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Number 96 was the legendary
Australian serial set in a Sydney
block of flats that combined melodramatic storylines, larger-than-life
high-camp characters, large doses of comedy and - most famously - sex.
The series was set in a four storey apartment block at the
fictional address of 96 Lindsay
Street, in inner suburban Paddington. The
building consisted of six flats - two on each level. They sat above a ground
floor delicatessen and a chemist shop - each with their own flat.
Storylines examined the lives of the various residents and
the shopkeepers. The deli, along with a nearby pub and laundrette, (as well
as the busy stair well) provided central locations for the various characters
to mix and congregate.
Early on in the series the chemist shop was converted to a
wine bar which became the primary meeting place for the show’s characters and
assorted visitors, and the pub was phased out of the series. Also seen on a
regular basis was the Red Baron cocktail bar and restaurant where any special
dates and nights out always seemed to occur.
The series had its genesis when Ian Holmes, the then program
manager at Channel Ten, decided he wanted a new, Coronation Street
style serial for the fledgling channel. The British soap had been
successfully screened on Channel Nine during Holmes’ time there and Channel
Ten, which had begun operation only six years earlier, was in a serious
financial position and desperately needed a hit. [1]
Holmes specified that the new series be set in a
tight-knit community of some sort. “Sexuality and other previously taboo
subjects had been part of the brief,” said Holmes. “It had to have dramatic
impact in breaking new ground, not in violent situations but in sexual
situations which we believed were handled fairly
puritanically here, as they were in America.” [2]
The Reg Grundy Organisation and
independent producers Don Cash and Bill Harmon were each asked to produce a
concept. Cash-Harmon employed the services of writer David Sale, who created
the premise, the characters, and dreamt up the title. Holmes was suitably
impressed with the Cash-Harmon treatment, and the rest is history. [3]
Producer Don Cash, however, would not live long enough to
fully witness the groundbreaking show’s impact, dying in 1973. Bill Harmon,
the creative force in the team, would continue to produce the show alone.
The black-and-white drama was recorded on videotape, with
the production rarely leaving the confines of the studio. A real Sydney apartment block,
at 83 Moncur
Street in Woollahra, was pictured in the opening
titles and end credits sequences of each episode. It was used for location
shooting on only rare and isolated occasions.
A newspaper report in 1986 said that just four episodes of
the serial were filmed at the Woollahra location. Tourist buses would stop at
the location up until the early 1980s. [4]
The series premiered in Sydney on the evening of 13 March 1972 with
the first three episodes of the serial run together to form a ninety-minute
special. The first two episodes made-up a one hour episode for the Melbourne debut the
following night. [5]
The series was produced as five half hour instalments each
week and episodes went to air in Sydney
each weeknight at 8.30 p.m. In Melbourne,
at least initially after its premiere, episodes of Number 96
were screened in one hour blocks on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 8.30 p.m. With
the program’s depictions of sex and nudity, ATV-0 in Melbourne flashed up warnings before each
screening warning viewers that Number 96 “is
an adult program and the realism at times may shock you.” [6]
Episode one opens with a brief exterior shot of the
building with a removal van parked outside as the title appears, and the
shrieking voice of a middle-aged woman named Dorrie
Evans (Pat McDonald) is heard - something that would become mighty familiar to
ongoing viewers of the show. True to form she is saying, of the new arrivals,
“No Herb I said no! We’ll see them when they have had a chance to settle in!”
This would not be the last time viewers would hear Dorrie
nagging at Herb!
Quickly introduced are the new arrivals: young couple
Helen and Mark Eastwood (played by Briony Behets and Martin Harris) who have moved into flat 4 of
the building. Beautiful blond Helen is eight months pregnant and wears a
maternity mini-dress. Dorrie Evans and her husband
Herb (Ron Shand) quickly drop in and Dorrie launches into a stream of derisive remarks -
eyeing the couple up and down in the packing-box strewn apartment she
pointedly intones “well you have been busy” - as if a married couple living
together was somehow sinful.
Viewers quickly learn that the retired Evans couple are
active members of the local Senior Citizens club, and that having lived in
the house that previously occupied the site where Number 96 now stands, Herb
and Dorrie have simply stayed on. Herb seems kind
and friendly, more or less, however the rather strident Dorrie
clearly presents herself as an inquisitive and interfering gossip, and as
Mark observes to Dorrie “you still regard this
whole block as your own.”
Herb and Dorrie quickly leave,
with Dorrie excusing herself with a pointed “we
will leave you to get on with it”, and indeed Mark does get on with it. He
attempts to seduce Helen on the living room couch provoking her abrupt
rebuttal leading to an angry and frustrated outburst from Mark. Living up to
its reputation Number 96 featured a
controversial sex scene – Mark running his hand up a mini-skirted Helen’s
bare leg - before the first ever commercial break. In fact censors cut the
attempted seduction, and in the extant copies of the episode viewed today the
segment of the shot containing Mark running his hand up Helen’s leg and her
rejection of him is excised, leaving a jump cut from kisses to cross words.
Next to be introduced are young flatmates Bev Houghton (Abigail),
a harbour cruise hostess, and Janie Somers (Robyn Gurney), a struggling
actor. Bev is in hotpants and thigh-high boots, with a waistcoat over a
see-through blouse. She playfully models for Janie, explaining that this is the
costume for her photographic session with neighbour Bruce Taylor (Paul Weingott) who plans to sell the snaps to Mod Photography
magazine.
Meanwhile, in the building’s ground-floor delicatessen, Dorrie and Herb discuss the new neighbours with deli
owner Aldo (Johnny Lockwood). Another customer, fellow Number 96 resident
Vera Collins (Elaine Lee), politely, but openly, disapproves of Dorrie’s judgemental demeanour. Dorrie
is silenced as Helen enters and meets her new neighbours. When Vera leaves Dorrie pointedly says to Helen “I’d keep away from Vera
Collins if I were you! She’s bad news. Very bad news!”
After the first advertisement break Alf and Lucy
Sutcliffe, immigrants from Lancashire,
England who
live in flat 8, are introduced. Their background is delivered swiftly and
immediately: a whining Alf complains about both Lucy’s spending and about Australia
as a whole. He insists he wants to return to the UK, while she wants to get a job.
We learn they have a married son with a young child who live
interstate.
Overall the storylines move along very quickly with
background information delivered at a rapid rate, although it does not seem
forced or artificial, being incorporated into introduction conversations with
the newly arrived Eastwood couple, or via arguments. As the story moves
forward Mark comes to the deli looking for Helen, but finds Aldo’s willowy
daughter Rose (Vivienne Garrett) serving behind the counter. She seems
dazzled by him and impressed by his profession of schoolteacher. Their
exchange reveals an instant attraction, the dialogue and action infused with
sexual tension. Mark helps out by lifting a heavy crate of produce and Rose
is clearly smitten.
Further background exposition is revealed when Vera reads
Helen’s fortune with playing cards. Vera is perturbed when Helen’s cards
repeatedly portend doom. Meanwhile Vera quietly admits to Helen that she
reads fortunes for money even though it is illegal to earn a living from it,
reasoning that “believe me there are worse ways!” Those ways, she explains,
involve latching onto men who, after they have had their fun give you the
boot, and while the show never explicitly states it, an image of prostitution
is vividly evoked by this description.
Down in flat 5 Bev is seen modelling for Bruce. As she
slips off the vest to reveal the see-through, Bruce’s “flatmate” Don
Finlayson (Joe Hasham) arrives home in a smart suit
and with a briefcase. Don, we learn, is a final year law student and an
article clerk.
Upcoming storylines are introduced as Aldo dreams of opening
a restaurant while Vera tells Lucy of the laundrette about to open up the
street that will be looking for staff. Lucy is thrilled with the idea of
obtaining a job there, triumphantly announcing to Vera that “I’ll be able to
watch everyone washing their dirty linen, in public!” Finally Cliff Stevens
(Vincent Gil), a biker friend of Rose’s, pays her a surprise visit in the
deli having waited for Aldo to leave. When Cliff sexually assaults Rose in
the parlour of flat 2 a heroic Mark answers her calls for help and storms in
to the rescue.
Each episode’s opening titles and end credit sequences
were simple yet effective. Suggestive of a peek into the lives other people,
the opening titles sequence is a brief shot of the building exterior as the
audio of the previous episode’s closing scene is heard. The shot zooms in on
the front window of the flat in which that action occurs as the program title
appears on screen, before the vision switches to show that scene. The end
credits sequence involves similar close-up shots on the building exterior. In
this sequence the shot pulls in for a close-up on the front of the deli and
then pans from one flat to the other, with the actors credited over the shot
of the flat where their character resides.
Ensuing episodes had Vera plagued by hang-up phone calls
while Bev had the opposite problem and endured a series of telephone
arguments with her apparently wealthy, disapproving and censorious unseen
mother. Mark Eastwood caved in to his desires and soon tumbles into bed with
a willing Rose Godolfus. His wife Helen walks in on
them and storms out of the flat in horror, only to tumble down the stairs and
lose her baby.
Helen disappeared for a while and then returned suffering
a mental block where she still believed herself pregnant. Vera’s phantom
caller was revealed as her husband Harry (Norman Yemm)
who had walked out on her a year before. He returns and rapes her, after
which she unwisely attempts to revive her marriage. This is despite Harry
being openly racist, clashing with new Number 96 resident, the African
American Chad Farrell (Ronne Arnold), while encouraging neighbour Alf to
engage in long drinking sessions much to his wife Lucy’s irritation.
Busty Bev and her propensity for wearing sexy hotpants, for
going braless, and for posing for Bruce’s glamour photographs, attracts the
scorn of resident gossip Dorrie, who observes that
“All those perverts we keep reading about in the papers, they’d all be coming
around to Number 96 peeping in the windows to see Beverly without her clothes
on!” Bev presents herself as a wise and experienced girl, warning flatmate
Janie, who is desperate for a role in a new play, that the intentions of
producer Alex Lederer (Harry Harris) are less than
honourable.
While Bev’s warnings to Janie are presented in a wise and
world-weary manner, she is in fact secretly a virgin nervous about sex.
Unfortunately, it is Bev herself who raises Alex’s pique. In a violent and
feverish scene in her bedroom he throws Bev naked onto her bed angrily
screaming that she is a “marvel virgin” and a “whore” who leads men on but
does not follow through. He promises that “I’m going to give you something to
remember me by” and raises his hand to hit her. Apparently the censors didn’t
want us to remember it, however, and the vision is censored. As screened
today, as Alex raises his hand the shot switches to black while Bev’s screams
can he heard on the soundtrack. Vision returns briefly on a shot of a crying
Bev just in time for the credits to roll.
Early in the storyline the mysterious brother and sister
team of Gordon and Sonia Vansard (played by Joe
James and Lynn Rainbow) arrived to set up a chemist shop in the building’s
vacant ground floor shop front across the hall from the deli, and they lived
in flat 1 behind their shop. It was soon learned that Gordon was secretly a
doctor who had performed abortions, he was estranged from his wife and two
sons, and that Sonia was his live-in girlfriend, not his sister. Sonia was
eager to marry Gordon who claimed he was reluctant to divorce his wife, the
bitchy Sylvia Vansard (Shirley Cameron), due to her
threat to disallow contact with his sons. Later she triumphantly arrived to
visit Sonia and announce that she refused to grant Gordon a divorce (in the
days before the “no fault” divorce laws), apparently out of spite for being
deserted.
Amongst this turmoil Sonia had fallen in love with new
neighbour, the African American teacher Chad Farrell (Ronne Arnold) who was
now boarding with Mark and Helen Eastwood. In a series of thoughtfully
written and acted storylines Chad experienced much racism during his time at
Number 96, while remaining cheerfully accepting of it, much to Mark’s
frustration. The storyline featured what is perhaps television’s first ever
interracial kiss between lovers Chad and Sonia in another taboo
breaking scene. Chad
would soon leave Number 96 when he moved to the outback to teach Aboriginal
children. Mark and Helen Eastwood also left the series after several weeks.
In other developments we learn that a large proportion of
Bruce Taylor’s rent is being paid by his rapacious boss, magazine editor
Maggie Cameron (Bettina Welch). Trapped in an unhappy marriage, Maggie keeps
Bruce in flat 5 with the intention of seducing him. What she does not realise
is that Bruce is gay, and has secretly brought his boyfriend Don Finlayson to
live with him. Don is outraged to learn that Bruce had lied about the
amazingly cheap rent: in fact Maggie herself is covering much of the cost so
as to have Bruce on tap when she calls in for some intensive work “designing
magazine layouts”. Likewise she is horrified to learn of Don’s existence,
initially ordering Bruce to throw him out. Bruce refuses, while skilfully
dodging her various attempts to seduce him. Later, when Maggie’s husband
learns of her affair with Bruce, he throws her out and announces his plans to
divorce her.
Bruce abruptly decamps for Adelaide while Maggie moves in to flat 5 -
her name is on the lease after all. While a shocked Don fears that he’ll soon
be out on the street unable to find such affordable accommodation anywhere
else, a grinning Maggie allows him to stay. Despite having earlier observed
that “Maggie is a bitch of the first order”, Don reluctantly agrees to the
arrangement.
Maggie quickly settles into her new home, and in sharply
written and brilliantly acted scenes she’s jubilantly mixing strong Martinis
for Don while warning that any of his young gentleman callers will be fair
game if he allows them to fall into her clutches, declaring that “when it
comes to well-built young men I’ve got claws like an eagle!” In an earlier
clash Bruce had suggested that she should “stop acting like Joan Crawford -
it doesn’t suit you!” provoking Maggie to quip that “1940s shoulder pads and
slaps across the face never did suit me.” Yet such an image seems to suit her
perfectly, and with the crisp acting the bitchy ripostes and witty repartee
one almost expects George Sanders and Bette Davis to swan in from the next
room at any minute.
When the series began the producers were unsure of how
long it might continue, and original cast member Elisabeth Kirkby recalled that the original cast of regulars was
initially offered contracts running just six weeks. [7]
The series debut was publicised as the “night Australian TV lost its
virginity” due to its nude glimpses and taboo-breaking storylines exploring
such topics as rape-within-marriage, adultery and homosexuality. The show was
an instant success, Channel Ten was saved, and a bunch of previously unknown
stage actors and comedy and vaudeville performers were suddenly turned into
superstars.
