, commercial networks will be permitted to offer multi-channel programming in both standard and high-definition formats.

OneHD will tackle pay television's grip on wall-to-wall sports coverage with its own 24-hour schedule of various local and international sports, including AFL, netball, cricket, Formula 1, NFL, NBA, Major League baseball, golf and tennis.  Ten has also scored a coup by securing exclusive rights to Swimming Australia events including Australian Swimming Championships, Pan Pacific Championships and FINA World Short Course events. 

As current legislation dictates, major events such as the AFL Grand Final and the 2010 Commonwealth Games will be shown on Ten's primary channel as well as in high-definition on OneHD.

OneHD also promises to expand its long-running Sports Tonight format with two daily editions of the program.  The channel also promises programming dedicated to AFL and other sports analysis.  Ten sports stalwart Stephen Quartermain and Fox Sports commentator Robert Walls are reported to be fronting a post-round AFL program being proposed for the new channel.

The move to OneHD is a bold move in that Ten's efforts in launching TenHD with some fanfare last year may now be redundant.  As well, networks (including Ten) are already losing favour with viewers over current trends towards sudden and numerous schedule changes, intrusive advertising and late-running programs, so for Ten to wipe out its high-definition mainstream programming, in favour of what is essentially niche market programming, is a risky move that could further alienate viewers, which will no doubt be something that its rivals Seven and Nine will endeavour to pounce on.

Tanya Halesworth

Tanya Halesworth, one of ABC's first female television presenters, died earlier this month at the age of 73.

Born in Brisbane in 1935, Halesworth moved with her family to Sydney and after finishing school became involved in small theatre companies and appeared in early TV commercials.

In 1958, the 23-year-old successfully beat 200 other applicants for an announcing and presenting role at ABC's Sydney station ABN2.  Later, in amongst studies and theatre performences, she also appeared as a presenter on Six O'Clock Rock.  In 1961, she won a TV Week Logie award for Most Popular Female Personality in NSW.

Halesworth moved to the Seven Network in 1962, and there met her future husband, announcer and interviewer John Bailey.  Although Halesworth had already been married, and divorced, and had declared that "entirely against man's instincts to be tied down to one woman", she later married Bailey after returning from working in the United Kingdom in the mid-1960s.  The pair worked at TEN10 Sydney before moving to GTV9 in Melbourne. 

In June 1973, Halesworth launched the Nine Network's daytime current affairs program No Man's Land, a ground-breaking effort given the program had an all-female line-up, including reporters Mickie de Stoop and Susan Peacock, and was determined to "liberate the women from the kitchen sinks and laundries for 30 minutes every day to keep up with the news."  The program won a TV Week Logie in 1975 for Outstanding Contribution to Daytime TV.

Halesworth then returned to ABC in the 1980s to host the arts program Sunday Spectrum, then moved to the Ten Network's Good Morning Australia, before leaving television.  She then went on to a career in public relations and later in psychology.

Halesworth returned to Queensland in the late 1990s following the death of Bailey, and continued working until she was diagnosed with cancer earlier this year. 

Tanya Halesworth is survived by her sons John, Michael and Keiran and their families, and six grandchildren. 

Source: SMH, Australian Television Information Archive

NITV goes to Sydney

Australia's national indigenous broadcaster, National Indigenous Television (NITV), is expanding its coverage by gaining access to Sydney's Digital 44 free-to-air service.

NITV commenced operation in July last year, initially broadcasting via the Optus Aurora satellite and re-transmitted through the facilities of Imparja Television in remote areas.  The channel is also available via Foxtel, Optus, Austar, Neighbourhood Cable and TransACT pay-TV platforms and even via the in-house television system at Parliament House in Canberra.  The expansion to Digital 44 marks the broadcaster's first free-to-air transmission in a capital city, adding to the 150 transmission sites already in operation in remote and regional communities.

As the name implies, NITV provides programming made by, and aimed at, Australia's indigenous communities, including children's programs, documentaries, drama, music, entertainment, news and current affairs.

Earlier this year NITV's sports program, Marngrook Footy Show, won Best Sports Program at the Antenna Awards in Melbourne, and NITV and SBS were broadcast partners for the Deadly Awards held at the Sydney Opera House earlier this month.  NITV was also a sponsor at this year's St Kilda Film Festival in Melbourne.

NITV has also joined with international broadcasters including Maori Television New Zealand, S4C Wales, SABC South Africa, BBC Scotland, APTN Canada, Taiwan Indigenous Network, TG4 Ireland and Australia's SBS, to form the World Indigenous Broadcast Network, giving NITV programs the potential to be given a global audience.

