Australian TV Plays: 1960s

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Article So You Want to Write Television

Article about writing TV plays from someone I'd never heard of

Portrait of a Star (18 May 1963) (Perth)

      Drama play tracing a young singer’s rise to fame, and the pitfalls and sorrows she encounters along with success. Based heavily upon Baker’s own career.

Originating Station:      TVW-7
Running Time:      60 mins

Cast : Dorothy Baker
     Ron Graham
     Alan Cassell

Airdate:      9:30 p.m Saturday May 18th 1963 (TCN-9)

SMH 6 May 1963

SMH 13 May 1963

SMH 18 May 1963

List of notes

When listing wiped plays mention The Torrents

PORTRAIT OF A STAR

Reaching For The Knob

Portrait of a Star, Channel 9.

Tn some “viewing areas” Saturday nights A are considered suitable for some of the best television shows, with the lightest items last on the bill. In Melbourne you can see “Startime” from 10.30 until you fall into a dreamless sleep. But in Sydney anything can happen on a Saturday night, and, as an instance, I give you a recent “musical play” called “Portrait of a Star,” which flashed on to my screen at 9.30 and remained visible until about 9.45 when my palsied hand at last found the knob, and tuned out. “Portrait of a Star (60 min.),” said the programme notice, “is the first musical play from TVW, Perth.” It starred Melbourne singer, Dorothy Baker, who has since gone to England, and it told the story “of a young singer’s struggle for recognition, and her rise to fame and fortune, of the people who guided her and the pitfalls she encountered on the way up.” It all had a familiar ring,somehow.

Well, the producer and director, Max Bostock, started his portrait with a splash of everything. On a tiered stage, floodlit and surrounded with utter blackness, the chorus whirled and Miss Baker sang in a magnificently loud, flat and tuneless fashion. It was an impressive way of showing her humble beginning with the West Cottesloe Musical, Dramatic and Marching Girls’ Society, and I waited for James Mason to appear and say, “You can’t sing, but you can be taught. You
have that other indefinable something, the stuff from which stars are born.”

He didn’t, though. In the next shots, our star was backed against her dressing room door by a tide of newspaper photo-
graphers who fired questions at her but took no pictures. And what questions! How, they asked, had she become a star?
The rest was flashback. Miss Baker, as a teenager named Dorothy Baker, wearing a pony tail obviously borrowed from
a real pony, came prancing in to a deserted dance hall where “Steve” sat fooling with a piano.

After a hesitant beginning, Miss Baker suddenly proved that she can sing more like Vera Lynn than Vera Lynn can these days, and “Steve”, sharing our astonishment, engaged her on the spot Apparently without rehearsal, she turned up that night to sing, run shyly from the stage, be talked back on by Steve, and win feeble applause from an unseen audience.

It must have contained a talent scout from the nether regions, because immediately the cameras looked down on our girl dancing in some hellish pit, while fallen vestal virgins swirled around her and some fellow tap-danced, waving a top-pop record. The cameras descended for a shot over a cauldron of sulphuric acid, and the fumes spread, and a man and woman danced merrily in them, crying “Baba Lu!” Then more of our girl and the vestals in their pit. And the result of all that was a clipping, pasted on to an edition of, I guess, the “Nether Regions News”, proclaiming “NEW STAR DISCOVERED”. I almost cried with relief when a new voice declared that you get one and a half cups of flavor from someone or other’s coffee beans, and that broke the spell. The trembling hand reached the knob, and Gary Cooper said, “Hop onto the stage, ma’am,” and thank heavens it was a sane, old fashioned Wild West stage he was talking about.

Naturally, I missed the credits and cannot report who wrote, or daubed, the “Portrait”. Nor do I know “Steve’s” name, but whoever he was, he did very well and much more should be seen of him, if anyone’s really looking for new actors in television.

FRANK ROBERTS

Bulletin 1 June 1963

Born on This Tide (22 December 1963) (Adelaide)

Cast      Jean Marshall
     Tom Georgeson
     Judith Dick
     Laurie Davies
     Carmel Millhouse

    Christmas drama play about a family spending the holiday at a beach shack, when they discover a pregnant woman washed up on the shore in a small boat. However, the woman has been exposed to radiation, and the family is divided over whether or not to aid her.