Much of the early attention seemed connected to the
program’s frank depictions of sexual matters. Though the show does not seem
prurient or exploitative, the Broadcasting Control Board objected to some
elements of the program, and they ordered that several shots be excised from
the opening episodes. The show’s first episode had gone to air uncensored in Sydney, provoking complaints from Sydney viewers about the sex scenes. [8]
For all subsequent broadcasts as the episodes were rolled
out to other parts of Australia, including Melbourne which would begin
broadcasting the series in the days following the Sydney premiere, several
shots were missing from episodes. Cuts were made in scenes where Mark runs
his hand up his wife’s leg, where Mark is shown sitting in bed with Rose, and
where a naked Rose is shown topless in bed before pulling the sheet up to her
chin. [9]
Of this censorship producer Don Cash told TV Week that the Control Board displayed “a lot of
nerve.” Cash explained that “We have not been involved in cutting anything
from the series. We produce the series and then it’s up to the 0-10 Network
to do what it wants. We have to bow to bureaucracy and are quite
philosophical about it. There are a lot of wise people protecting the morals
of the people and who are we to fight them.” [10]
The same article reported that in the five or so weeks
since the series began the 0-10 Network had reported being inundated with
telephone calls - about a quarter of which were critical of the series. In
two days, the Sydney
station had received 200 calls. About a third of these were critical of the
series. [11]
Brian Phillis, one of the main
directors on the series, later described the program’s use of sex and nudity
for TV Week.
“In the early days, with Abigail, we were after
titillation. We were constantly pushing out all the barriers and testing the
water, seeing how far we could go, how nude we could get. There was a lot of hot
air from the Festival of Light people in the early days. They even stood
outside Channel Ten in Sydney
with placards. But it all died down. I think there’s obviously an element who can’t wait to be outraged. […] For the first nine
months, it rated somewhere between 35 and 40. It finished with nothing more
to show. The law was you could show everything but genitals - but toward the
end of the show we even showed that.” [12]
Brian Phillis could recall only
one topic that was banned outright: necrophilia. “But I think at one stage
even that was hinted at.” [13]
Years later cast member Elisabeth Kirkby
offered her own opinion on why the series found instant popularity, and in
her opinion it wasn’t really due to the sex and nudity.
“The show was held together by the fact that the six main
characters were all middle-aged, and this gave it an appeal to the older
audience. Also I think the older members of the audience immediately
recognised somebody they knew in the older characters. They knew a pommie like Alf who couldn’t hold a job and was always
whingeing and whining about how terrible Australia was and … they could
recognise a Flo and Dorrie as two good friends who
spent all their time arguing.” [14]
Creator David Sale wrote the show’s first dozen episodes,
after which a team of writers took over.
“I feel very protective about the characters and how they
should be written,” Sale
later told TV Week. “I still go to story
conferences and shout a lot. I have often fought to preserve my idea of how a
certain character should be presented.” After the program had been on air
several months Sale
offered his opinion on why the show had become so successful: “I think the
program’s popularity lies in its realistic approach. The characters and the
situations are real and people at home can identify with them.” [15]
Johnny Whyte, who had written scripts for UK programs Emergency Ward Ten
and Z-Cars, and had scripted four episodes of UK
soap opera Coronation Street in the early
1960s, would serve as script editor for Number 96.
[16]
Whyte described the conditions under which the new series was created.
“Right from the start it was a gamble. The whole concept
of the series was something so incredibly new that it was an enormous task.
The original brief asked for two episodes a week, but early on in
pre-production the network asked for the series to be stripped five nights a
week, a change that required many changes to the show’s production
organisation. Finding writers was probably the hardest thing. There are any number of good writers around, but finding writers
who could interpret the ideas we had for Number 96
was something of a problem. I, as script editor, came up with the outlines
for the various characters and situations for those first episodes and it was
up to the writers to interpret them”. [17]
In 1973 writer Eleanor Witcombe
described to TV Week her work as a script
writer on Number 96. Witcombe
was at that time one of a team of six regular writers on the series, all of
whom were graduates of sketch comedy series The Mavis Bramston Show. Witcombe herself had spent three years scripting for that
series, and said that this experience influenced the style of scripts for Number 96, with each of its scenes being concise,
sharp, and each having a punch line. [18]
Witcombe also explained the writing
procedure behind the series. The script editor and synopsis writer plan 25
episodes at a time, and the scriptwriters are assigned five episodes each,
with a fortnight to complete them. Scriptwriters received $350 an episode. Witcombe described the script writing process on the
show.
“It’s hard, high-pressure, round-the-clock work. You go
from flat to flat (of the fictional apartment block), advancing the story for
each character, ringing the other writers at midnight to check some detail of
the part they are preparing. You juggle the characters so that no performer
appears in more than three episodes a week. The five episodes -
two-and-a-half hours of television - are shot in five working days. There are
15 scenes per episode; no scene can take longer than 20 minutes to block out,
rehearse, and tape. It demands the highest standard of professionalism from
the entire crew.” [19]
Witcombe defended the show’s sex
scenes and nudity to TV Week. “I don’t think
sex or nudity is wrong. Are we expected to show people showering with their
clothes on? It’s a fact of life that people go to bed with each other. We try
not to be prurient or offensive, we’re conscious of our young audience,” she
said. Of these youngsters Witcombe commented “The
kids like 96 because, unlike its critics, they understand its secret - it’s a
comedy.” [20]
In terms of the show’s sex and nudity, one of the problems
early on was that the board had not laid down guidelines of what the series could
show. Meanwhile Network Ten had instructed the show’s producers to “sail as
close to the wind as you can”. [21]
Even a rather innocuous comedy sequence where a young
hippie couple disrobe in the laundrette to wash their clothes brought a
barrage of complaints. [22]
This sequence, which has been repeated several times in televised
retrospectives on the serial, featured actor Chard Hayward - later to return
in the regular role of Dudley Butterfield - as a chilled out hippie. Model
Cathy Jones played his equally languid girlfriend.
In the scene Alf Sutcliffe brings Lucy a lunch of fish and
chips to the laundrette. As she tucks in Alf notices two patrons stripping
off their clothes and putting them into a washing machine. Alf feigns
interest in Lucy’s lengthy description of the weird and flamboyant types that
frequent the laundrette while furtively enjoying the background stripping
display. When the nearly nude hippies front up to Lucy to report a faulty
washing machine she rushes to get them covered up, while Alf doesn’t seem too
concerned at all.
Producer Don Cash defended the laundromat
scene, telling TV Week that “It was meant to
be funny. It had a purpose for being there, to make people laugh. If anyone
could be upset with that then there is something wrong - and as far as I’m
concerned they can go dig themselves into a big hole.” [23]
Indeed the scene itself is funny with the distant disrobing while an
oblivious Lucy chatters away and Alf leers. While both hippies strip right
down to bikini briefs, except for a brief distant glimpse in wide shot, the
topless woman’s nipples remain concealed. Her habit of crossing her arms in
front of her or standing back to camera ensures that the comic scene never
gets too raunchy.
Sometimes the show’s nudity was provided by guest artists
specifically hired to appear in one or two episodes – and primarily to appear
nude. American-born actor Mirrem Lee appeared in
the series as tough bikie Sharon
for just two episodes during the show’s first few months on air. Her scenes
involved drug use and gang rapes, while her portrayal featured lesbian
overtones.
Of the requirement that she appear nude in the serial Mirrem Lee told TV Week
that “if the part requires it then I guess it is okay. I know I haven’t got a
great body but it doesn’t worry me. Marilyn Monroe posed nude early in her
career and it didn’t hurt her career, so I suppose what I am doing won’t hurt
mine.” Cathy Jones who stripped in the laundrette was well-known as a glamour
model regularly pictured in nude and semi-nude newspaper and magazine
layouts. Jones was cast in the brief role specifically for her attractive
figure and because the makers of the series knew she would have no qualms
about performing in the nude. [24]
Producer Don Cash described to TV Week
the handling of the nude sequences in the series.
“Whenever I am directing an episode involving a nude
scene I always insist on a closed set. The doors to the studio are all locked
and there is a guard posted to keep people away. I even go off the set myself
and sit in the control room and watch on a monitor. Virtually the only people
on the set are the performers and the cameraman and a sound man.” [25]
Cash went on to reject the criticism that the series was
cashing-in on nudity.
“Absolute rot. There is so much rubbish written about
this series and if you analyse it there aren’t all that many nude scenes
anyway. We were asked by the network to produce a soap opera and that’s
exactly what we are doing. We’re treating it realistically and we aren’t
pulling any punches. We believe that people do make love and we believe that
people do get undressed. And if they don’t then I am living on the wrong
planet.” [26]
Actor Chard Hayward who acted with Cathy Jones as a semi
nude hippie explained to TV Week his
experiences performing in a nude scene.
“People are always asking how I feel doing a scene like
this, with a girl like Cathy who is nearly completely nude. They want to know
what on earth it must do to your libido. But it’s really not like that. With
all the people standing around – cameramen and producers – it’s all very
clinical, like being examined by a nurse.” [27]
The same report noted that actor Norman Yemm, who appeared nude with Elaine Lee in an early
episode, had some “psychological barriers” to overcome. It was his first ever
nude scene, so he acclimatised himself to the idea by walking around in the
privacy of his own home without any clothes. [28]
The show’s most famous sex symbol Abigail also spoke of
the requirement to appear nude.
“If I didn’t agree then I wouldn’t be appearing in the
series. It’s written into our contracts that we have to do nude scenes if
required. But the crew we are working with is wonderful and I am not
embarrassed in the least – not that there is much nudity in the series
anyway. What little nudity there is has been cut by the Broadcasting Control
Board. You can sit there for hours waiting for it and you hardly even see a
bare bottom.” [29]
By mid 1974 Abigail had left the series and the show’s
current blond sex symbol was Josephine Knur who played vivacious and eager-to-please
wine bar waitress Lorelei Wilkinson. Of the
requirement she sometimes appear nude Knur explained to TV Week
that “it doesn’t worry me at all, provided it gives me a chance to act and be
seen acting.” [30]
Prior to taking the Number 96
role Knur had rejected an offer to appear in a decorative semi-nude role in
the sex comedy feature film Alvin Purple.
“I was offered a part. A small one where I had to sort of
parade around wearing see-through clothes. […] It wasn’t the see-through bit
that bothered me, it was just that there was no
acting at all. I don’t want to get the reputation for being a girl who will
take off her clothes for any purpose. It’s acting
I’m interested in, that’s all. I’ve spent two years doing small pieces and
learning, so I’m sure I’m not going to get away from my real ambition for the
sake of a bit of notoriety and a few dollars. My only ambition is to become a
famous actress, and I mean famous. Now I feel I have the chance. Number 96 is a tremendous show and it will give me
the best chance I could ever have of getting established.” [31]
In some cases there were tensions where cast members were
directed to enact nude scenes. Actor Bethany Lee came into the series in
early 1974 as chaste and studious schoolgirl Penny Snow who squatted in a Number 96 flat. When Bethany Lee was required to
appear in a nude shower scene in the series, TV Week
reported that it upset her.
“It wasn’t the fact that I had to get my gear off that stirred
me up. Although I don’t feel it’s too good for a new actress to be seen in
the raw. I don’t want to get typecast. It was the fact that I had no warning
that I would be required to do the nude scene until I actually arrived on the
set. It made me feel like a piece of merchandise.” [32]
As the series progressed there would be scattered
instances of censorship of a scene.
“The first few episodes actually included bleeped out
pieces and fade out scenes which the board imposed. For a while we had a
little man from Melbourne
sitting in on production to keep an eye on us. The board imposed article 101
of their regulations, which says that they can view each episode before it
goes to air. It happened on two occasions that they imposed the restriction.
Once right at the beginning, and then one other time for a 1975 episode. As
far as I can recall, Article 101 hadn’t been used previously and hasn’t been
used since.” [33]
In a separate article, TV Week
reported other instances of censorship in the show’s early years. The black
mass scene involving devil worshippers in late 1972 was excised. At around
the same time several episodes dealing with prostitution were heavily
censored by the Control Board. According to TV Week,
after the black mass incident the Board reinstated the previewing of episodes
before broadcast, which continued until March 1973. Then, in June 1973, the
Board leapt into action again after other risqué scenes were taped. Their
report of the incident stated that “In June, two segments showing practices associated
with sexual aberrations were, at the board’s discretion, deleted from the
program, and Channel TEN was informed that the inclusion of similar material
would again lead to the previewing of the program by the board.” [34]
Bev and Claire Houghton
Cast member Abigail was the show’s first breakout star. As
the story progressed her character Bev fell in love with her law-student
neighbour Don not realising that he was gay, and he was forced to confess all
when she attempted to seduce him. Traumatised by Don’s revelation Bev locked
herself away in her flat, finally prompting a visit from her imperious
mother, Point Piper socialite Claire Houghton (Thelma Scott), previously
known only via Bev’s frequent argumentative telephone conversations with her
as overheard by Janie and most visitors to flat 6.
Claire’s first visit to Number 96 dominated the
episode. Finding Bev’s abode locked Claire called in on Dorrie
and Herb, hoping to borrow the spare key. With Dorrie
sorting through the donated stock for an upcoming jumble sale the flat is an
embarrassing mess, and Claire is horrified when Dorrie
assumes she is there to donate some old clothes. After the introductions Dorrie is thrilled to finally meet Mrs Houghton. “Oh, Mrs
Houghton! You’ve come all the way down here”, gushes Dorrie.
“Well it isn’t all that far down. Mind you I am speaking geographically”,
Claire imperiously intones.
Despite her reservations about the apartment block where
Bev chooses to live, Claire seems to have no objections to the “Jewish man”
she met on the way in. When she learned Bev’s turmoil was due to falling in
love with a homosexual law clerk, it was only his lowly profession that
Claire was concerned with. Now had it been a gay fashion designer or interior
designer that would have been a different matter, reasoned Claire. Such a
union might well have made a workable marriage.
In their historic first meeting Dorrie
had trilled “Oh, Mrs Houghton. It’s so nice to finally meet you!” provoking Claire’s
reply of “‘Finally’? Let’s hope that’s the operative word!” This all went
right over an impressed Dorrie’s head, and luckily
for the viewers of the show it wasn’t their final meeting. Claire would
continue to make sporadic appearances in each year the series ran, continuing
long after Bev’s final appearance in the show. On Claire’s first meeting with
Dorrie she had referred to her as the building’s
concierge, which a thrilled Dorrie immediately
picked-up on, even if she mispronounced it as “conserge”.
Thereafter, Dorrie’s self-proclaimed status as “conserge” of Number 96 became one of the show’s most
famous jokes.
Bev herself would finally lose her virginity to ladies’
man and loveable rogue Jack Sellars (Tom Oliver).
Eventually their romance faltered after a furious Jack discovered Bev in bed
with her adult brother Rod Houghton (John Benton) and got the wrong idea. A
traumatised Bev abruptly left for a trip to the United States. Several weeks
later Bev returned to Number 96 married to an American businessman.
Abigail’s impact in the series was so great that folklore
today suggests that she was not only the first woman to appear topless on
Australian TV but that she was one of Number 96’s
most uncovered stars. However at various times Abigail has played-down her
reputation for getting her gear off on camera.