Digital 44 is a datacasting service operating on an extended trial basis in Sydney.  The service is not allowed to provide mainstream television but carries a number of niche or narrowcast channels including Expo Channel, Australian Christian Channel, news and weather reports (ABC), parliamentary broadcasts and NSW government information.

 

Source: NITV

Denton's had enough of Rope

After six seasons and almost 200 episodes, Andrew Denton (pictured) has decided it's time to move on from his weekly interview show Enough Rope With Andrew Denton.

Beginning on ABC in March 2003, Enough Rope With Andrew Denton marked a return to television after seven years for Denton.  His TV career began in 1988 as host of variety/comedy show Blah Blah Blah on ABC, followed by The Money Or The Gun and the Friday night sports show Live And Sweaty.  In the mid-1990s, Denton moved to the Seven Network with his own self-titled show that ran for two years, before moving into breakfast radio on Sydney's Triple M with Denton colleague Amanda Keller.

On the same night that Enough Rope With Andrew Denton premiered the Seven Network launched its own talk show, The Chat Room, featuring a number of radio personalities including Keller.  The Chat Room had a short life, having proved that breakfast radio presenters don't always translate to prime time television, but Enough Rope went on to become a consistent ratings performer for ABC with Denton's interviewing style becoming a hit with viewers.

Enough Rope has attracted acclaim for its high-profile guests from a range of fields including politics, business, entertainment, sports, the arts and medicine.  The program has also featured people behind major news stories, such as Joanne Lees, the partner of abducted English tourist Peter Falconio, and Major Michael Mori, the military lawyer for former Guantanamo Bay detainee David Hicks.

Some of the international guests to have appeared on Enough Rope: Bill Clinton, Michael Parkinson, Jerry Seinfeld, Sir Bob Geldof, Billy Connolly, Al Gore, Sir Elton John, Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin, Jamie Oliver, Bono, Helen Mirren, Rudy Giuliani, Crown Prince Frederick and Princess Mary of Denmark. Local guests have included: Steve and Terri Irwin, Jane and Glenn McGrath, Pauline Hanson, Maggie Tabberer, Michael Leunig, John Laws, Jimmy Barnes, Dame Elisabeth Murdoch, Mike Willesee, Raelene Boyle, Judith Lucy.

And part of the charm of Enough Rope was not just its high-profile guest list, but also in featuring 'ordinary' Australians, from less-glamorous fields, such as nurses, cab drivers, priests, driving instructors and butchers, all of whose stories could be as equally enthralling as those of the big-ticket names.

The program also staged a ten-year reunion of cancer sufferers featured in an earlier Denton documentary, The Topic Of Cancer, and has taken the show out to regional Australia, to towns such as Rainbow and Mt Isa, to give a unique insight into rural Australia. 

This year, Enough Rope also featured a special series of episodes, Elders, featuring interviews with some of our most prominent older citizens.  And Denton was nominated earlier this year for a TV Week Gold Logie award as Most Popular Personality on Australian Television.

In moving away from Enough Rope, Denton is keen to pursue other projects behind the cameras with his company Zapruder's Other Films.  The company has already turned The Chaser into a household name with CNNNN and The Election Chaser, and also had success this year with The Gruen Transfer, going behind-the-scenes in the advertising industry.

The final episode of Enough Rope With Andrew Denton appears on Monday 8 December on ABC1.

1978: October 28-November 3

Sammys Golden Night
It was a Who's Who of Australian Showbusiness when 800 stars, producers and writers gathered at Sydney's Seymour Centre on 11 October for the third annual Sammy Awards.  The awards, held in partnership between TV Times, the Variety Club of Australia charity and the Seven Network, honour the Australian film and television industries.  The event is also a major fund-raising effort for Variety which has collected over $30,000 over the last three years.

