It’s been a couple of years but “VHS Revue” is back with FOUR new episodes!
Check out Ep 13 above. Highlights from a 30-year-old tape of the Australian TV drama series “All the Way” include commercials for Safeway, RACV, Copperart, BP, Strongbow cider and more.
If you like what you see then please hit that like/retweet/subscribe/share/thumbs up button at these various locations: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube.
Three more episodes will be uploaded weekly-ish during the month of July.
– DMG
Ahoy hoy, I thought I’d do a bit of real journalism for a change and copy and paste straight from an unsolicited press release:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
‘Good Afternoon Adelaide’ is coming to Channel 44 Adelaide and Channel 31 Melbourne & Geelong, Monday 5 March at 9PM.
[Tuesday, 27 February 2018 – ] ‘Good Afternoon Adelaide’ was a South Australian television institution. The one-hour chat show aired live across SA and into the silver city of Broken Hill weekdays at 2PM from 1989 to 1992 during an era when Adelaide truly was the place to be (before Victoria stole the slogan for their number plates, along with the Formula One Grand Prix).
Hosted by journalist Jeremy Dome and business identity Norman Vine, the show featured news, celebrity interviews, live music, talkback callers, lifestyle segments, paid advertorials and a who’s who of Adelaide royalty.
Like a lot of local Adelaide telly, the show became a victim of increased networkisation from the eastern states and GAA was cancelled in 1992. As a final insult, the station’s master tapes were later sold and used for episodes of “Wheel of Fortune”. Hence very few recordings of the show still exist today.
However, when Hallett Cove amateur video archivist Ben Felixstove passed away last year, several Betamax tapes were uncovered by his family, featuring home video footage of Ben introducing some of his favourite ‘Good Afternoon Adelaide’ clips recorded off TV.
Ben’s tapes have been eagerly snapped up by C44 Adelaide and C31 Melbourne and six half-hour ‘best-of ‘episodes of ‘Good Afternoon Adelaide’ will be broadcast for the first time in more than a quarter of a century beginning Monday 5 March at 9PM.
RIP Good Afternoon Adelaide. Also Ben.
GAA on Facebook
GAA on YouTube
– DMG
Well that’s another year. A year of two blog posts. Here’s what I was doing when I wasn’t writing stuff on here:
In January for the first time I worked at the Australian Open as an audio operator at Rod Laver Arena. It was similar to the panelling I’ve done for radio, but the audio (music, umpire’s microphone, packages on the big screen, etc.) wasn’t for broadcast, but played to the crowd in the stadium. I got to see most of the big night games. It was pretty great.
Used a different kind of panel too. This one had VU meters on each individual channel, which was quite nifty.
And living in South Yarra was great. Walked home most nights.
I was also conveniently positioned to walk to work at my other panelling job at Crocmedia. For the first few months of the year, I walked a couple of k’s east. And then they moved to their new studios in Southbank, so I walked a couple of k’s west.
I panelled the rebranded “AFL Nation” this year (formerly “AFL Live”), as well as some A-League and the Australian Open (golf). Panelling the golf was my introduction to “Zetta”, which is quickly becoming the new industry standard broadcast software. I do love the old NexGen, but Zetta’s built for the social media age.
The new studios and offices are state-of-the-art. Big fan of the landscaping.
Mid-year, I was back writing for the 7th season of Shaun Micallef’s Mad as Hell, which was also one of the last shows made at the ABC’s historic Ripponlea Studios.
Once again I popped up standing in the background of a few sketches. But this time I also had my first ever speaking role on ABC TV in a sketch about the Bananas in Pajamas turning 25.
And once again I can’t believe I’m actually doing this with these great people. Show’s back early next year and I get to be part of it all again, this time in the new Melbourne ABC TV studios in Southbank. Can’t wait.
I continued writing questions for the quiz show I started on last year, and I was a “talent stand-in” for another quiz show on a different network. I don’t think I’m supposed to talk about those because one of them hasn’t aired and the other wants to protect the identity of the question-writers, so… not sure why I even mentioned it, other than to demonstrate to any producers from those shows who periodically check up on me that I can at least partially keep a secret.
Here are some places I traveled to this year:
Finally did the Great Ocean Road. London Arch was my favourite.
Ditto Puffing Billy.
Celebrated my 30th birthday in Sweden with Annika.
Had an amazing week on Lord Howe Island with family for my Mum’s 60th birthday.
Road trip down the Limestone Coast of South Australia to Mount Gambier.
And made several trips back to Adelaide. Here’s me and my brother Luke. He had a Bond-themed birthday. I’m Max Zorin.