In 1976 she insisted that the closest she ever came to a
nude scene in Number 96 was the early sequence
from the first episode where she posed for photographer neighbour Bruce
Taylor in hot-pants and a see-through blouse. At other times Abigail spoke of
her brief side-on flashes of naked breast and bottom in the show, as seen
when Alex threw her naked onto her bed in a violent scene depicting a sexual
assault on Bev.
Abigail fans had to wait until sex comedy feature film The True Story of Eskimo Nell (1975) to see full nudity from Abigail.
Following this she posed nude for Australian Playboy
magazine in 1980.
Vera Collins
Also sometimes shedding her clothes was Vera Collins
(Elaine Lee) who lived alone in flat 7. The warm and sophisticated Vera was
devised as “everyone’s friend”. Unfortunately for her, she was also friend to
a long stream of unsuitable men, enduring a series of rather unwise, and
ultimately disastrous, romantic entanglements in her quest to find true love.
Several attempts to rekindle her relationship with
estranged husband Harry Collins failed, and Vera embarked upon various
ill-fated affairs. Her unions with tough mobsters, ruthless businessmen,
youthful gigolos, married men, closet homosexuals and other unworthy or
untenable types always ended in heartache.
Vera would also be raped twice more as the story
continued. Despite her later career as a fashion designer, Vera often seemed
to wear poorly constructed apparel. All three of Vera’s rape scenes featured
her flimsy clothing being torn off to reveal her voluptuous nude form.
Vera initially read tarot cards for a living, but as the
story progressed would be seen working as a designer in the clothing fashion
industry or even as secretary to Don. Later, in the feature film, it was
explicitly stated for the only time that Vera had once worked as a
prostitute.
Maggie Cameron
As the series progressed the scheming Maggie Cameron moved
out of flat 5 but remained a friend, a business associate, and often a rival
of Vera’s. However she was openly despised by most of the building’s other
residents, particularly Don, with whom she had many business and personal
clashes.
A ruthless businesswoman who often regretted her
bitchiness and devious schemes, Maggie finally secured ownership of
Number 96 and thereafter made several attempts to oust the residents, or
take over the wine bar that would be established in the building.
The character of Maggie was created with Bettina Welch in
mind to play the part after series creator David Sale saw her in the science
fiction series Phoenix 5. For her portrayal of the man-hungry schemer,
Welch drew inspiration from Anne Bancroft’s portrayal of Mrs Robinson in Mike
Nichols’ 1967 film The Graduate. “She
underplayed the part of a nasty grabbing woman beautifully,” Welch told TV Week, “I tried to model my characterisation on
her a little bit and I think I’ve been successful.” [35]
Dorrie
Evans
Overseeing these activities was Dorrie
Evans, a screeching modern-day Mrs Malaprop. Dorrie emerged as the show’s most popular character, with
her portrayer Pat McDonald winning the Best Actress Logie Award in 1973, 1974 and 1976, and
the 1974 Gold Logie for Australia’s most popular female
television personality. [36]
Constantly trying the patience of her hen-pecked but
usually cheerful husband Herb, Dorrie immediately
became a national joke though her disapproving ways, endless gossip, and her
attempts to interfere in the lives of the various residents. Though initially
an unsympathetic and rather malicious gossip who
seemed to take sadistic glee in the situation of a horrified Helen catching Mark
and Rose in bed together, Dorrie Evans was soon
converted to a comedy character, someone we could chuckle at rather than
despise.
Dorrie’s mangling of the
language provided many of the laughs. Of her many signature lines, one of the
most repeated was “I am quite ardimant about that!”
At various points in the story she was heard to describe her “last will and
testicles”, to advise apparently duped characters to “stop being so knave”,
to bring an argument to impasse by conceding “we have reached stable mate”,
or to butt in with “pardon me for protruding”. Of conducting an intensive
search Dorrie, “or whatever it is she chooses to
call herself”, declared she would leave “no stone upturned”, the genuine
article was described as being “bony fido”, and
while making an inventory of a stock of American Indian artefacts she would
note the presence of “scrotum poles”. “It was a well-known fact” that all of
this was “flying in the face of nature”, and enough to drive anybody
“beresk”.
With Don Finlayson emerging as the hero of the piece all
the residents of Number 96 accepted his sexuality without question.
While in the opening episodes Dorrie had initially
harboured “suspicions” about the relationship between “flatmates” Don and
Bruce, the writers soon realised it would be much funnier if chronically
confused Dorrie remained completely oblivious to
the truth. Just a few weeks into the storyline with Bev discovering that Don
was gay she angrily screamed down the stairwell that “Don Finlayson’s queer!”
When the flat 3 door opens it seems Dorrie had
heard this cry, yet in the next episode she is dithering about the racket,
muttering that “it was something about Don Finlayson being queer… you know I
saw him earlier and he looked perfectly alright to me!”
Through the show’s entire run Dorrie
never realised that Don was in fact gay, even if everyone else seemed fully
aware of - and completely blasé about - the fact. Though Dorrie
would remain a gossip, she became a harmless one. She frequently got her
facts all wrong, and with her constant malapropisms it was difficult to take
her too seriously. Certainly none of the other characters paid much attention
to her antics, and ironically, Dorrie often seemed
to be the last to know. Appropriately, “Why wasn’t I told?!” became perhaps Dorrie’s most famous catch phrase, and yet she seemed the
only character never to realise why.
Aldo Godolfus
Another popular comic character was bumbling Hungarian
Jew, Aldo Godolfus, who ran the ground floor
delicatessen. Though somewhat a comedy character with some humorous
mannerisms and his own comic mangling of the English language, the character
was well played by comedy actor Johnny Lockwood, who managed to evoke both
humour and pathos with the portrayal. Said his portrayer, “Aldo was originally
a Greek character. But I told them, ‘I can’t do Greek’, so he became a
Jewish-Hungarian.” [37] However,
despite this switch, no one thought to change the character’s supposedly
Greek-sounding original name.
The producers had initially asked Lockwood to grow a
moustache for the role of Aldo, but he refused so the show’s make-up artists
added a big bushy fake moustache for taping. Lockwood’s wavy hair was also
slicked-down for the role. Lockwood’s differing appearance away from the show
allowed him some degree of anonymity in public; as he told TV Week “I realised that if I had the moustache I
would be exactly like Aldo and I would be the target for people the whole
time.” [38]
Overall Johnny Lockwood had nothing but good things to say
about the show.
“How can anyone disagree with success? This is one of the
most professionally planned series ever to be made in this country. When we
launched the whole of the 0-10 Network was behind it. It was sold on sex and
sensationalism which made people watch it. That way it got a bigger audience
than could have been expected. But of course it had to prove itself. And it
did. Eventually it had to show evidence of talent by the performers and good
scripts. The producers, Bill Harmon and the late Don Cash, had hand-picked
everyone for the series and they were the right people for the roles. The
initial ballyhoo got people watching and because the product was a good one
they bought it.” [39]
Aldo faced much turmoil as daughter Rose had an affair with
her married upstairs neighbour, then fell in with the wrong crowd and smoked
marijuana before being raped, prompting him to wish they were back in the old
country. Concerning Rose’s drug use, Johnny Whyte reports that “The
[Broadcasting] Control Board was very strict with that scene and we weren’t
allowed to show Rose enjoying the smoke. It had to have her being forced to
smoke it and being sick.” [40]
They were not the only ones concerned with Rose’s
activities. Her portrayer Vivienne Garrett sometimes objected to playing in
salacious scenes, especially to the implication that Rose might have actually
enjoyed being raped, and after five months she broke her contract to leave
the series. [41]
In the story Rose was married off to nice Jewish doctor
Julian Myers (Lew Luton) and left Number 96. Meanwhile Aldo concentrated
on his romance with restaurant owner Roma Lubinski
(Philippa Baker). Aldo and Roma eventually married
to run the deli and to experience endless confusion in their attempts to
incorporate English-language phrases and metaphors into their daily
conversation, emerging as long running comic favourites.
When Philippa Baker was
originally approached to play Roma she thought it was a joke, but after one
audition she had the part. [42]
In a 1973 interview Baker admitted to TV Week
that her accent in the role had sprung from somewhere within her imagination.
“Bill Harmon asked me if I could do a Jewish accent – and
of course I had no earthly idea. ‘Is there such a thing as a Jewish accent?’
I asked him. There are a lot of Jews in a lot of countries. ‘Oh, we want you
to be a Russian Jew’ he told me. A Russian Jew! What was I to do? I know it’s
far from the real thing and I feel there must be a lot of Russian people
around Australia
who are highly insulted. I think the accent I have adopted is a bit like Zsa Zsa Gabor.” [43]
Alf and Lucy
Alf and Lucy Sutcliffe also emerged as key characters in
the program’s on-going storylines. The bright and down-to-earth Lucy had
Alf’s constant whining and his late night drinking binges to contend with,
along with a long series of dramatic health concerns,
though confiding in close friend Vera Collins brought her some consolation.
Lucy endured a dangerous eye operation with a cliff hanger unbandaging that implied she had gone blind (it was later
revealed she was only temporarily blinded by the surgery), a breast cancer
scare, and a troubled unplanned pregnancy to deal with.
Indeed the Friday night episode leading up to Monday’s
revelation that Lucy’s tumour was benign proved to be Number 96’s
highest rated episode to that time. Though known for his self centred whining
and staggering home drunk, the sometimes insensitive Alf would always come
through when the chips were down. Through her job working in the laundrette,
one of the meeting places for the show’s characters, Lucy was always up to
date with the comings and goings of Number 96 and was sometimes a
recipient of gossip and rumour, even if Lucy herself never put much stock in
such malicious banter.
The series presented a seamless mix of comedy and drama,
yet within this scheme the Sutcliffes seemed to
occupy a special place. While the comedy characters would sometimes drift
into a dramatic storyline, they usually stayed in comedy mode. Likewise when
characters such as Vera or Don were dragged into a comic moment they usually
played it straight and sustained an air of bemused detachment. However while
superficially the Sutcliffes seemed like comedy
characters with their stereotypical thick Northern English accent and
dialect, their banter and their minor squabbles, a large number of their
storylines were serious and dramatic. The sometimes comic pair would
seamlessly switch into straight dramatic mode, and present a compelling
dramatic piece.
Despite the show’s reputation for saucy sex scenes, high
camp dramatics and broad comedy, the show’s early episodes were largely
played straight with their emphasis on basic drama, relationship storylines,
and character studies. Though tied to its same set of interiors and with
lengthy, wordy scenes, the dialogue was sharp and stories moved quickly. The
scenes were well acted giving episodes the feel of a television play.
Though many of the topics explored in the storylines might
have been considered sensational in themselves, they were not presented in a
prurient or leering manner. The series brought such rarely discussed subjects
as rape, infidelity, divorce, racism, intolerance, drug use and homosexuality
into many homes for the very first time.
Actor Elisabeth Kirkby observed
that the travails of her character Lucy served to both entertain and to
educate the show’s audience.
“In a subtle way we emphasised the importance of a woman
going to her family doctor for a check-up if she detects and abnormalities in
her breasts. Many women are scared of having cancer check-ups and I hope that
seeing Lucy’s reaction gave them a little encouragement and understanding.
People at home can identify with the characters in Number 96, and
therefore they are more likely to learn from watching the program than from,
say, watching a medical documentary on the same subject.” [44]
Kirkby went on to praise other
elements of the show.
“When the homosexuality theme was introduced, it was done
in such a way that the audience couldn’t possibly dislike the characters. It
simply made some people aware that homosexuals aren’t lepers - but ordinary
people. The same applies for situations such as the one where Rose became
involved in drug taking. Parents must realise how easy it is for their children
to get involved in drugs. Surely this must make them more conscious of the
problem and more tolerant and more understanding of their kids.” [45]
However Kirkby saw the show as
more than just educational. “It really is such good entertainment, something
is happening every second. And the ratings prove that people watch it.” [46]
In a similar vein, Johnny Whyte observed that while the rape of Vera by her
estranged husband Harry provoked a huge public outcry, that it “helped awaken
the consciousness of people about rape within marriage.” [47]
Overall Whyte noted while the series was initially
motivated to showcase previously taboo topics as part of its drive to achieve
high ratings, that the explorations of these
subjects “helped to bring these subjects into open discussion within the
home.” [48]
Notable was the show’s inclusion of a gay character, an
Australian TV drama first in 1972. The character of Don was presented as a
normal person in a normal job, who just happened to be gay. Whyte observed
that it was Don’s overall normalcy that seemed to shock viewers the most.
“Homosexuals had always been presented before in overseas
shows as figures of fun. Now here was one being presented sensitively as a
person with a normal lifestyle. Gradually as the months wore on you could
sense the acceptance by the audience as they identified with Don and his
problems. I like to think that Joe Hasham’s
portrayal of Don Finlayson has led to a greater understanding and indeed
acceptance of homosexuality in Australia.” [49]
While most soap operas of the 2000s have included a gay
character at some point, frequently they are a briefly glimpsed character who
does a “gay” storyline and disappears. But Don was a key original character
who lasted through the program’s entire run, was involved in the gamut of
storylines, and had many gay relationships across the series. In many
respects, as the series drifted into comedy and new characters were developed
as comedy caricatures, dependable Don became the show’s sanest character. He
regularly stepped in to take charge of a chaotic situation and to help out
the other characters.
Within months of its launch the series was a clear
success. As the series progressed the emphasis on comedy would be increased
and there would be less emphasis on sex, nudity, and other outwardly shocking
elements. The second half of the first year saw the introduction of key
characters who would quickly emerge as firm
favourites.
Les and Norma
Moving to flat 5 was bubbly Norma Whittaker (Sheila
Kennelly), the barmaid from the local pub, and her a lovable and accident
prone amateur inventor husband Les (Gordon McDougall), who worked as an
orderly at the local hospital. Their adult son Gary (Mike Ferguson) briefly
returned to stay with them after their arrival at Number 96. However Gary and his marital
troubles were soon out and Les and Norma would concentrate on comedy
storylines.
Norma, who called everyone “Ducky”, wore a blond wig when
working behind the bar. This was a costume choice requested by her portrayer,
the dark-haired Sheila Kennelly, who initially took the Number 96
role partly for the regular income. Not wanting to jeopardise a potential
serious acting career, she wanted to disguise her appearance in the raunchy
soap opera. Nevertheless as the role continued Norma would frequently be seen
at home sans wig. English-born Kennelly used an Australian accent leaning
towards ‘broad’ for her portrayal of Norma, and could regularly be heard
exclaiming “gawd, strewth!”
in exasperation at Les’s infuriating antics.