1978 Sammy Awards TV category winners: Gold (male): Mike Walsh Gold (female): June Salter Chips Rafferty Memorial Award: Ken G Hall Best Actor in a Single TV Performance: Tony Bonner (End Of Summer) Best Actress in a Single TV Performance: Davina Whitehouse (The Night Nurse) Best Actor in a TV Series: George Mallaby (Cop Shop) Best Actress in a TV Series: Lorraine Bayly (The Sullivans) Best Variety Performer: Julie Anthony Best Variety Program: Julie Anthony's First Special Best Comedy Program: The Norman Gunston Show Best Drama Series: The Sullivans Best TV Play: End Of Summer Best News Coverage: Brisbane shoot-out (QTQ9) Best Documentary: A Big Country Best Current Affairs Program: Four Corners 'Utah' report Best Children's Series: Wombat (BTQ7) Best Sports Coverage: Australian Open Golf 1977 Best Light Entertainment Program: The Mike Walsh Show Best Writer TV Series: Tony Morphett (The Sullivans) Best Writer TV Play: Cliff Green (End Of Summer)

News team under fire in Vietnam
An ABC news team came under fire on the Cambodian-Vietnamese border, during a four-week news-gathering visit to Vietnam.  ABC's Singapore correspondent Tony Joyce, sound recordist Steven de Vroom and cameraman David Westray, were filming material for a documentary, Vietnam Today, to screen nationally on ABC later in the year.  "There was quite a bit of sniper fire and shelling so we were creeping and crawling, close to the ground.  We were warned if the Cambodians saw us they would assume we were Russian military advisors.  Then they would really let loose.  Luckily they didn't," Joyce told TV Times.  The Vietnam visit is only the second by Australian newsmen since the war ended in 1975.  A team from the 0-10 Network had been there earlier this year.

Polly put the kettle on for Kerry
Before Against The Wind and the role of convict woman Polly came along, actress Kerry McGuire (pictured) had almost despaired that her big acting break would ever happen.  The 32-year-old actress, who had studied at NIDA and scored some roles in TV series such as ABC's Dynasty and the Seven Network's Catwalk and stage productions including Hedda Gabler and Antony And Cleopatra, was still waiting for a big break but feels now with Against The Wind she is able to move into the next stage of her acting career: "I think I'm just beginning to break into my age group.  I've been a mature style of actress competing with some very good older women.  Now I'm growing into the era that should be mine..."

Briefly:
Marcia Hines is to present another series of six shows for ABC in the new year, but still has commitments in Europe to fulfil before she can start work on the series.

Former Homicide cop Don Barker is back in Melbourne for a guest role in the new 0-10 Network series Prisoner, now in production.

Former Australian Test skipper Bobby Simpson is to be chief commentator for the Gillette Cup series of cricket matches to be telecast on the 0-10 Network over the next three months. 

Viewpoint: Letters to the Editor:
"Why, oh why has TEN10 decided to put The Steve Raymond Show on at 1.30 of all times?  Don't they realise that a very popular show is on the other channel at the same time.  Steve Raymond will put on a fantastic show, but after watching Days Of Our Lives for the past twelve years, I think TEN10 could have found any other time to put the show on." E. Fuller, NSW.

"Although I am enjoying Against The Wind (pictured), I find it difficult to believe that after a hard life for 10 years that people would not age at all.  It is a pity that the continuity was not up to the excellent standard of the rest of the series so far." J. Higson, NSW.

"I really enjoyed the article in TV Times about viewers who ring in to TV stations.  However, I hope they got a better reception than I did on the two occasions I phoned TV stations here in Sydney.  When I called ATN7 to congratulate them on their camera-work in the 1977 Hardie-Ferodo at Bathurst, the switchboard operator was amazed that a woman would even watch motor racing, let alone comment on the camera-work.  Then I called ABC to say how much I was enjoying Sailor, but the girl on the switchboard  didn't go a bundle on my taste in TV programs either.  I'll never ring in again, that's for sure." M. Bennett, NSW.

What's On (October 28-November 3):
On Saturday, ATV0 presents the Gillette Cup cricket, live from the Gabba in Brisbane, for the match between Queensland and South Australia.  On Sunday, the Gillette Cup moves to the Sydney Cricket Ground for the match between New South Wales and Victoria.

Denise Drysdale (pictured) is Ernie Sigley's special guest on HSV7's Penthouse '78.

On Monday night's A Big Country on ABC, reporter Kenyon Castle follows jazz musicians Don Burrows and George Golla on their tour through the mining areas of the north west.  The program features aboriginal performers David Gulpilil and David Blanasi.

Vince Lovegrove presents a two-hour special on HSV7, Australian Music To The World, paying tribute to the Australian artists who have achieved international acclaim.  Lovegrove and his film crew travelled the world to catch up with Australians including the Bee Gees, the Little River Band, Olivia Newton-John, Peter Allen and Sherbet.

The Naked Vicar Show and The Best Of Norman Gunston appear on HSV7 on Wednesday night, while on GTV9 there's a one-hour special An Evening With Les Girls, recorded at the Carousel Room of the Chevron Hotel, Surfers Paradise.