Scriptwriter:      Reverend Frederick Wiseman
Director:      Ted Craig
Producer:      Maurice Coombs
Originating Station:     Christian Television Association / ADS-7
Running Time:      30 mins

Airdate:      10:30 p.m Sunday December 22nd 1963
     5:45 p.m Sunday December 25th 1966 (SES-8)

Dear Edgar (27 March 1964)

DEAR EDGARRichard Kerr .................................................... Russell JarrettCorrie Kerr .................................................... Gweneth SmithChris Kerr ......................................................... Graham BeanLinda Kerr .............................................................. Gail WoodCarl Wentworth ................................................. Dick McCannVirginia .............................................................. Jackie EllisonBabs .......................................................... Barbara Wheelton........................................................................ Don McTaggartComedy play about a Brisbane newspaper editor who is also an anonymous lonely-hearts columnist with whom his wife starts a correspondence, whereupon their children decide to arrange a meeting between the pair. Jarrett took over the lead role after original choice Eddie Edwards was seriously injured in a car accident.Scriptwriter: ........................................................ Dennis LaneDirector: ...................................................... Brian Rhys-JonesProducer: ............................................................ Wilson IrvingOriginating Station: ..................................................... BTQ--7Running Time: ........................................................... 30 mins

Airdate: ............................... 7:30 p.m Friday March 27th 1964Note: The original cast announced was:Richard Kerr ................................................... Eddie EdwardsCorrie Kerr .......................................................... Jean MunroChris Kerr ......................................................... Graham BeanLinda Kerr .............................................................. Gail WoodCarl Wentworth ................................................. Dick McCannVirginia .............................................................. Jackie EllisonBabs .......................................................... Barbara Wheelton

Crisis (27 Oct 1963)

Brisbane play

CRISIS

George Bryant ............................................. Gerard Kennedy

Reverend Ted Heard ....................................... Brian Cannon

Jim .................................................................... Victor Knight

.......................................................................... Patricia Knight

1st nurse .................................................... Jeanette Campbell

Doctor .................................................................... Bill French

Visitor ............................................................... Daphne Lilley

............................................................................ Gilbert Perrin

Telegram boy .................................................. John Reynolds

Drama play about a man whose wife is rushed to hospital, and his difficulty in accepting that her condition is critical.

Scriptwriter: .............................................................. unknown

Director: ................................................................ Gavin Kelly

Producer: ............................................................ Dennis Lane

Originating Station: Christian Television Association / QTQ-9

Running Time: ........................................................... 30 mins

Airdate: ....................... 12:30 p.m Sunday October 27th 1963

Note: Possibly the first TV appearance by Gerard Kennedy (billed as “Jerry Kennedy”).

Hey You (1967)

Bright Wright told Susan Lever:

"Hey You" was a very early comedy. It was written by John Michael Howson who became quite well known as a rather dilettante commentator on film and so forth. John actually was-- John wrote most the Magic Circle Club, a very fine children's program we were doing from Channel 10 which was also directed by Godfrey Phillip, a very talented young director. And Godfrey and he put together "Hey You" and I sort of--what will I say? I fed it a bit, and helped it along, and managed to sell it to the management.

It was the story of two - what do they call it? Two disparate characters living together: the rough, tough Australian who was reasonably intelligent and well-off, and a little toffee-nosed Englishman who was really a tramp a sort of Charlie Chaplin type character. It always opened with the Australian going, "Hey You!" And the Englishman sort of being very hurt about it. But they got some good comedy out of it. There was a rough serial thread running through it.

And the scripts weren't brilliant, but they were quite good. John Michael was a very good writer. But that was "Hey You." I would have loved to do more, but I parted on rather bad terms with the management. They were telling me actually to kill all live production so they could make more money out of film, and I refused to do it. I rang my wife and said, "I've just given my resignation." She used some rather rude words, and told me what to say to them. We came back to Sydney.

Workshop 1965

PR release on it below from NAA Publicity files.

Writers included: Marion Ord, G. Robinson, Shirley Baron, ?? Wheeler, Edwin Thomas, Michael Wright.Stuart Littlemore, Dennis Carroll, James Earle, Michael Thomas.

Alan Burke, Colin Dean taught. Richard Meikle and Lola Brooks.