Indeed Les always had a get-rich-quick scheme up his
sleeve, always had a home grown solution to people’s various troubles, and
was an avid proponent of various self help manuals. Les’s never ending
library of manuals included the Be Your Own…
series (which included Be Your Own Acupuncturist,
Be Your Own Caterer, Be Your Own Nanny), and the 1001 and 1 [insert subject] series.
Even more annoying was his obsession in sleuthing. Local crimes and mysteries
frequently had Les conducting eccentric investigations which sometimes
amounted to interfering with police enquiries.
Later, when the chemist shop was converted to a wine bar
by Jack Sellars, Norma was installed as manager and
she and Les moved in to flat 1 behind the bar. The friendly and cosy wine bar
with its lively hosts would quickly emerge as the primary meeting place for
the show’s characters. Norma and Dorrie sustained
an on-going feud while Les’s constant failed schemes and inventions - which
often involved assistance from Alf and Herb - provided many comedy moments.
Sheila Kennelly later described the formation of the
character for TV Scene:
“I didn’t know we were going to be regulars. It just went
on and on. It was weird, a whole new world. The fans became friends. They were
so sweet. People write in and ask for the patterns of the dresses I’ve worn,
so I draw little sketches for them. And teenagers write asking for advice
because they’re having trouble with their boyfriends. They see Norma as a
mother figure – and there is a lot owing to the writers, the way they’ve
developed her as a sympathetic figure.” [50]
Arnold Feather
Next Arnold Feather (Jeff Kevin) arrived from catering
school to work in the wine bar. Just 18 and an orphan, Arnold soon switched to working in the deli
where he initially clashed with Aldo in his attempts to reorganise the
business. He also emerged as an unlikely sex symbol in the story, warding off
advances from several eager young women. Arnold was a mild mannered, meek but
officious gentleman fond of peppering his sentences with pet phrases “If I
may be so bold” and “in point of actual fact”. He became somewhat a son
figure both to Aldo and Roma Godolfus, his business
partners in the deli business, and the Sutcliffes,
with whom he boarded for a significant time.
Jeff Kevin had in point of actual fact been initially
signed to appear in just nine episodes. [51]
A big success in the show, he would continue in the series right through to
its final episode. Like the Sutcliffes the
character of Arnold
superficially resembled a comedy caricature, yet was a well-drawn character
successfully deployed in a range of straight drama storylines along with the
comedy vignettes. The expert acting of Jeff Kevin in the role provided for
many a poignant moment as Arnold’s
saga played out.
Despite Pat McDonald winning more awards than anyone else,
there were safe guards built into the production organisation of Number 96 that were designed to prevent any one
performer becoming the show’s star. All actors received equal billing, with
the billing order decreed by where in the flats their character lived:
actor’s names appeared on screen over each flat as the camera panned from one
to the other in the end credits sequence. The standard contract for regular,
on going cast members was for just three months. In addition to this all
actor contracts had a ten week notice clause: if a character was not working
out then the character would be dropped. Each actor received the same salary,
and no one actor would ever appear in more than three of the five episodes
broadcast over a week. These safe guards were in place to prevent jealousies
and bickering over billing and pay rates, and to discourage a star system
from developing. [52]
With the 2008 release of Number 96’s
1974 Pantyhose Murderer storyline on DVD, Elaine Lee described working
conditions on the show to the Brisbane Times.
“We had to learn our lines
over the weekend… the work was constant and very tough. We shot five episodes
a week. We were all paid $500 a week… had we done this in the states we would
all be multi-millionaires today. But I wouldn’t have missed it for anything.”
[53]
At the time of acting in the serial, regular actor Tom
Oliver had described to TV Week the fast
turnaround on the show and the relative insecurity of the job.
“In Number 96 you never
really know when your run is likely to finish. They like to add new
characters all the time, and nobody knows who will go next. When we make the
show we are only two weeks ahead of the audience - and we have scripts for
two weeks in advance. That only makes us one month ahead in knowledge of
what’s going to happen. We get more notice than that, of course, but it’s
always around the corner.” [54]
In early 1975 Bill Harmon described the process of adding
new characters to the ensemble. “The public and the ratings will tell me
whether we keep using them,” he told TV Week.
Harmon also admitted that it is a “traumatic experience all round” when he
has to evoke the ten-week notice clause because a character is not working out.
[55]
“We work here as one big
family and that’s part of the reason for the success of the show. When Johnny
Whyte or I have to tell someone that they will have to leave because the
character has been written out it is a fearful business. It’s like kicking one
of your kids out so they can make a life of their own. I can tell you that
there have been more than a few tears over the years.” [56]
The second half of the 1972 season featured two infamous,
head-line grabbing storylines. First there was the black mass conducted by
devil worshippers, followed by the panty snatcher dubbed the “knicker snipper”.
The Black Mass
The controversial Black Mass storyline occurred mid 1972.
In the story Bev’s new flatmate Karen Winters (Toni Lamond)
arrives and shows an interest in the fortune telling exploits of Vera
Collins. When Vera wants to give up smoking, Karen suggests that Vera visit
hypnotherapist Vernon Saville (Alistair Duncan) to
undergo hypnotherapy to help her quit.
Meanwhile, Karen discovers that Bev is a virgin, and is
soon suggesting hypnotism to help her cure her fear of sex. It is revealed
that Vernon Saville is actually a devil worshipper
who begins to control Vera through hypnosis. Karen meanwhile has procured Bev
as the virgin needed for a ceremony where they plan to summon up the devil
himself, and Bev too falls victim to his
hypnotherapy. Vera is put into a trance to be used as the medium in the
ritual, while a naked Bev will be the sacrificial virgin.
The black mass scene involved Bev laying
on a velvet altar and naked under a silk sheet as a team of robed extras
writhed to jungle rhythms. Poised above her was a sword wielded by De Como,
the high priest of the mass played by Peter Reynolds. Looking on is Vernon Saville, while Karen flutters around in the background
muttering incantations. As the mass gets underway Vera’s clothes were
stripped away to reveal her naked body before she was dressed in a billowing
robe for the ceremony. [57]
The sequence was shot on a Friday the 13th and
Vera’s portrayer Elaine Lee admitted that she approached the scene with
trepidation.
“I am tremendously worried about this particular scene.
As Vera Collins I play a mystic and I really identify with the character. I
couldn’t play Vera if I weren’t like her. I have brought all sorts of lucky
charms with me today - just to keep me calm. I don’t believe in black magic
but I do definitely believe in the supernatural.” [58]
Also worried was guest artist Toni Lamond
who told TV Week that “I am genuinely worried
about the filming because I have strong feelings about dabbling in things we
don’t understand. In one scene I had to recite the Lord’s Prayer backwards,
which upset me very much.” Lamond sought counsel
from a clairvoyant friend who advised that as long as Lamond
was merely reciting the words but not feeling any actual malevolence things
should be fine. “But I still find the whole thing very unsettling. I will be
very glad when it’s all over.” [59]
Abigail told TV Week that
“I don’t personally worry about these things as a rule although I was upset
at rehearsal when Peter Reynolds was holding that dagger over me. The dagger
is very heavy and sharp - and we were all laughing a bit while rehearsing. If
he had dropped it I would have been in trouble.” The show’s associate producer
Ted Jobbins said that the actors were not overly
disturbed by the scenes. “I think most of them are amused rather than worried
about the scene. As far as the cast is concerned it’s just another job. It is
all being treated very light-heartedly, even if it is Friday the 13th”.
[60]
The black mass ceremony included Elaine Lee’s second nude
appearance in the series after Vera’s rape scene in the show’s opening installment. [61]
With the scene requiring her to be stripped naked, Lee explained that “I
prefer it if the set is closed when I have to do a nude scene, as I get very
embarrassed.” Indeed onlookers and non-essential personnel were ordered out
of the studio during the taping of the nude sequences. [62]
Nevertheless in the Channel 10 boardroom a team of specially-invited
members of the press enjoyed a bird’s-eye view of proceedings through the
transmitting monitor. For nearly an hour Abigail, who had worn a
flesh-coloured bikini for rehearsals, lay naked on the altar while the scene
was being shot and re-shot. Overall Elaine Lee admitted that “I’m not really
looking forward to doing the scene, but I feel it is essential to the plot of
Number 96. I wouldn’t do it otherwise.” [63]
Unfortunately, the Broadcasting Control Board felt that the
black mass sequence - essential or not - should not be seen, and ordered it
to be cut from the episode. Channel Ten hadn’t shown the footage to the
Broadcasting Control Board and the first the board knew of it was when the
black mass episode was broadcast in Sydney.
Earlier in the year the board had exercised one of their rarely evoked powers
and been previewing all episodes of Number 96
prior to broadcast. This had continued for the show’s first five or so weeks,
and had long been discontinued by the time the devil worshippers showed up.
But after the black mass went to air in Sydney
the board leapt into action and quickly acted to ban the segment. The board
evoked the regulation against televising displays connected to the occult,
and the scene was cut before it went to air anywhere outside Sydney. [64]
Perhaps this censorship was for the best, because,
according TV Week columnist Jerry Fetherston the sequence was ridiculous, its displays of
hypnotism inane. For Fetherston such outrageous
displays stray too far into the realms of fantasy for a series purportedly
about everyday people, and threaten to stretch credulity to breaking point,
potentially eroding the show’s popularity. [65]
Johnny Whyte himself later regretted the storyline. “I was disappointed that it
didn’t work,” he said, noting that audiences apparently “didn’t want to see
black magic on television. It was a big turn off.” [66]
However it had been series creator David Sale himself who
had initially suggested the storyline in a story conference. Sale attempted to
reconcile the witchcraft angle with his concept of the show as having a
“realistic approach” by emphasising the moral behind the devil worshipper
storyline. “When the public see the black mass ritual,” Sale told TV Week,
“I hope they are horrified enough to be completely turned off ever getting
involved in that sort of thing.” [67]
The “Knicker Snipper”
Next came the serial panty
snatcher who was dubbed the “knicker snipper” in
the show’s publicity. This was an unidentified intruder who crept into the
women’s unattended bedrooms, snipping holes in their panties and bras. The
storyline was presented as a mystery whodunit that kept the residents of
Number 96 (and the viewers) guessing for weeks.
In late 1972 the culprit was eventually discovered by Herb
and Dorrie’s niece, the plucky Georgina Carter (Sussannah Piggot). Young
Georgina had already encountered the knicker
snipper during her stint staying with Herb and Dorrie
in flat 3. During a provocative (and hilarious) undressing sequence the knicker snipper’s hand had emerged from under her bed to
reach out and grab Georgina’s freshly
discarded panties. When he came back for more she wasn’t about to lose
another pair of undies. Georgina quickly
calls a passing Jack Sellars in to help, and the
criminal is apprehended.
The culprit turned out to be Alan Cotterell
(Mark Hashfield), who had entered the storyline as
Janie’s boyfriend. To keep the guessing viewers off the scent the cunning
writers had earlier shown Alan organising a vigilante group to capture the knicker snipper.
It was later reported that during this storyline, three
Returned and Services League clubs, noticing a downturn in attendances,
disclosed the name of the attacker before it was known publicly. In fact, the
scriptwriters didn’t even know who the “knicker
snipper” was at that stage. Johnny Whyte recalled, “we had no idea who it
was. We had implied it was someone in the block of flats, but we were halfway
through the story before we sat down and decided who it would be.” [68]
Knowing that the series could not lose its two male sex
symbols, Tom Oliver or Joe Hasham, they had little
option but designate the character of Alan Cotterell
as the culprit. [69]
Around the same time Janie also left Number 96.
It was reported that her portrayer Robyn Gurney decided the leave the series
to avoid being typecast. [70]
The Logies
The core cast that had steadily developed over the show’s
first year became cult figures. When they travelled by train to the Logie
television awards ceremony in Melbourne the
fans that greeted them at Spencer Street Station seemed to rival the Melbourne crowds for The
Beatles. These whistle stop train journeys became major publicity for the
show for the first few years of its run. Much of the regular cast would travel
together, greeting hordes of fans at every stop, even if the actors
themselves never received any extra pay for this weekend work. [71]
By 1977, perhaps as a convenient way to articulate the
program’s sudden fall from grace, The Sun
newspaper columnist Ralph Broom noted with some regret that despite previous
years seeing busloads of the cast in attendance and their presence being
commercially exploited, that by 1977 just four members of the Number 96 cast were at the Logies, and that they
were seated behind scaffolding and virtually out of camera range. [72]
Turmoil behind the Scenes
As Number 96 rose to the
top of the ratings in 1973 various behind the scenes dramas were reported in
the press. Actor Pat McDonald and her former co-star Sussannah
Piggot who had just finished a three month stint
playing Georgina, the niece of McDonald’s
character Dorrie, both incurred the wrath of the
show’s producers after appearing in television advertisements where they
reprised their Number 96 characters. [73]
Bill Harmon said that actors were allowed to appear in
commercials…
“so long as they don’t appear as
their 96 characters. If they appear as their 96 characters they take away
some of the believability of the series and characters. In fact, what they
are doing is stealing the characters and if anyone does it in future they
will find themselves up against a lawsuit.” [74]
It was for much the same reason that actors could not
appear in any advertisements whatsoever that were screened in breaks within Number 96. [75]
McDonald did not think the producers would object to her
commercial, which was for a new brand of bread, as her costume in the
commercial was not one of Dorrie’s, and she wore a
different hairstyle. Harmon told TV Week that
“When she found out we were concerned about the commercial she was terribly
embarrassed.” Piggott, whose advertisement featured her discussing her
“Auntie D” and a popular brand of vacuum cleaner, admitted that she was
“heartily sorry” and said that “at the time I had finished working in Number 96 and I couldn’t see any harm in it. But
later I realised that perhaps I had done wrong.” [76]
The commercials were quickly withdrawn from Sydney’s Channel Ten,
where the series was produced, and assurances sought that they would be
withdrawn entirely. At the Channel Ten studios an official notice quickly
went up advising all actors that such portrayals were banned. [77]
There was further turmoil when actors Tom Oliver and Lynn
Rainbow complained to producers about proposed use of their likenesses on the
cover of a book about Number 96 without
payment. [78]
Meanwhile original cast member Joe James spoke out when, to his surprise, he
was abruptly written out of the series at the end of the first year. Joe
James explained his reaction to TV Week.
“I was hurt and upset by the decision. I really enjoyed
working on the show, in fact it was one of the most pleasant jobs I have ever
had. All the people involved in Number 96 are
great and it makes me sad to think I won’t be rejoining them in the new
year.” [79]
No specific reason was given for the character’s demise
except that the writers felt they had exhausted all the drama associated with
the character. “They like to keep a constant flow of dramatic situations
going with the regular cast members - and I suppose Gordon had his fair share
of high drama,” James concluded. [80]
Indeed Gordon Vansard had
endured a troubled relationship with Sonia before being embroiled in a murder
mystery plotline after his estranged wife Sylvia was killed, and then
starting an affair with Yvonne Marette (Sophie Vaillant). For his exit Gordon was killed in a horror
road accident with his mistress Yvonne while Sonia promptly departed the
series, though she would return to play a major role in the 1974 feature film
version of the serial.