On Friday night, ATV0 presents the final episode of The Daryl And Ossie Show, after forty episodes, and The Peter Couchman Show presents a special Melbourne Cup preview on Friday night.

Jeanne Little (pictured) and John Ewart are guest panelists on ABC's Micro Macro on Friday night, joining host Noel Ferrier and regulars Carol Raye and Stuart Wagstaff.

Sunday night movies are The Shootist (HSV7), A Touch Of Class (GTV9) and The Drowning Pool (ATV0), while ABC's Sunday night opera is L'Heure Espagnole (The Spanish Hour) produced at ABC's Sydney studios and featuring the Sydney Symphony Orchestra.

Source: TV Times (Melbourne edition), 28 October 1978.  ABC/ACP

Melbourne's Guide turns 18

The Herald Sun Guide has been a weekly supplement in Melbourne's Herald Sun newspaper since October 1990. Though it could be said that the Guide actually had its origins as Melbourne's Listener In which began as a radio listing back in 1925 and continued publication until 1987, ending its days as TV Scene. The Sun newspaper at that time had only recently launched a seven-day TV guide in its Thursday edition, which later moved to Wednesdays after the demise of TV Scene, which also used to come out on a Wednesday. Another common link between TV Scene and the Guide was that of Robert Fidgeon who wrote for TV Scene and later wrote for and edited the Guide until his passing last year.

This week's edition of the Guide, to celebrate its 18th birthday, featured network personalities Rove McManus, Rebecca Gibney and Bert Newton (pictured, above), thus representing each of the three networks, each recalling various highlights of their careers over the past eighteen years.

Back in 1990, 16-year-old Rove McManus was in Perth performing in a high school musical production of Oklahoma ("thankfully for everybody I didn't move into musical theatre") before eventually coming to Melbourne to host a variety show on Channel 31 called The Loft, attracting high praise from the Guide's Robert Fidgeon (pictured). In September 1999, McManus began hosting his own late-night show on the Nine Network and when the network decided not to renew after ten weeks he wound up at Network Ten where his company Roving Enterprises now heads a number of prime-time shows for the network, and has led to McManus winning three TV Week Gold Logies awards.

New Zealand-born Rebecca Gibney has been a regular fixture on Australian TV for much of the last eighteen years, with roles in popular productions The Flying Doctors, All Together Now and the Halifax f.p. and Small Claims telemovies, plus mini-series Day Of The Roses, Kangaroo Palace and Come In Spinner. A break from regular series television saw Gibney move to Tasmania, but still appearing in programs such as Sensing Murder and Venus And Mars. The TV Week Logie award-winning actress has returned to television drama this year in the popular Seven Network series Packed To The Rafters.

Bert Newton recalls that at the age of 18, he was starting in television as a host of HSV7's The Late Show. By the time the Guide began publication in October 1990, Newton had been in television for over thirty years but his TV career was looking a bit uncertain following the demise of The Bert Newton Show which had struggled to make a dent against Midday With Ray Martin the previous year. Things turned around in 1992 when Newton made a surprise signing with the Ten Network to host its new Morning Show, later changing to Good Morning Australia, and redefining mid-morning television. Newton eventually left Ten when Good Morning Australia wrapped up three years ago, and returned to the Nine Network to host Bert's Family Feud, and later 20 To 1 and What A Year.

To commemorate the 18th birthday of the Herald Sun Guide, Darren Devlyn proposed his list of the top 18 TV stars who've made the biggest impact on TV over the last eighteen years:

1. Rob Sitch and Working Dog Productions, with hit shows The Late Show, Frontline, The Panel, Thank God You're Here and The Hollowmen under their belt.

2. Daryl Somers, for his broad appeal in popular shows Hey Hey It's Saturday and Dancing With The Stars.

3. Don Burke (pictured), for bringing gardening to prime-time commercial television and hence spawning a whole string of similar lifestyle programs

4. Ray Martin
5. Eddie McGuire
6. Bert Newton
7. Brian Naylor
8. Jana Wendt (pictured)
9. Gina Riley and Jane Turner (Kath & Kim)
10. Rove McManus
11. Bruce McAvaney
12. Lisa McCune
13. Aaron Pedersen
14. Rebecca Gibney
15. Andrew Denton (pictured)
16. Georgie Parker
17. Claudia Karvan
18. Gary Sweet

Source: Herald Sun, 22 October 2008

TV Guide goes for a dollar

TV Guide is an icon of the American magazine publishing industry.  Since it was first published in 1953, TV Guide has followed the progress of television, its programs and celebrities on a weekly basis.  The stars that have featured on TV Guide front covers over the last fifty-five years are a Who's Who of popular culture.