Speaking of Adelaide, I finally made good on that Adelaide-based web project I mentioned last year (and the year before that… turned out to be more complicated than I thought). Anyway, check out “Good Afternoon Adelaide”. It’s a multi-cam TV chat show from the early 90s.
Or if you’d prefer a less convenient way of watching, we’re currently in the process of editing x6 half hour episodes, which will air on Channel 44 in Adelaide and C31 Melbourne & Geelong sometime in the first half of 2018.
I spent October and November writing a new screenplay. This will be my second. Both comedies. Always comedy. The first one is going back in the drawer for a while. Anyway, I’ve found screenplay #2 a lot easier to write – actually planning it first helps, and I guess just practice and all that.
I was about 85% of the way through the first draft when Annika and I found out our landlord wanted to sell the house we were living in, so we had to move at short notice. That basically consumed our entire lives until we found somewhere and moved everything in. I don’t mind the packing and moving part, but the searching and the applying and competing with other people and the not knowing – that’s the stressful part. It was the sixth time I’ve moved house in eight years. Renting in Australia kinda sucks. Hopefully the next place we move to is one we own.
But we got it done. We found a unit in Malvern that’s about the same size and a tad cheaper, but it has an air conditioner AND a dishwasher. It’s already changed our lives. So we moved in and handed back the keys to the old place and literally the next day, I was driving to Adelaide for the Christmas break.
Every time I’ve come back to Adelaide, Katie the family dog has been there to greet me. We’ve had her since 2005. This time, I was shocked at how thin she was. It was like she was a puppy again. She hadn’t been well for a couple of weeks. Turned out it was cancer. She couldn’t eat and it was clear she was in pain. We made the difficult decision to put her down on December 18. I’m glad I could be there with Mum when the vet came to the house, but it was very sad.
I’ve never felt so attached to a dog. Katie was my favourite. She had so much character. Not too many cardigan corgis around here so she always turned heads where ever she went. She had some problems with her hips when she was a puppy, so she had this funny wriggling way of walking. She was always the top dog. Even when she went to doggy daycare with 30 other dogs, some of which were quadruple her size, she was the boss of all of them.
She loved food, attention, lying under a curtain or up against a wall and would go nuts if you bounced a tennis ball. She never truly grasped the concept of fetch. Or possibly she did, but it was beneath her. Thanks Mum for getting her 12 years ago. She’s been a great part of our lives and I will miss her.
But on a lighter note on the final day of 2017, pleased to announce that Annika and I are now engaged. Surprise!
A bigly year indeed. Hope yours was too and all the best for an even biglier 2018. It will be the bigliest.
– DMG
It’s mid September so figured it was about time I did my first post for the year. It’s been a busy one, with lots of legitimate writing work and a little schlepping keeping me from writing anything on here.
Any who, came across this funny old show on YouTube called “Good Afternoon Adelaide”. Take a gander:
Apparently an Adelaide-based TV chat show circa early 90s. To quote this article I found on the subject:
“…the one-hour chat show aired live across SA and into the silver city of Broken Hill weekdays at 2PM, during an era when Adelaide truly was the place to be (before Victoria stole the slogan for their number plates, along with the Formula One Grand Prix).
Good Morning Adelaide featured news, celebrity interviews, live music, talkback callers, lifestyle segments, paid advertorials and a who’s who of Adelaide royalty – with ratings success.
Eventually, the show became victim of increased networkisation from the eastern states and was cancelled in 1992. As a final insult, the station’s master tapes were later sold and used for episodes of Wheel of Fortune.”
There’s a Facebook page too.
Sure takes me back 😉
DMG
Most will agree 2016 has been a pretty crummy year. It’s hard not to be disappointed in humanity, or at least the small pockets who happen to be in influential districts, what with Brexit and Trump and Turnbull and Woolworths Home Brand garlic bread no longer coming pre-wrapped in foil. Not to mention the many celebrated people leaving us (although I just did).
President Trump? I still can’t believe it. When I’m an old dude in the 2060s driving across America one last time, I’m going to stop at a gas station and see a display stand with those commemorative plates with all the presidents’ faces on them and one of those faces will be Donald Trump. How gridlocked and unrepresentative does the USA’s political system have to get before they actually do something about it? I suspect we’ll find out in the next couple of years. Hopefully without a nuclear war.
Closer to home, it’s also been a bad year for my family, with my sister Alice passing away in July from a degenerative genetic condition aged 27. It’s the worst thing I’ve ever experienced. It’s also especially difficult as my brother Luke has the same condition and he is slowly getting worse. I’d like to write some more things about these events some day, but not today. Though I will say I’m very lucky to have the love and support of my family, especially my Mum, my sister Hannah and my partner Annika.