With his character killed off Joe James would make no such
returns to the story, but he at least could take consolation in the honour of
being the one and only fellow Number 96 cast
member that co-star Joe Hasham invited to his
wedding during the filming break in December 1972. [81]
However the biggest turmoil surrounded the show’s earliest
standout star, Abigail. In March 1973 TV Week
reported that the producers planned to drop her from the series as the
writers had exhausted her character’s storyline potential, a decision that
provoked a storm of viewer protests. The TV Week
report stated that there was more to the move that mere lack of story ideas,
noting that Abigail was one of the program’s most temperamental actors. She
frequently showed up late for work, and indeed had been 20 minutes late for
rehearsals the day after her departure from the show was announced. The
magazine reported that Abigail was emotional and moody, had had minor clashes
with the other actors, members of the crew and the producers, and had had at
least one shouting match with an associate producer who had tried to hurry
her along for a taping. [82]
The final straw came with the special cast train journey
to Melbourne
for the Logies in March 1973. Abigail asked that manager/boyfriend Mark Hashfield be allowed to accompany her on the train so he
could act as her body guard, protecting her from the hordes of fans who it
was expected would meet the train. With the entire regular cast aboard and the
limited accommodation on the train and at the Logies, the producers decided
that partners would not be allowed, and no exception was made for Abigail.
Her demands over the matter angered producers to the extent that they almost
revoked her invitation to the Logies altogether, but they relented and
decided Abigail should travel on the train with the cast but without Hashfield. However 15 minutes before the train was due to
leave Sydney
the message came through that Abigail would not be aboard because her “dress
was not ready”. [83]
In the event Abigail was the only regular cast member not
aboard the train, and her absence greatly disappointed a segment of the huge
crowds that had come out to greet the travelling actors. Some fans were
reportedly chanting “We want Bev!” But with Abigail missing the fans left the
station feeling disgruntled, while network executives seethed. [84]
Meanwhile rumours about the turmoil abounded. Manager Mark
Hashfield refuted claims that her departure was
merely a publicity stunt and that Abigail would only be taking a short break
before returning to the series. He told TV Week
that he had received written notification from the show’s producers that
Abigail’s contract had been terminated and that she would be leaving the
series on 20 April 1973. Due to the stockpile of pretaped
episodes, her last episodes would go to air three weeks after that. [85]
With Abigail’s departure from the show her character Bev
was written out by leaving for an extended overseas trip. Meanwhile new
character Jill Sheridan (Candy Raymond) would steam up the show in a series
of risqué storylines as Bev Houghton stepped aside. In the story Jill, and
her older sister Helen Sheridan (Carmen Duncan), move to Number 96 from
the country.
Candy Raymond, a thoughtful and politically-minded
graduate of the prestigious National Institute of Dramatic Arts, mixed
intelligence and sex-appeal. She was described by producer Bill Harmon as “a
luscious brunette who’s going to do things for a lot of people,” while in her
own comments to the press she denounced her status a sex symbol. Raymond
claimed that she partly accepted the role to assist a friend who was writing
a university thesis on communications media in Australia, and the particular
effect Number 96 was having on Australians.
Working on the show, she said, would give her an insight to the series and
the media in general, from the inside. [86]
Other reports presented Candy Raymond as an outspoken
supporter of various social issues who had even organised a Number 96 cast protest against French nuclear tests.
[87] Much like
cast member Vivienne Garrett before her, Raymond played a sexy girl thrown
into a series of storylines involving love scenes and nudity, while her
apparent rejection of her sex-symbol status and comments supporting “Women’s
Lib” only served to enhance her - and her character’s - image as a complex
and rebellious bad girl.
Candy Raymond observed that the sex symbol mantle was
being passed from Abigail to herself.
“There might be some animosity to me by Abigail’s fans. I
hope that’s not the case because I am not, in fact, replacing another
actress. I am playing an entirely different character, although they are both
sexy ladies. In a way, it’s good not to have to be a pioneer of that image.
Abigail has done it all and she has done it well.” [88]
Then Abigail returned to the series as Bev in an episode
that first went to air in Sydney
on 13 June 1973. In the story Bev returned from the US with a new husband. Then on 22
June 1973, just seven episodes later, Abigail was gone and the role of Bev
was taken over by new actor Victoria Raymond. In reality, shortly after
resuming work on the serial Abigail had abruptly been fired for “breach of
contract.” [89] She later claimed that she had
resigned from the show earlier that same day. [90]
In 1976 Abigail admitted to TV Scene
that “they sacked me. They said I was temperamental, but I’m not. Only a
small down-trodden pussycat.” [91]
In 2004 Andrew Mercado revealed in his book Super Aussie Soaps
that Abigail had been fired from her role after a series of photographs of
her in some compromising situations entered circulation. [92]
The decision to recast Abigail’s character was not made
lightly - night time Australian soap opera was still in its infancy and such
a ploy had not been tried before. Moreover the original actor had been the
show’s most popular and famous player. Nevertheless with Bev’s popularity and
storyline entanglements it was felt she couldn’t just disappear, so the
producers opted to slip new actor Victoria Raymond into Bev’s boots.
Bev’s new portrayer was the older sister of Candy Raymond
who had proved a big success in her role as the wicked Jill Sheridan.
Victoria Raymond had in fact been one of the actors who auditioned for the role
of Jill a few months earlier. At that time Candy Raymond, a slinky brunette,
had rather perceptively told TV Week that
“Vicki is blond and blue-eyed and has a busty appearance and seemed just
right for the series. But she would have been a repeat of Abigail so this
time I got the part.” [93]
With Abigail’s departure Victoria was an ideal cast addition, and
she was cast as Bev on the basis of that earlier audition. [94]
As Victoria
said “Candy and I auditioned for the role of Jill Sheridan last February and
Candy got it because I looked too much like Abigail. Now I’m in the series
for the same reason.” [95]
The replaced Abigail meanwhile stated that “I shouldn’t
imagine that viewers would accept my replacement in the role of Bev
Houghton.” She apparently believed a physical resemblance was required for
such a recast to be successful, explaining that “my similarity to Vicki
Raymond is not very great and I think viewers connect me very closely with
Bev. I may be wrong, but I don’t think they will accept it.” [96]
Luckily for the show, viewers did seem to accept the
switch. A few weeks after Victoria’s
first appearance in the show a network spokesman said that “In fact we have
had very few people writing in or phoning about the change-over. Those that
have seem to have done so merely to congratulate Vicki.” [97]
For Victoria’s
first episodes in the series the director reportedly chose to keep the new
Bev in a wide shot. All viewers would see was a shapely long haired blonde in
the background while the new facial features would be more difficult to make
out. In the event Victoria
ultimately worked out in the role and came to be regarded as a popular actor
and sex symbol in her own right. [98]
The transformation was a success and three months later there would be
another recast when a pregnant Carmen Duncan left the series, with Jill
Forster stepping into the role of Helen Sheridan.
Helen was at the time embroiled in a troubled romance with
Jack Sellars and had the rather extreme problems of
her promiscuous younger sister Jill to contend with. Indeed Jill had affairs
with Arnold Feather, Harry Collins and a priest, became pregnant, finally
gave birth, then smothered the baby. After a stint
in a mental hospital Jill became a nun. By this stage, Number 96
had become Australia’s
highest rating program.
During 1973 the character of Flo Patterson (Bunney Brooke) was added to the serial. Brooke was tested
for and won the role of Flo after the producers had tested several actors for
the part of a character to act as a foil to Dorrie
Evans. [99]
Flo was introduced as a sometimes bitchy character who, according to her portrayer, “makes waves for the sake
of making them.” In her first scene where Flo arrives to confront Dorrie in the laundrette, Brooke said she felt her acting
“came on too strong” where she was to verbally attack Dorrie.
Later she came to realise she should play Flo as a listener instead of trying
to meet the verbose Dorrie on her own ground. [100]
Softened into a more loveable figure, wisecracking Flo
quickly became a highly popular character in the series, and was soon moved
into Number 96 permanently. Escaping a fire that destroyed her residence
in nearby Paradise Street,
a rather sooty Flo arrived to live with Herb and Dorrie.
The only possession she was able to save was her caged budgerigar Mr Perky,
and the pet was moved in to flat 3 as well.
As a fixture of flat 3, Flo emerged as a crusty supporter
for henpecked Herb and a perfect foil for the fussing and swooning of Dorrie, with whom she often playfully quarrelled. Though
of the show’s cast it was the enormously popular Pat McDonald (Dorrie) who won most of the Logie Awards (winning the
award for Best Actress in 1973, 1974, and again in 1976) the year she didn’t
win, 1975, it was Bunney Brooke who took home the
award.
On winning her Logie, Bunney
Brooke discussed the formation of the character and Flo’s popularity with TV Week.
“The character has developed a lot since I first took it.
Originally Flo was envisioned as an interfering busy body type of person – not
really very likeable – but she has developed into something different since
then.” [101]
Brooke also reported that she received loads of fan mail.
“A lot of it is rather sad. I get a lot from people who
are obviously very like Flo. They are really lonely people
- which is exactly what Flo is under it all - but like her they tend
to play down their loneliness and their personal problems and retain the
attitude that something better is around the corner.” [102]
Bunney Brooke explained that Flo
didn’t really have all that much dialogue, allowing her to use a range of
subtle nuances and expressions to get the character across. This, she said,
helped make the character so interesting. Brooke took particular pride in her
scene from late 1974 where Flo was jilted at the altar.
“That was only a 50 second scene, but with those 50
seconds I had to get across the heartbreak that Flo was going through and it
was done almost wholly without a word being spoken.” [103]
The portrayers of Dorrie and
Flo, Pat McDonald and Bunney Brooke, lived together
in a Paddington terrace house at the time of Brooke’s debut on the show. In
1973 TV Week had reported that the two
divorcées had been close friends for four years; as Brooke said “we have
shared a deep friendship for a long time.” [104]
Later TV Week reports on
the duo charted their subsequent domestic arrangements. In April 1973 they
had moved to a big old house in Warrawee in Sydney’s
expensive North
Shore area. The move
was partly prompted by the loss of privacy at the Paddington location after a
number of fans discovered their address. Brooke explained that “we need a
house this big. Even though we are close friends, there are times when we
want to be alone.” In addition, McDonald’s 15 year old son Ian also lived
with them at the address. The accompanying photo spread illustrated Brooke’s
bedroom and antique brass bed, while other shots showed McDonald’s high back
mahogany bed. [105]
Years later, it was confirmed by Andrew Mercado that the two were a lesbian
couple. [106]
During the 1973 season several other key characters joined
the ensemble. Camp young movie fan Dudley Butterfield (Chard Hayward) arrived
as the new cook in the wine bar. Dudley was
always fantasising about old films, likening current story situations to
classic cinema moments. Of a favourite film he would always enthusiastically
ask “...did you see it? It was ever so good!” Dudley
also frequently employed the term “bona”, meaning very good,
from the old camp cant language Polari, while another of his signature lines
was “Don’t be cheeky, I’ll slap your wrists!” Dudley
would go on to enjoy a long running live in relationship with the more
pragmatic Don, “if you know what I mean?”
More camp fun erupted with the arrival of Don’s glamorous
jet setting and much widowed aunt, the Baroness Amanda von Pappenburg. Amanda was a bright and bubbly comedy
character portrayed by the bright and bubbly Carol Raye.
Amanda boarded in flat 4 with Don and Dud and befriended most of the
residents. Amanda enjoyed a close friendship with Flo while sending up the
snobbish Dorrie, but her witty retorts to the
bitchy Maggie Cameron were most enjoyable of all.
After two substantial stints in the series in the
1973-1974 period, Amanda was written out of the
series. Her portrayer Carol Raye became a tireless
behind the scenes worker on Number 96, with
the casting of main characters one of her primary roles. [107]
Raye would enjoy 18 months in this later position. [108]
The second year of Number 96
ended with a parcel bomb severely injuring Arnold Feather while Bev is
accidentally shot in a struggle after pulling a gun on her latest love, the
recently returned Bruce Taylor. When the series returned the following year
viewers learned that Arnold
had survived, though his injuries would result in the amputation of a leg.
Bev (having been played by Victoria Raymond for the preceding six months) had
been killed.
On leaving the series Victoria Raymond reported that her
ambition was to become a serious film actor.
“I want to do parts that give me full scope. I would like
to have time to get right into a character before I play it. On 96 this was
not possible. There was too much to do technically. Learning lines, moves and
shooting. Many times I would love to have reshot a scene, which I felt could
have been done better, but time was always at a premium.” [109]
However the job was a valuable experience according to the
actor. “You can’t work on something as hectic as 96 and not learn. It was a
terrific opportunity for me. I gave it a lot and got a lot back.” [110]
Helen Sheridan - now played by Jill Forster - would also
be written out of the series, reportedly because the writers had run out of
story ideas for the character. [111]
Though the recasts had worked, clearly it was felt that something had been
lost with the change of actor; the recast characters were disposed of and Number 96 would not rely on recasting again. Jill
Sheridan would also leave the series, leaving flat 5 vacant and ready for a
new family.
A movie version of the serial was filmed in colour at the
end of 1973 featuring most of the show’s current cast. With a change over of
flat 5 and flat 6 residents occurring at this time in the series, new
character Diana Moore (Rebecca Gilling) appears as the new flat 6 resident,
and in flat 5 is the returning Sonia, along with her new husband Duncan
Hunter (Alister Smart).
The film was shot on 16 mm, reportedly in eleven days,
with a budget so low the producers refused to disclose it. [112]
Other sources report a filming schedule of just over three weeks – starting
on Thursday 6 December 1973 and wrapping before the new year. [113]
The film used the main sets from the television series but
with some changes made for the demands of colour. [114]
The cast received roughly an extra week’s pay for their work on the film,
although Elaine Lee received the larger sum of $1,200 due to her large role
in the proceedings and her several nude scenes, one of which she described as
“harrowing”. [115] [116]
The film was released in time for the May 1974 school
holidays and despite being savaged by critics, hordes of eager fans flocked
to see their favourite characters on the big screen. While critics at the
time gave consistently bad
reviews, fans loved the film. In his 8 May 1974 review in
newspaper The Australian, critic Mike Harris
noted that “I’ve never been in a cinema before where the audience has
applauded when characters made their entrances.” [117]
The film’s entry in The Oxford Companion to Australian Film
strikes out in deference to the general reaction of film critics, judging the
film to be “an entertaining, bawdy, romp.” [118]
Number 96 the movie does
not differ too much from the series proper in style, characterisation or
content. The main differences, apart from the altogether different look
produced by colour film rather than videotape, is the inclusion of a small
amount of location filming, some brief (and clumsily mounted) action
sequences, and full-frontal nudity, things not seen in the television version
during this early period.