And while - like other printed TV listings - TV Guide has recorded a declining circulation in recent times, it still claims a weekly readership of over 20 million Americans.

But this week TV Guide made news itself when its owner, Macrovision, sold the title to private equity firm OpenGate Capital for one dollar - not for one issue, but the whole publication.  (TV Guide's online presence is not included in the sale)  As well as that, Macrovision also offered OpenGate a low-interest loan to help cover the magazine's losses.  This is all quite a markdown considering that a previous owner, Rupert Murdoch, made corporate history when he bought the magazine for $US3 billion in 1988, at the time making it the largest deal in American publishing history.  Murdoch later admitted that he had paid too much for the title and in 1998 sold it off for $US2 billion.

The recent bargain-priced sale of TV Guide highlights the challenges facing the printed media market, such as TV listings, with intense competition from other media such as the internet and electronic TV listings through services such as TiVo or electronic program guide channels often found on pay TV and digital TV, which can all be updated at the press of a button, an obvious benefit given networks' tendency for rapid schedule changes at a moment's notice. 

Since the historic Murdoch deal, TV Guide has been reworked numerous times including dumping its digest-size format to the larger-page format in 2005, a move which coincided with the controversial scrapping of all localised TV program listings and replacing with a single national 'grid' format covering the major networks only, and editorial featuring an increased emphasis on celebrity stories rather than breaking news.   The title recorded a $US20 million loss in 2007, but OpenGate is hopeful to turn the magazine around and have it making a profit again as soon as 2009.

The evolution of the TV listing market has also seen Canada's TV Guide (not related to the US title) abandon print publication altogether in 2006, instead choosing only to maintain itself as an online presence.

Source: AdAge, Folio

Digital deadlines mapped out

Following news that Mildura has been selected as the pilot market for phasing out analogue television transmission, Communications Minister Senator Stephen Conroy has mapped out the timetable for conversion from analogue for the rest of the country:

2010:
January-June: Mildura VIC*
July-December: Regional SA, Broken Hill NSW

2011:
January-June: Regional VIC
July-December: Regional QLD

2012:
January-June: Southern NSW, Canberra ACT, Griffith NSW
July-December: Northern NSW

2013:
January-June: Tasmania*, Perth, Brisbane, Gold Coast QLD
July-December: Melbourne, Adelaide, Sydney, Darwin*, Regional WA, Remote Central and Eastern, Central Coast NSW

* Markets that already have one commercial service exclusively broadcast on digital.

Source

Mildura to lead digital switch

The north-west Victorian city of Mildura is set to lead the state into the world of digital-only television.

The Age reports today that Mildura is to be earmarked as the first region to have analogue signals switched off in early-2010, with the rest of the state to follow a year later.

Mildura has been selected as the pilot market for the transition as it currently has a high market penetration of digital tuners, estimated to be around 70 per cent, largely due to the region's third commercial TV station, a relay of Network Ten, being broadcast locally only on digital. Mildura is one of only three markets in Australia to have a digital-only commercial TV signal, the others being Darwin and Tasmania which both also have Network Ten outlets broadcasting exclusively in digital.

The switching off of analogue television in a smaller-sized market like Mildura will also highlight any issues that may need to be addressed by the time capital city and other regional sites are affected.

The Government has set a deadline of 31 December 2013 for all analogue services to be shut off nationwide. The full timetable for shutting down analogue services is expected to be announced by Communications Minister Stephen Conroy this week.

1978: October 21-27

Jimmy's still playing the game
In 22 years of TV, Jimmy Hannan has hosted more than twenty shows - including Celebrity Squares, Spending Spree, Split Second, Say When, Generation Gap, The Jimmy Hannan Show, Saturday Date and Let's Make A Deal - but since Nine axed Let's Make A Deal a year ago, the "eyes and teeth" of Australian TV has rarely been seen on screen. But Hannan is not lying low, instead he is spending his mornings hosting a radio show on 2GB Sydney and has just started as a panelist on the new ABC game show Micro Macro. And the father of four who rose to fame as a champion contestant on Australia's first TV game show, Name That Tune in 1956, has an untold ambition to be an actor. "I'm starting acting lessons next year," he told TV Times. (Pictured: Micro Macro's Carol Raye, Noel Ferrier and Jimmy Hannan)

Nurse Lynda cops out
Actress Lynda Stoner will be leaving The Young Doctors when her contract with the Nine Network soap expires early next year. The former Miss TV Times is due to start work on the Seven Network series Cop Shop as policewoman Amanda King. But when asked about her leaving The Young Doctors, John Fowler of the Reg Grundy Organisation, which produces The Young Doctors, knew nothing of Stoner's plans: "As far as we are concerned she is under contract with us."