One aspect of 2016 that hasn’t been shit has been the ole media career. I was back at the ABC writing for season 6 of Shaun Micallef’s Mad as Hell. And season 5 won the Logie for Most Outstanding Comedy, which was swell. Such a great team and an honour to again be part of it.
I also made my on screen non-gorilla costume debut in a desk segment, playing the role of lobotomised Young Liberal Oscar Curtain-Pelmet:
It was the part I was born to play.
FYI, here was the gorilla suit one:
I was also a nun.
After Mad as Hell I put my 31 Questions experienced to good use and started writing for another TV game show, the title of which I’m not allowed to say. But you can probably work it out.
You can tell when I have plenty of writing work because the blog entries decrease in frequency. I mean, look at the last thing I posted. It was 7 months ago! You’re unlikely to see too many (if any) posts like 10 Years of Corollas or Burger Heaven – The spam is better at Hungry Jack’s when paid writing work is on offer.
I’ve also continued the fine radio panelling for Crocmedia. Coming up on 5 years now I’ve been working there. It’s a great job and exciting times are ahead with the move from South Yarra to new studios in South Melbourne, as well as the new AFL radio rights deal, meaning more games and more affiliate stations. It’s quite unusual for a media company to actually be expanding these days, so I feel extremely lucky (especially as I’ve experienced the other side of the coin first hand with SAFM in 2008 and then MTR in 2012).
This is the first time I’ve had consistent radio and TV work all year round. Even though it was bloody hard, I don’t regret moving from Adelaide to Melbourne for a second. For the first time, I actually feel valued as a writer, comedian, broadcaster, whatever you want to call it is that I do.
Let’s see, what else?
Earlier in the year I did my first solo show in a comedy festival. Read about it here (or just scroll down to the previous post from 7 months ago). I’m glad I did it, but I gotta say, as soon as the last show was over, it’s like that bit in The Simpsons where Homer’s brain floats out of his head, except I’m the brain and Homer’s head is stand-up.
The thought of doing it again, of putting in all the work to make it good and then hanging out at an open mic night, sweating bullets for 4 hours waiting to go on for 5 minutes doesn’t really do it for me. It never really has, to be honest. What does however, is this:
Made 2 more VHS Revue episodes and I discovered a new cache of tapes, so there’s a couple more on the horizon for 2017. I’m also still working on that other Adelaide-based webseries project, codename “GAA”. But it’s still early days (even though I mentioned it in my last end of year post). We’ve done a bunch of test shoots, and hopefully we’ll have something to show early next year. It’s a lot of fun.
Annika and I have had some great trips this year. When we were both in Sweden this time last year, we took a train to Gothenburg for the day. Although most people from Stockholm seem to regard Gothenburg as the Geelong of Sweden, I enjoyed it very much. Especially their impressive Museum of Art:
We also took a budget flight to London for a few days. As someone from “The Commonwealth”, it’s somewhat of a right of passage to visit the mother country. Fascinating place. I’d never been there before, and yet it was all strangely familiar. There were parts of it where if I wasn’t paying attention to the tiny details, I could have been in some other Australian city. I thought too of my Dad who was there in the late ‘70s, and my Grandfather who was there during the war. It’s a special place. I can’t see Brexit making it better.
Back in the southern hemisphere, we went to Sydney. Annika had never been. Great place to visit. Still glad I don’t live there. It’s just so hard to get around. Na, who needs it.
Great photos though:
The last couple of months have all been about moving house. We’d outgrown that beautiful one-bedroom place in Hawthorn and with two of my workplaces moving to the Southbank/South Melbourne area next year, it seemed the right time to move. We found a great two-storey three-bedroom place in South Yarra. Check out those ‘80s bricks!
After the chaos and stress of the actual moving was behind us, it’s turned out to be a great decision. We each have our own office now and a DINING ROOM TABLE! This is an extraordinary concept. It’s closer to both our workplaces and I’m walking more and driving less, which is good for everybody. Particularly my ass.
Still a few issues I’m hoping to solve soon. Moths and spiders seem to keep finding ways inside and the sun hitting the glass in the afternoon is a problem I’m hoping some shade cloth can fix. But we’ll get there.
I’m seeing out the year in Adelaide with family and friends. Missed Christmas in Adelaide last year so it’s been a while. I love it here this time of year. Barbecues, short pants, driving around the suburbs with the windows down, walking barefoot on the grass and swimming in the ocean.
And so for the most part, this year can get fucked. I’ve said every year since 2004 has been better than the last for me (although 2008 only just). I think 2016 is where that stopped. Hopefully it’s just a small flat bit on a very long, upward journey for all of us.
Merry Christmas and all that.
DMG