The series episodes had followed the usual soap opera
format of a sequence of roughly two-minute scenes, shot on video and switched
in the studio, that swap between the various current storylines, with the
final of these presenting the cliff-hanger moment. The editing of film
afforded greater flexibility than the fast-turnaround analogue video tape
editing of the series episodes, and taking advantage of this the film’s pace
quickens at several points where the various story threads reach a moment of
confluence and the film rapidly crosscuts back and forth between the various
plotlines in a volley of brief shots. The feature film was released on DVD in
July 2006.
Film Guest Star Rebecca Gilling
Cast member Rebecca Gilling had not appeared in the
television series version of Number 96 and her
character, flight attendant Diana Moore, is introduced moving in to flat 6
early in the film. Dialogue reveals she met Jack Sellars
on a flight and they started dating. She needed a place to live and Jack
quickly arranged for her to move into one of the vacant flats of
Number 96. Gilling’s character plays a
significant role in one of the plot threads, plus she provides the film’s
full frontal nudity.
Rebecca Gilling quickly regretted her decision to appear
nude for the cameras.
“I have been thinking about the whole thing and in future
will look hard at any offers to strip for a part. I am not saying there is
anything wrong with appearing naked if a part calls for it, but I can’t help thinking
that I’m in danger of being typecast as just another actress who doesn’t mind
getting her clothes off.” [119]
With her previous on-camera experience consisting of one
shampoo commercial, the young drama student had been one of seven actresses
who auditioned for the role of Diana. “I got the part, but only after giving
it serious thought - about five minutes thought.” [120]
Later Gilling realised a ‘sex kitten’ reputation could
jeopardise her planned serious acting career. She admitted she had not informed
her drama coach Mechtilde Harkness
of her decision to provide the Number 96 film
with some decorative nudity.
“To be quite honest, I’ve never told her about it, and I
don’t think she knows. I think she would say ‘Are you sure you know what you
are doing?’, but I don’t think she would approve completely.” [121]
Certainly many members of the general public did not
approve completely. “For about a year afterwards I was getting heavy
breathing phone calls and letters from irate mothers saying I was destroying
the youth of the nation,” Gilling later told TV Week
of her Number 96 appearance. “It stands out in
my mind as one of the faulty decisions I have made in my life, but I was very
young.” [122]
Then she agreed to be interviewed by a journalist writing
a story about people who lived together without being married, expecting that
her response would be one of many compiled into a general article on the
subject. Gilling truthfully reported that she had lived with her boyfriend
under the parental roof with their approval during her final year at high
school. When the article appeared it was a front page story with the headline
‘Number 96 star lives in sin at home’ and
Gilling admitted that “It was devastating.” [123]
Gilling would later appear nude in another film, the 1975
kung-fu action adventure The Man from Hong Kong. She went on to enjoy a long and
distinguished career which included lead acting roles in television series Glenview High, The Young Doctors
and Return to Eden. Gilling was later a
presenter on early 1990s lifestyle series Our House.
After production of the film the television version
continued in earnest. Arnold
endured the amputation of his leg, was fitted with a false limb, and then fell
in love with his nurse Patti Olsen (Pamela Garrick). Patti and Arnold would
be married in the show’s first big wedding, with the reception held in
Norma’s wine bar. As for the false leg, well Arnold
convincingly hobbled around the set for awhile but Bill Harmon soon decided
that this handicap slowed the pace of the show, so Arnold’s leg was conveniently forgotten
about.
The MacDonalds
A new family, the MacDonalds,
moved into flat 5 at the beginning of the 1974 episodes. The officious
Reginald P MacDonald (Mike Dorsey) was better known as Reg, or as “Daddy” to his
wife and adult daughter. His scatter-brained wife was Edie, also known as
“Mummy” or “Mother” (Wendy Blacklock). Their
vivacious blonde adopted daughter was Marilyn (Frances Hargreaves).
Reg, who liked to speak in
acronyms as a sort of verbal shorthand, was a bureaucrat at the local council
(the “LC”) and his office was located at the Town Hall (the “TH”.) Edie
flittered around the apartment as a dizzy homemaker, sometimes relying on
headache powders, tipples of gin, and daytime soap operas to help get her
through the day. Marilyn was a dreamy romantic who would deal with a series
of eager suitors. This rather eccentric threesome was another batch of comedy
characters for the show. They would become big favourites with viewers,
enjoying long-running roles.
Wendy Blacklock, who had been
asked to do the role by producer Bill Harmon after he saw her in the play Don’s Party portraying the wife of a Liberal Party
supporter, recounted the creation of Mummy and Daddy for TV Week.
“When I first started the role I realised I couldn’t play
Edie the way I looked. I saw her as a character role - a symbol of the
house-bound, dominated woman not up with the trends. My hair was too modern
and my clothes too stylish. So I gave her this page-boy, June Allyson hairdo
with butterfly clips I found - after a hunt all over Sydney - in a St Vincent de Paul shop. I
put her in a padded, constricting corset to give her a no-curve, up-right
look. Mike Dorsey and I discussed our parts and he saw he couldn’t play
“Daddy” as he looked if I was going to play Edie as I imagined. So he slicked
down his hair and donned glasses. It was perfect. Mike was a bit upset. He
turned to me with a doleful look and in his “Daddy” voice said ‘You realise,
Mother, you’re destroying my image. I used to be the daredevil, handsome hero
type.’” [124]
Overall Blacklock felt that her
character Mummy was “not too bright but she’s a genuine sort of person.” [125]
Mummy and Daddy’s much travelled son Dean (Marty Rhone) briefly returned to
stay with his parents in 1974. He resumed his clandestine affair with his
adopted sister, Marilyn before promptly departing.
Meanwhile the sprightly Frances Hargreaves had been a
last-minute replacement in the role of Marilyn. The role had originally gone
to Judy McBurney who had already taped about 30
scenes as Marilyn when she suffered a flare-up of peritonitis and was advised
by her doctor to take two or three week’s rest. McBurney’s
scenes had yet to be broadcast, and after several tense conferences between McBurney and the show’s producers and directors, the
tough decision was made to recast. [126]
After a hasty check of available actors the name of
Frances Hargreaves came up, and she was offered the role at 48 hours notice.
She was handed a wad of scripts with just one weekend to memorise the lot,
and all scenes featuring Marilyn were re-shot. The South African-born
Hargreaves had few Australian television credits but had gained much stage
experience in England.
Leaving England she
returned to South Africa
and married Australian actor David Gilchrist, and they subsequently settled
in Australia.
[127]
Sadly for Judy McBurney it
turned-out she could have returned to work a week after her illness. However
losing the role of Marilyn proved only a temporary setback to her acting
career and she would subsequently become a successful soap opera actor with
several long running roles. After a stint as a plain Jane secretary named
Jane Fowler in The Box
she had a brief part in Number 96 in 1977
before going on to the long running role of Tania Livingstone in The Young Doctors. She subsequently played the
comedy role of Pixie Mason in Prisoner.
Trixie O’Toole
Meanwhile more comedy emerged as brassy cabaret singer Trixie O’Toole (played by singer and stage performer Jan
Adele) was added to the proceedings as a visitor to Number 96. The
comedy character proved successful, so the writers arranged for Trixie’s nightclub tour to frequently visit Sydney and for Trixie to move in as house guest to whoever happened to
have a spare bedroom at the time. Usually, however, she would wind-up with
the McDonalds where she would ruffle Reg’s
feathers.
The standard Number 96
actor contract included a nude clause, even if certain stars such as Sheila
Kennelly always refused to agree to that section. However Jan Adele, a
self-described “fattie” tipping the scales at 15
stone, happily signed reasoning she would never be called-on to appear nude.
She was later horrified to learn that she would be required to strip down to
her underwear for a bedroom farce comedy sequence. [128]
These semi nude scenes occurred during a comedy storyline
where Trixie goes on a weekend away with Reg and Edie MacDonald. As a result of an earlier lie Trixie must impersonate Edie for their hosts while the
meek and retiring Edie must somehow present herself as the brassy nightclub
performer Trixie. Of course after everyone has gone
to bed Reg insists the women switch bedrooms but
their host won’t settle and a chaotic round of switching back and forth
ensues.
Petrified at the concept of appearing semi nude before a
national television audience, Adele admits she “shrivelled inside”. However,
as she told TV Week, it was simply a matter of
“gritting my teeth, and getting on with the job.” Despite this Adele was
happy with her role, and found it easy and enjoyable to be playing a likeable
character and someone similar to herself. [129]
Adele continued to make appearances in Number 96
over a three-year period.
Jack Sellars Out
In September 1974 the highly popular star Tom Oliver left Number 96. His character, Jack Sellars,
married the briefly returned Helen Sheridan and they departed for a happy new
life in Paris.
The back-slapping rough diamond Jack Sellars had
first emerged during the show’s early days when he appeared as Janie Somers’
new beau. Tom Oliver was initially signed for just a three-week run but the
character caught on and was continued, quickly becoming one of the show’s
most popular figures. Indeed TV Week expressed
the opinion that, since Abigail’s departure, he was the program’s most
popular character. [130]
In the story, Jack, like Maggie Cameron and Claire
Houghton, did not permanently reside at Number 96 but with the
convoluted storylines they frequently visited and sometimes were the
temporary guest of one of the residents, often Vera Collins. These frequent
visitors to the flats were presented as more sophisticated figures who
dabbled in the world of business and finance, a milieu that sometimes also
involved residents Vera Collins and Don Finlayson. Indeed Jack and Maggie
would become part-owners of the Number 96 building, and it was Jack who
had established Norma’s Bar.
During his time working on the show Oliver married fellow
cast member Lynn Rainbow. Later, with life imitating (or cashing in on) art,
he opened a wine bar in Kensington, Sydney, cunningly named
Jack’s Cellar. The bar was decorated just like Norma’s Bar in the series
and allowed fans to call in and hope to spot their favourite TV star. This
should not have been too difficult because, as Oliver told TV Week, he was in the bar every evening until it
closed at midnight. [131]
At the time he left the series, Tom Oliver told TV Week that he didn’t think of himself as any great
actor, admitting that he was “one of the brigade who
says his lines and hopes to hell he doesn’t bump into the furniture. I don’t
worry too much about a part. If the words are there I’ll say them.” Oliver
never really followed the storylines of the series he acted in, learning only
his scenes and ignoring those he didn’t appear in. He also admitted that he
wasn’t too far removed from his character. [132]
Years later Oliver said of his departure that “I left the series
- and I was one of the few to leave voluntarily - because things were
becoming automatic for me. I was acting automatically and I was becoming lazy
as an actor.” For about a year after leaving the serial Oliver did little
television acting work as the roles offered were all Jack Sellars
type characters. He instead did theatre work which included acting in a play
with Robert Morley in New
Zealand. [133]
Jack had been an appealing and enjoyable figure in the
series - and was immensely popular - and after he left the show’s makers
always endeavoured to include a loveable rogue mid-thirties male sex symbol
figure in the show. Shortly after Jack’s departure a replacement of sorts
arrived in the form of Andy Marshall (Peter Adams), a newspaper journalist
and heir to a fortune who formed a close business and personal association
with Vera Collins.
The jovial Andy who called everyone except Norma Whittaker
“Amigo” (for the brassy blond barmaid, the moniker “Duchess” was reserved)
was a key character in several storylines, yet would be written out of the
series by mid 1975. Peter Adams, an excellent actor who would become a key
figure in the later Cop Shop series,
played well in Number 96 and fitted well into
both drama and comedy scenes of the show. If anything Adams’
naturalistic and believable performance meant his character grew too large
for the camp comedy confines of Number 96.
By late 1974 the series had begun shooting episodes in
colour in readiness for the official changeover of Australian Television to
colour in Easter 1975. During 1974 the series had also shifted the emphasis
from melodramatic stories laced with nudity and titillation to focus more on
lighter storylines and comedy situations. [134]
[135]
By this time the series had settled into a regular
comedy-drama rhythm with the sexual elements deemphasised; the serial now
played like a situation comedy but one presented in a soap opera format with
the comedy storylines interwoven and spanning multiple episodes alongside
more dramatic plot strands.
The series of the middle period had a look and feel that
most closely resembles 1970s UK
situation comedies Bless This House, Man About the House and George and Mildred. Like those shows Number 96 focused on comedy caricature characters,
domestic interiors, comic class and inter-generational clashes (Number 96 had its regular turnover of flat 6
youngsters). Storylines featured home-grown solutions to the problems of
friends and neighbours which often ended in disaster. The comic storylines
often drifted into drama and pathos before the comedy denouement.
One comedy storyline in Number 96
in the late 1974 period had Dorrie, Herb and Flo,
and Mummy and Les, teaming up to create the help agency Dig Up a Treasure.
Various team members took turns manning the phone lines where their differing
phone manners and the one sided telephone discussions about the various
‘problems’ people phoned for help with were half of the comedy.
The storyline was also ideal for introducing short comedy storylines
to the proceedings, such as when Herb had to look after the (unseen) baby
Basil but was constantly losing and then having to retrieve him. After
leaving Basil behind in a cinema and then having him go missing from outside
the deli Herb discovered that Basil’s parents had deserted him and was left
holding the baby (or at least wheeling a pram around).
Then when Arnold is absent from the deli the Godolfuses call the mysterious new Dig Up a Treasure
agency advertised in the local paper asking for a replacement and are
surprised when Flo arrives to take over Arnold’s deli shifts, and proceeds to
create chaos behind the counter.
While the series continued to remain set-bound for the
vast majority of scenes during this middle period, interest was sustained by
the show’s mix of appealing and humorous characters, and while the action was
frequently talky, scripts breezed along with witty repartee, funny dialogue,
and amusing word play.
Most of the characters had signature lines or phrases, and
many had several, and these were regularly utilised. Flo Patterson frequently
used old style phrases “hubba hubba”
and “tickety boo”, all of which Herb Evans
understood, “more or less”. Roma Godolfus would
exclaim “this I cannot believe” while Reg McDonald
would react to Mummy’s latest domestic disaster by declaring “great Scott!”
Les’s inventions were “guaranteed to make a fortune”… even if this would only
be “up to a point”, and “all in good time!”
The catch phrases were not restricted to the comedy characters
of the show. Jack Sellars would emphasise a point
by pronouncing “I kid you not.” Imperious Claire Houghton would refute any
argument with “allow me to be the best judge of that!”