Trisha's nobody's Patsy
Former Bandstand favourite Trisha Noble (pictured), now based in the US but currently visiting Australia, finds herself living a double life. Although she is known as an actress in Hollywood, with recent roles in TV series including Executive Suite, James At 15 and Husbands And Wives and as a call-girl in an episode of The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Noble is keen to shake off her image as the sweet, little gingham-gowned Patsy Ann of Bandstand. "I want so much to come back to my own country to do a strong, solid role which will once and for all get Patsy Ann off my back."

Sales plan for Wherrett series
Negotiations are already in progress to sell Peter Wherrett's big budget series on the history of the motor car internationally. The ten-part series, Peter Wherrett's Marque: 100 Years Of Motoring, is still in production and not due to screen on ABC until the new year. Wherrett has told TV Times, "a lot of interest has been shown and negotiations are going on in North America and England. We hope it will be the first ABC series to crack the overseas market in a big way." Wherrett also told TV Times his enthusiastic plans for a new series, potentially titled Highway One, which will follow the highway from Cairns to Darwin, circumnavigating Australia, but just needs the money to make it happen.

Briefly:
Malcolm Searle (pictured), host of the new 0-10 Network game show Pyramid Challenge, told TV Times, "I'm enjoying this more than I've ever enjoyed any TV work. But I won't be destroyed one way or the other when the show eventually finishes."

Rock singer Doug Parkinson is about to embark on a new role in soapie The Young Doctors, playing the manager of a country and western singer, to be played by 20-year-old Kim Durrant.

At a recent cast party to celebrate the first birthday of The Restless Years, TEN10 chief Ian Kennon announced that the network has chosen to renew the series for a further twelve months.

Viewpoint: Letters to the Editor:
"When will the 0-10 Network realise that Blankety Blanks is the most boring show on TV?  Graham Kennedy wants a rap on the knuckles and told to get on with it. It should be a fast-moving show." A. Wilton, QLD.

"I eagerly sat down to watch ATV0's late movie The African Queen, as advertised in all TV guides.  But I had made a sad mistake, for The African Queen was obviously of secondary importance. Of primary concern was Ross D Wyllie and his endless rambling concerning mindless trivia. I realise ATV0 is a commercial channel and Mr Wyllie has to earn a living, but really!" H. Boer, VIC.

"What a great pity it is that ABC did not make that fine series Against The Wind (pictured). We would have been spared the excessive ads which break the concentration of the viewer." M. Nolan, NSW.

What's On (October 21-27):
ATV0 screens live coverage of the Custom Credit Indoor Tennis Championships, from Sydney's Hordern Pavilion, on Saturday night and Sunday afternoon. Commentators are Ray Warren and Bill Bowrey.

In a repeat of GTV9's The Paul Hogan Show, Paul Hogan and his team send up Number 96 and Pot Of Gold. Delvene Delaney joins Strop (John Cornell) and Hoges to discover the hazards of health clinics.

Barry Creyton and Kate Fitzpatrick are guest panelists on ABC's Micro Macro.  Followed by A Visit To The Uncle, the final episode of the comedy series Tickled Pink on ABC, starring Barry Otto, Max Gillies, Bunney Brooke and Johnny Lockwood.

This Is Your Life host Roger Climpson is joined by Annette Allison and Mike Higgins to host the Miss Australia 1979 contest, live from Brisbane, screening on HSV7 on Friday night.  In the same timeslot, ATV0 presents 21 Hours In Munich, a special movie presentation tracing the events at the 1972 Olympic Games which saw Arab terrorists kill two Israeli athletes and taking nine others hostage.

Sunday night movies are The Ghost Of Flight 401 (HSV7), Night Flight To Moscow (GTV9) and Carry On Abroad (ATV0). ABC presents a Sunday night opera, Lucrezia Borgia, from the Australian Opera Company featuring Joan Sutherland and the Elizabethan Symphony Orchestra.

Source: TV Times (Melbourne edition), 21 October 1978.  ABC/ACP