Where do we start? There have been so many people who have helped us to pull this book together, and each has played an important part in making it a reality.
First up, we’d like to acknowledge all the researchers and writers from Media Giants. Chloe Boulton and Thomas Hunter ended up carrying much of the load, and did so wonderfully well, but they had plenty of help along the way from Marcella Bidinost, Andrew Bliss, Tony Brown, Claire Deutsher, Megan Flamer, Elizabeth Joyes, Chris Ord and Amanda Place. Thanks also to Harry Clark and Bronwyn Owen, who helped out with additional research late in the piece, and Heather Kelly, who edited most of the features and pulled together many of the On Debut and Memories columns.
Brian Courtis, TV writer from The Age, read through all the features and identified a number of areas where they could be improved, or recalled things we’d neglected to include. We really appreciate his time, his expertise and his assistance.
A huge thank you to Barrie Bell, at Channel 9 in Melbourne, for his amazing photographic archives, his willingness to help and his overall friendly support for the entire project. We would have been lost without him. His colleagues, Lyn Elford and Irene Doel, also played important roles and we thank them.
Gordon Bennett, at Channel 7 in Melbourne, has been a good friend through a number of different projects, and so it proved again with this one. He gave us access to the filing cabinets of old negatives from HSV-7, and a couple of precious scrapbooks from TV’s early days, both of which proved to be crucial in filling in some of the detail and colour from that heady period. He also introduced us to the ‘Old Codgers’ – a group of friends from the old HSV-7 days – and their memories and photos were priceless. Special thanks to Graham Foster, Don Smith, John Walters and Harold Aspinall.
Kristina Echols, from Channel 7 publicity in Melbourne, was a terrific help in finding photos from more recent years, while Linda Calkin and Fiona Robertson at ATN-7 in Sydney, and Elizabeth Toberty and Guy Tranter from the ABC in Sydney were also a huge help in finding and gaining access to many photos.
Bob Phillips and Judy Banks, from the TV World Media Museum, were generous with their time, their recollections and their wonderful collection of memorabilia. If you’ve got a soft spot for TV nostalgia, we heartily recommend a visit to their museum on the corner of Moorooduc and Eramosa Roads in Moorooduc, on the Mornington Peninsula in Victoria.
Chris Keating was a wonderful help to us – we just wish we could have found him earlier in the whole process! He helped with access to many old TV magazines, and his A–Z listing of Australian TV programs was the answer to many odd research questions. He has not, however, had the chance to check this book, so any inaccuracies are not of his doing!
Don Storey and Andrew Bayley were also extremely generous with photographic and research material, and TV fans should definitely check out their websites (www.classicaustraliantv.com and televisionau.siv.net.au respectively) for a treasure trove of information.
We owe a great debt to everyone who’s ever written about TV for the major daily newspapers – but especially to those specialist TV magazines such as TV Times, TV Week and Listener In-TV. We thank all those magazines and supplements, and the journalists and photographers who worked on them, for producing such a comprehensive body of work.
Thanks to the current Managing Editor of TV Week, Marnie McLean, and the wonderfully helpful Leila Jeffreys at ACP, for allowing us to use a number of photos from old editions of TV Week. We really appreciate their help.
We thank the following photographers who have taken TV-related photos over the years. They include Harry Wannacott, Barrie Bell, Steve Brack, Paul Shire, David Parker, John Allott Rogers, Robert Clark, Michelle Day, Lindsay Hogan, Phil Holloway, Brian McInerny, Brian McKenzie, Coll Millington, Julia Morrell, Vivian Zink, Dennis Wisken, Greg Noakes and Skip Watkins, Double PR Photography and Tarsha Hosking.
A big, global thank you to all of the following, who have provided assistance of one form or another throughout this process (in no particular order):
The Age Editorial Library
Carol Matthews, Crawford Productions
Alex Gionfriddo, AFI Research Collection
Zsuzsi Szucs and Simon Smith, National Film and Sound Archive (ScreenSound)
Steve Knapman, Knapman Wyld Television
Michèle Burch, Deb Choate and Michael Hirsh, Working Dog
Greg Evans
Philip Brady
Sharon Williams, Kennedy Miller
BTV-6, Ballarat
Paul Shire
Shannon Becker and David Brown, Endemol Southern Star
Anna Sorenson, SBS TV Publicity
Heidi Virtue, Foxtel
Andra Gough, Holeproof
Dorry Kordahi, Dorry Kordahi Management
Sally Chapman and Paul McMillan, George Patterson Y&R
Maria Mitropoulos and Emily Hope, JWT
Georgina Lyell, TAC
Rove McManus
Roving Enterprises
Kirsten Le Bon, The Best Picture Show Company
Steve and Terri Irwin, Australia Zoo Pty Ltd
Kylie Connell, Grundy Organisation
Jeremy Kewley
Aaron Haberfield at Prime TV
Kellie Hampton at NBN Television
Sam Dawson at Imparja
Don Burke
Les Murray, SBS
Drew Morphett, ABC
Jenny Buckland at Australian Children’s Television Foundation
Nigel Dick
Derek Malone, Village Roadshow Pictures Television P/L
Grahame Bond
Cheryl Gagliano, Fauna Productions Pty Limited
Gary Reilly and Tony Sattler
Marius Luppino, Granada
Murray from Gardenvale Collectables
Ray Pond
Helen Siberson, Channel 7
Madeleine Burke
Dan Trenear
Belinda Winnall, Channel 10
Cynthia Kelly and Ben Gannon, View Films Pty Ltd
Pauline Lee, International Casting Service & Associates Pty Ltd
Helen Morse
Lorraine Bayly
Kerrie Matthews, Somers Carroll Pty Ltd
Daryl Somers
Alli MacGregor, Terry Blamey Management Ltd
Kylie Minogue
Jessica Carrera, Shanahan Management
Jason Donovan
Kelly Davis, Channel Nine Publicity
Bert Newton
Simone Roleff, Beyond Simpson Le Mesurier
Hal McElroy, McElroy All Media
Melina McKenna, I.C.S & Associates
John Waters
Jillian Bowen, Entertainment Public Relations
Sigrid Thornton
Debbie Newsome
Bryan Brown
Maggie McLaren
Jana Wendt
John Wood
And everybody else who has given us their time for interviews, fact-checking, research and reminiscing.
And finally, thanks to all those who worked on the production of this book, especially our talented and ever-patient designer Phil Campbell, our copyeditor Kerry Biram, and our editor at Hardie Grant, Jasmin Chua. It’s been a long, long journey – sometimes it must have felt like 50 years in itself – but hopefully the results are worth it.
We’re big fans of television. We’ve watched far too much of it to be good for anybody. But if you’ve bought this book, we suspect you’re in the same boat. So here’s to Australian television’s next 50 years – let’s hope it’s every bit as wild and entertaining a ride as the first 50 have been.
Nick Place & Michael Roberts Media Giants