Dorrie’s malapropisms continued
to be regularly repeated, while Aldo and Roma faced similar confusion,
frequently taking metaphors literally. When Arnold confided in Roma that Aldo might be
experiencing the “seven year itch”, Roma was perturbed that Aldo would keep
secret this “itch” - caused by a skin infection perhaps - in their food
handling business.
New wine bar waitress Lorelei
Wilkinson (Josephine Knur) is worried by her limited vocabulary. But despite
concerted efforts to learn new words, she seemed stuck on using her favourite
new adjective: “congenial”.
In late 1974 two of the show’s most popular and enduring
characters, deli owners and flat 2 residents Aldo and Roma Godolfus, were abruptly written out of the series. A TV Week article reported on their departure, noting
that while their eventual return was possible, this was by no means
confirmed. [137]
By the time they departed the popular and
fondly-remembered Pantyhose Murderer storyline was well underway. Like the
earlier Knicker Snipper this storyline presented an
intriguing whodunit for the show’s characters and the viewers (as well as a
deranged criminal with a fondness for sexually-charged undergarments). Red
herrings and shock revelations would abound, but this time several characters
would also be killed off.
To ensure secrecy of the new whodunit storyline security
at the studio was tightened, and the producers placed a blanket ban on
visitors to the set. [138]
Viewers would have to watch and see who would die, and who the culprit would
be.
In the storyline, the hospital ball is looming, but Norma
is reluctant to take the night off from the wine bar to attend the ball with
Les. With Dudley away in Melbourne and his wine bar duties taken by newcomer
Matt Barrington (John Paramor), sweet but naïve
blonde waitress Lorelei Wilkinson will be left as
the wine bar’s most experienced staff member if Norma takes the night off.
And perhaps Norma is slightly spooked because a young hairdresser in nearby Chestnut Lane has
just been found strangled?
In the end Norma relents, apparently unaware that Matt’s
fixation on Lorelei had earlier that day led to him
peeking at her in the shower. Norma and Les and Patti and Arnold all go to
the ball, leaving Lorelei in charge of the wine
bar.
Also going to the ball is Arnold and Patti’s new flat 6 lodger Tracey Wilson (Chantal Contouri),
a nurse colleague of Patti’s. The thoughtful and conscientious Tracey, who
like her portrayer is of Greek descent, had moved in after fleeing her
abusive husband Peter Wilson (Dennis Miller). She soon started a romance with
Andy Marshall, who is separated from his wife. At the last minute Andy had
cancelled out on their date to attend the ball together, so Tracey goes
unescorted.
That evening Lorelei Wilkinson
becomes the strangler’s second victim and the first on-screen character to
die. Her strangled body - with pantyhose draped around her neck - is
discovered in the living room of flat 1 by Les and Norma when they return
from the ball.
Lorelei’s portrayer Josephine
Knur had for a time been touted as the show’s most successful new sex-symbol
to appear in Abigail’s wake, and Lorelei was killed
off to allow Knur to switch to a role in Cash-Harmon’s new soap opera The Unisexers. That show lasted
just sixteen episodes.
After Lorelei’s death the
Pantyhose Murderer mystery absolutely dominated proceedings for several
weeks. Lorelei had been murdered after locking up
the wine bar from the inside. The storyline was initially presented as a
locked room mystery where the perpetrator was suspected as a resident of
Number 96 who had somehow made a copy of the key to flat 1, with the
various residents suspecting other residents.
Appointed to investigate the case was Detective Short (Ken
Fraser). In an innovative police procedure, Short employed the convenient technique
of conducting many of his enquiries at Number 96 rather than at the
police station, and of openly discussing the twists and turns of the
investigation and revealing all the facts at hand to whichever resident he
happened to be questioning at the time.
Les Whittaker, who frequently loved to play amateur
detective, became engrossed in trying to uncover the identity of the
murderer. His various undercover comedy sleuthing attempts ended in disaster
and frequently interfered in the official investigation.
Don, and the police, initially suspected the suddenly
vanished Matt Barrington, the temporary chef in the wine bar replacing Dudley
during his trip to Melbourne.
Nevertheless several other residents are unable to account for their
whereabouts: Arnold
was alone in his flat having left Patti and Tracey at the ball after an
argument. Alf and Lucy’s new lodger Michael Bartlett (Peter Flett) had returned home to flat 8 after the discovery of
the murder, claiming to have been out with Marilyn all night. Lucy and
Marilyn later speak of this, and are horrified when Marilyn confirms she had
returned home hours before, leaving Michael out alone. Later Lucy disturbs an
intruder in flat 1 and discovers that the intruder and Michael wear the same
distinctive brand of aftershave.
Patti thinks Tracey’s violent husband Peter could be the
killer; however she is horrified, during this period where she always seems
to be squabbling with Arnold,
to find a packet of pantyhose in his deli jacket pocket. Tensions among
residents abound as Alf claims he saw Dudley at Sydney
Airport when he claimed to be in Melbourne, and later reports he overheard Dudley talking to Lorelei in
flat 1 the night she was murdered. Don believes Alf and argues with Dudley over the suspected lies about his whereabouts.
Amongst this Andy Marshall’s
initial alibi is later shown to be a lie, and even his lover Tracey seems to
suspect him.
The mystery even permeates the comedy sketches in the
show. Reg McDonald arrives in the deli to buy
headache powers, explaining that his headache came on after an afternoon
scouting the streets in his quest to locate a young blond woman. Given the
strangler is at this time suspected of targeting young blondes, Aldo quickly
decides that this implicates Reg as the strangler!
In fact Reg was merely trying to find Marilyn,
concerned she was the strangler’s next target. Then Dorrie
is worried when the flat 5 key goes missing from the “consergical”
key ring, further fuelling suspicion that Marilyn will be the next victim.
Tensions build as the suspects are eliminated. It is
finally learned that Matt was a passenger in a car pulled over by the police
the night of the murder, and was at the station at the time of Lorelei’s death. Michael, Dudley and Andy admit they
initially lied about their whereabouts that night. Michael had secretly
attended a pornographic movie, Dudley had a
secret meeting with the (surprise!) mother of his son, and Andy had had a
secret meeting with Tracey’s estranged husband Peter. Arnold explains that the pantyhose in his
pocket was a packet that Vera had accidentally
dropped in the deli.
The locked key mystery aspect of the story is resolved
when it is revealed that a foolish Les had naïvely misled the police into
believing all the flat 1 keys were all accounted for. He had in fact lost his
key, but thinking it would turn up and not wanting to waste police time he
told them he still had it. It was in fact missing, and the killer had it.
Nevertheless the belief that the killer was a resident of Number 96 was
still emphasised.
The strangler’s next victim was Tracey Wilson. Patti
arrived home, and in the cliff-hanger discovered her lying on the floor of a
darkened flat 6 with pantyhose draped around her neck. The following episode
revealed that Tracey had in fact survived the attack. Shortly afterwards
Patti Feather would herself be strangled to death in flat 6 for the 1974
end-of-year cliff-hanger.
Poor Patti bit the dust after the show’s makers decided
that the popularity of Arnold Feather was cooling now that he was ensconced
within a blissfully dizzy marriage. [139]
Unfortunately for the melodrama fuelled soap this happy couple had become
deadly dull.
Meanwhile the suspects were lined-up. Was it the newly
arrived Andy Marshall? Or Tracey’s violent husband Peter? Or how about the
Sutcliffe’s young lodger Michael who took up with a smitten Marilyn MacDonald
just as some unsavoury facts about his character began to emerge?
Some weeks into the 1975 episodes the strangler was
finally revealed to a terrified Marilyn who was attacked while working late
at the laundrette. In a fabulous Friday night cliff-hanger Marilyn was
confronted by the silent killer and cried “Oh my God! It’s YOU!” as the
pantyhose was wrapped around her neck... however viewers would have to tune
in Monday night to discover that the strangler was in fact Tracey Wilson.
Apprehended by the police before she could murder Marilyn,
Tracey quickly revealed herself as a vicious and jealous sado-masochist
unable to find pleasure in the more usual pursuits of innocent romance or a
normal marriage, and she was murderously resentful of those young women who
could. Tracey had staged the attack on herself as a red herring; her fervent sado-masochism meant she could readily inflict the
violent and injurious strangulation attack upon herself.
Tracey would promptly escape from police custody and
return to Andy who was now residing in flat 6 of Number 96, expecting
that he would happily go on the run with her. When Tracey overheard his
subsequent phone call to the police she committed suicide by diving out the
front window of the flat. Hearing the smashing glass Andy ran to the bedroom
but was not quick enough to prevent the jump, getting to the window in time
only to see Tracey’s blood spattered corpse splayed amongst the deli’s
outdoor furniture on the pavement below.
Behind the Murders
In an episode of Channel Seven reunion series
Where Are They Now? broadcast 8 July
2007, guest Chantal Contouri said of her
character’s identity as the murderer that “I didn’t know until the day we
were doing it.” Contouri explained that two decades
after the event David Sale had revealed to her that “they absolutely loathed
my character Tracey Wilson because she was so boring... that’s why they made
her the Pantyhose Murderer.”
Indeed, on that program, she and fellow guest Frances
Hargreaves joked that when the two were called to enact an attack scene in
the laundrette, neither knew if they would be
revealed as the killer or the victim. None of the other actors present at the
reunion - Jeff Kevin, Sheila Kennelly, James Elliott, Elisabeth Kirkby or Elaine Lee - knew the identity of the murderer
either.
On the DVD commentary of the Number 96
feature film, series creator David Sale confirms that the various whodunit
storylines were always devised without a clearly planned perpetrator in mind.
The culprit would be decided later in scripting meetings after the storyline
had already begun screening.
In this case, with all the earnest scenes involving the
often rather serious and moody Tracey fretting over her romance with Andy, or
her snappy demeanour while interfering in marital arguments between Arnold
and Patti, you can see why they made her the killer. Yet Chantal Contouri is so good at portraying the Psycho who
strangled young women with Frenzy, it seems difficult to believe that these
scenes were not part of her audition script. Watching the wickedly evil and
gloating Tracey when the police catch her during the attempt on Marilyn’s
life when she gleefully reveals why she committed the murders (“I hated them!
I hated their guts!”), it is hard to believe this wasn’t the plan all along.
Contouri had taken advantage of
the show’s shift away from sex and sin and demanded that the show’s standard
nude clause be removed from her contract before she would sign. [140]
Ironically, the closest thing to sex and nudity in this period of the show is
the low-cut pink nightgown Tracey repeatedly wears.
During this period Paula Duncan finally agreed to
appear in the show now that it seemed likely she would never be called-on to
strip. Duncan had earlier turned-down the offer to play Jill Sheridan, the
man-hungry sister of Helen (played by Paula’s real-life sister Carmen Duncan)
because at that time she would have been required to appear nude in the show,
and the then-unknown actor had wanted to avoid being tagged a “sex symbol” at
the start of her acting career. [141]
Now Paula would play Don’s warm-hearted sister Carol Finlayson who moved in
to flat 4 and took a job in the wine bar. Covered-up Carol would be written
out of the series after eight months.
As the pantyhose murderer storyline reached its conclusion
the reason for all of Michael Bartlett’s constant lies was also revealed -
and it was nothing to do with the murders. He had arrived at Number 96
with the secret mission to destroy the marriage of Lucy Sutcliffe after his
parents divorced when his father fell in love with Lucy. With this revelation
Michael was quickly forgiven by all concerned, and promptly married Marilyn
and moved in to her bedroom in flat 5. Soon afterwards Marilyn threw Michael
out when she discovered that he was already married to someone else, and he
left Number 96.
Amongst all the drama and recriminations of the murder
storyline the comedy still kept bubbling along. When Lorelei’s
murderer is dubbed the “Pantyhose Murderer” in the press, Aldo misremembers
this as the “Fancy Pants Murderer”, and continues to describe the killer as
such. Mummy and Daddy McDonald also endured amusing word-play
misunderstandings. When Mummy thinks out loud about her outfit for the
upcoming Kerbing and Guttering Ball, Daddy does the same while reading a news
report on the strangler. When Daddy muses that the murder weapon was
“pantyhose, nothing more or less!” it is the one thing that Mummy listens to,
and she momentarily believes that is what Daddy thinks she should wear to the
ball.
As had been the case the previous year, for 1974 the
series held the position as Australia’s
highest rating television program. It had also been joined on Channel Ten by
another sexy soap, The Box, about the lives and loves of the colourful
characters populating a television studio. Number 96
was at the crest of its success; however this success could not last forever.
1975 Season Starts
In 2010 a DVD of 32 consecutive episodes of Number 96 from early 1975 – following straight on
from the Pantyhose Murderer DVD - is scheduled for release.
As the 1975 storylines unfolded Norma had to accommodate
her imperious and disapproving mother Mrs Florentine (Aileen Britton). Mrs
Florentine arrived to stay with Les and Norma with visions of spending her
days with an “urban countess” what with Les’s title as the Earl of McCraddanow – even though it had actually been
transferred to his peripatetic off-screen half-brother Andrew.
Mrs Florentine was horrified to find a cramped,
junk-strewn flat behind a small wine bar and was forced to sleep on a camp
stretcher followed by a Murphy bed in the cluttered living room. Since these
sleeping arrangements had been devised by Les, it was guaranteed that they
would collapse and malfunction in catastrophic comedy sequences.
Small-time entrepreneur Freda Fuller (Sheila Bradley) had
bought the deli business from Aldo and Roma but quickly alienated staff
member Arnold - and the regular customers - with her inflexible attitude and
wholesale changes to the deli’s stock and operations.
When Freda hired Dorrie Evans on
an unpaid week’s trial, Dorrie’s natural fussiness
meant that the appointment was a disaster alienating the client base even
further. She was not kept on beyond the week – and not paid a cent either! In
retaliation Dorrie quickly instituted a boycott of
the deli and with Herb and Flo started up a supermarket shopping service for
the residents of Number 96 to ensure that the boycott stuck.
Also introduced was the beautiful Tanya Schnolskevitska (Natalie Mosco),
a vivacious brunette who spoke in a thick Russian accent at a rapid rate.
Tanya was introduced as a wine bar customer who caught Norma’s eye as a potential
new waitress for the business. However the mysterious Miss Schnolskevitska (“just call me Tanya, darling - it makes
life so much simpler!”) was instead snapped-up by Freda who hoped that
Tanya’s self-professed skill at attracting men might lead to increased
patronage at the deli.
Tanya had a tall story to match every occasion and her
speech was liberally peppered with “Da” and “Nyet”, but it quickly became apparent that the colourful
stories spanning various continents, assorted comrades and all manner of
historical events could hardly have been experienced by someone of her tender
years.
Meanwhile comedy characters Aldo and Roma returned to the
series in early 1975. Their absence from the series was planned to be only
temporary all along; press reports of the characters being “dropped” from the
show had just been a publicity stunt. In the story the officious Freda
Fuller, with the deli business well down, agreed to sell the business back to
them.
Tanya embarked on a romance with Andy Marshall and moved
in with him in flat 6. He soon discovered her real identity: she was an
American named Rosemary Prior. She switched to using her American accent and
began working in the launderette, while the romance with Andy ended when he
left Number 96 to return to his wife.
Womanising layabout medical student Miles Cooper (Scott
Lambert) moves in and develops a habit of scrounging money from the
residents. Soon a love-struck Marilyn decides she and Miles must be married,
and she switches to hard-nosed businesswoman to raise funds so they can
settle down to domestic bliss. Reluctant Miles is more interested in Tanya,
who is fired from the laundrette in a cost cutting move by Marilyn. Tanya and
Miles now share flat 6, and a more earnest Tanya, who now tells stories of
her ruthless and murderous crime boss father, switches to a job in the wine
bar.
As production on the 1975 season got underway TV Week magazine had reiterated that the sex and
nudity angle of Number 96 was being
de-emphasised in favour of “comedy and the development of relationship
between characters”. [142]
However as those episodes played out there was a downturn
in the show’s ratings. In June 1975 TV Week
critic Jerry Fetherston delivered his verdict on
the show’s recent episodes. “The plots of late have been straining for
effect; the show has been flagging. And this has been reflected in the
ratings, particularly in the key state of New South Wales. Now the word has gone out
from Cash Harmon, the series producer, to bring flesh back and so restore
interest.” [143]
In light of this Tanya Schnolskevitska
began to contribute nude glimpses to the show. Meanwhile Vera’s new flatmate,
model Bernadette (Charne Marshall), was revealed to
have a casual regard for clothing. The languid model is used in a comedy
storyline when Aldo repeatedly bursts in on Bernadette while making his
grocery deliveries, only to find her lounging around topless.
Bernadette is lusted-after by Miles; when Marilyn finally
catches them together she realises Miles doesn’t want to get married and
leaves to visit her brother Dean in Spain. Bernadette soon commits
suicide as her rather melodramatic main storyline plays out. The character of
Tanya was also slated to leave in mid 1975.
The departures of Marilyn, Bernadette and Tanya, following
those of Carol Finlayson and Andy Marshall, would open the way for an influx
of diverse new characters in the series. Carol had been written out of the
serial because the character was not working out. Likewise things had not run
smoothly for the character of Andy, who had become a pariah at Number 96
after penning a series of newspaper features on the Pantyhose Murderer
crimes. Actor Peter Adams would later reveal that the job was not a happy one
for him: “The character was two-dimensional, and I got the feeling that the
writers did not know what to do with him, except to involve him in
sensational things like drugs and murder.” [144]
Marilyn McDonald’s departure at this time was a blow to
the series, even if recently the writers had resorted to abrupt comedy
personality transformations - rough and laconic lesbian biker, followed by
fervent businesswoman - to keep the character busy. In reality Marilyn’s
portrayer, the highly popular Frances Hargreaves, left the series due to her
real-life pregnancy.
Former cast member Carol Raye,
now working at casting the major roles in the series, [145]
was soon describing the new batch of characters. In a TV Week
article titled “Nudes come home to No. 96!”, Raye explained that while sex was being reintroduced, it
would be “strictly for fun”. “There will not be sex and nudity just for the
sake of sex and nudity,” Raye told TV Week, “We hope to have a lot of fun with our
sex.” [146]
Curiously, after the series had openly instituted a move
away from sex before widely promoting its reintroduction, for two of its new
glamour girls the makers of Number 96 agreed
upfront to waive the requirement that all actors sign a nudity clause whereby
they agree to strip for the cameras whenever requested. These new non-nude
stars were leggy dancer and actor Pamela Gibbons who would come in as Grace
“Prim” Primrose, and Margaret Laurence who would play the rather serious and
moody Liz Chalmers. Both actors had insisted they would not do nude scenes
when signing on with the series, and indeed both had rejected offers to
appear in the series the year before, because at that time they would have
been required to strip. As Gibbons told TV Week
“in a small industry like Australian show business, once you strip for the
cameras, that’s it. You’ll never get any other roles”. [147]
In the story, Liz arrives at flat 5 claiming Dean
MacDonald asked her to marry him, but then stole her savings and absconded
overseas. Hoping to convince Liz to not report Dean to the police, Mummy and
Daddy appease her by letting her move into flat 5 where she will briefly
share with the soon-to-depart Marilyn. Film maker David Palmer (Vince Martin)
had moved in to flat 6 to share with Miles and Tanya; Prim was David’s
flippant, cinema fan assistant who enjoyed engaging in witty verbal wordplay.
David had signed a contract to direct television
commercials but soon wanted out of the deal. Hoping to be fired from his role
he decided to create the worst advertisements he could. The star of the
latest commercial was a thrilled Dudley Butterfield. Film fan Dudley is amazed he had been cast without even having
to audition, and even seems to be happy with the dailies of David’s dreadful
advertisement for a brand of Vodka. Poor Dud remains unaware that David’s
secret plan had been to create something so astonishingly bad he would be
released from the contract.
Tanya was eventually tracked down by her boyfriend, Clarke
Harvey, played by American actor Brandon Smith, the real-life husband of
incoming cast member Margaret Laurence. With the truth of Tanya’s background
and identity finally revealed she left Number 96. Wisecracking Prim
quickly moved into flat 6 to share with David and Miles. Miles was forced to
think seriously about his future when Susan Temple, a girlfriend from
university played by Elisabeth Kirkby’s real-life
daughter Debbie Baile, announces she is pregnant
and that Miles is the father. Miles was soon back to
his carefree ways when her claims were revealed as false.
Meanwhile the show’s new mid-thirties male sex-symbol was
Kit Taylor who would portray ruthless businessman Warwick Thompson, involved
in Vera Collins’ venture to launch an exclusive new clothing salon, the House
of Danielle. Soon the married Warwick
would start a love affair with Vera.
The sex and nudity would now be handled by another new
character, Jacqueline “Jaja” Gibson, Dudley’s
cousin from the country town of Forbes, New South Wales. In
casting the role the show’s makers said they were looking for a “stunningly
beautiful, sexy girl about 18”. [148]
In describing this new character, Carol Raye told TV Week “I wouldn’t call her a nymphomaniac, not
quite, but she’ll definitely be a bundle of love up from the country, not a
simple country girl”. [149]
This was the final role in the batch to be cast, and
apparently it had been difficult finding the right girl. More than 15 girls
between the ages of 16 and 23 applied for the part and the list was gradually
shortened to five. One of the 16 year olds had insisted she was willing to
strip as part of the role, but Raye was adamant
that 16 was too young, telling TV Week that
“I’m a mum myself and don’t go along with that sort of thing. A girl of 16 is
too young for that sort of part.” [150]
Eventually the voluptuous blond Anya Saleky,
a former ice skater whose only previous television experience was appearing
in three Paul Hogan television comedy specials, [151]
was signed for the role of Jaja. The novice actor
had apparently not read these earlier reports, later telling TV Week that “Bill Harmon offered me a part as a
girl next door type and assured me there wouldn’t be any stripping - but I
don’t think the message got through to the writers immediately.” Indeed one
of Saleky’s first scenes called for her to sit up
in bed, naked, while the sheet slipped away. However during the take when she
sat up the sheet stayed put: the young actor had secretly used sticky tape to
keep it in place. [152]
Anya Saleky feared the incident
would see her fired from the role, however Bill
Harmon was still keen to keep her on, and agreed to rewrite her contract with
the nude clause excised. Anya Saleky explained her
no-nudes stance to TV Week.
“The way I see it, I had to make a decision right at the
beginning. It might have been very tempting to strip for the sake of getting
a part but I kept thinking ‘what follows?’ There have been any number of sexy
ladies in Number 96 and the only one who is
really remembered is Abigail. I didn’t want to be just another young acting
hopeful who stripped and was then forgotten.” [153]
So Jaja thereafter remained
fully clothed - albeit mostly in very sexy and revealing costumes.
Despite these new characters being gradually integrated
into the proceedings, most of the main cast remained unchanged. With five
episodes a week this led to much storyline repetition as the light comedy
storylines persisted, becoming perhaps even sillier.
Dorrie and Flo again squabbled
over their competing activities at the Senior Citizens club when both wanted
to hold similar fund raising events. Roma and Aldo had yet another separation
and standoff where their pride refused to allow them to admit they had both
been in the wrong. Meanwhile Mummy MacDonald becomes obsessed with fictional
daytime television serial Natalie Faces Life.
Deli staffing problems of a grumpy Aldo and an absent Roma
lead to the temporary appointment of the clumsy Phyllis Pratt (Moya O’Sullivan). When Mummy and Prim are the only ones
on duty at the wine bar one night Arnold and Liz and Herb and Flo crowd into
the flat 1 kitchen to help out with the wine bar meals, leading to a
(hopefully) humorous kitchen disaster and yet another collapse of Les’s
high-rise stacks of clutter.
Les’s latest invention is the conveyor-belt baby cleaner,
the Babymatic. Even an increasingly weary Alf is
openly cynical about this new invention and expresses frustration with Les’s
constant crazy schemes. Norma meanwhile becomes positively furious at Les’s
absences to enlist investors, the mess in flat 1, and endless hours spent
trying to perfect this latest contraption. And yet again Les plays at amateur
detective and unofficial crime investigator, further angering Norma. As her
frustration crosses from playful to serious Norma starts a close friendship
with Gilbert Barton (Don Philps) and takes unexpected
time off from the wine bar.
By mid-1975 the show’s ratings had begun to decline to
alarming levels. In August 1975, just as the raft of new characters were
getting established, TV Week reported that the
show’s ratings had in preceding months dipped to as little as half what they
had been only 12 or 18 months before. Newspaper reports speculated that
several long-running characters including Dudley Butterfield, Vera Collins,
the Whittakers and the Sutcliffes
faced the axe - claims all vehemently denied by producer Bill Harmon. [154]
However ensuing storylines would reveal that there was some truth to these
rumours.
Keen to reverse the ratings decline, Harmon had called the
show’s writers together, ordering them to revamp the show and inject more drama
and cliffhanging situations. As had occurred during the Pantyhose Murderer
storyline, a blanket ban on visitors to the set was instituted in an attempt
to keep plot developments secret, and in an unprecedented step 40 completed
scripts were discarded and fully rewritten. Harmon insisted that these
rewrites were not to accommodate cast departures, but because a better
storyline had presented itself. [155]
The show’s big new revamp storyline would prove to be Number 96’s most famous incident: the bomb.
Apparently when ordered to rescue the series from ratings doldrums the
writers believed salvation would come with the sacrificial deaths of some
high-profile characters and the ensuing publicity that such a move would
generate, so they concocted a ‘Mad Bomber’ storyline to kill off some
expendable characters, and then set about debating who should be killed.
Their ultimate choices were extremely bold.
Certainly the bomb-blast episodes themselves were
well-executed. There’s much chaos in the building as Don and Dudley from flat
4 switch places with Lucy and Alf in flat 8 to save a pregnant Lucy climbing
all those stairs. With suspense building we see an unidentified assailant
planting a time-bomb in a carton of Spanish olives destined for the deli, constant
cuts to the bomb ticking away as various characters go about their daily
business, climactic shots within Vera’s deserted flat (she had been
unexpectedly called away on business) while the bomber’s warning note, which
has been slipped under her door, lies unread on the carpet. The note advised
that the bomb was set to explode at 6 p.m.
After much build-up the deli was finally blown up on
Friday night, September 5. Les finally discovered the note at 5:58 p.m., and
he ran down the building’s central stairway in an attempt to warn residents
of the bomb. During this climactic sequence, to emphasise the suspense we are
treated to an innovative four-way split screen showing Les on the stairs, the
bomb’s digital clock display, the crowded wine bar, and the deli.
After warning the shocked wine bar patrons Les runs into
the deli, and with Aldo and Roma serving customer Miles Cooper the bomb goes
off, causing a spectacular explosion. The episode ends with the closing
credits shown (without the usual backing music) over rather grim pans across
the devastated deli and wine bar strewn with smashed furniture and motionless
bodies.
After an excruciating three day wait, Monday’s episode
quickly revealed that Les, Aldo, Roma and Miles had all been killed. Norma
was severely injured, remaining in a coma for several episodes, though she
would eventually recover to continue in the series. The heavily-pregnant
Lucy, who had been upstairs in her flat, was uninjured but went into labour
and was rushed to hospital where she gave birth to a baby girl who would be
named Emma.
The aftermath of the explosion featured the brief
reappearance of Aldo’s long-departed daughter Rose Godolfus
(Vivienne Garrett) who clashed bitterly with Arnold Feather over his handling
of Aldo’s burial. Arnold
had arranged for Aldo and Roma to be buried within 24 hours of their death as
prescribed by their Jewish faith. Unfortunately the consequence of this was
that Rose, who had travelled from New Guinea after the explosion,
had been unable attend the funeral.
Jack Sellars (Tom Oliver) also
returned just long enough to uncover the identity of the mad bomber. Jack
suspected the culprit was a current resident of Number 96 (weren’t they
always?) so he arranged a party in his hotel suite for the surviving residents.
Apart from the apparent poor taste of holding a gay get-together while former
neighbours are being buried, Jack caused further angst by announcing that
some evidence pointing to the identity of the bomber existed at
Number 96 before making his excuses and abruptly leaving the party he
had arranged.
However it was all a cunning trap; Jack secretly made his
way to Number 96 and lay in wait to see who would come to check on the
“evidence”. Sure enough Jack soon discovered an intruder creeping through
flat 7...
...and it turned out that the Mad Bomber was none other
than the scheming Maggie Cameron. It transpired that Maggie was not trying to
kill anyone, she was only trying to scare the
residents away so as to secure a vacant possession sale of the building, and
thought a series of planted bombs would do the trick.
To ensure the building would be evacuated in time, Maggie
slipped a warning note (cunningly addressed to herself)
under the door of Vera’s flat, where Maggie had been staying until that
morning. Maggie believed Vera to be inside feverishly working on her fashion
layouts, not realising that she had in fact been called away, and so the note
remained unread until it was too late. With the revelation that Maggie was
the mad bomber she departed the series in a blaze of publicity, and another
great character bit the dust.
Just a few weeks after the bomb, in early October 1975,
Alf and Lucy Sutcliffe suffered a traumatic experience when their new baby,
Emma, was snatched from her pram which Alf briefly left in the street outside
a grocer’s shop. By the next episode the kidnapper, Stella (Anne Charleston),
was discovered threatening to throw Emma off a cliff. Alf and Lucy arrived at
the cliff where Lucy was able convince Stella to release Emma. After this experience
Alf and Lucy promptly left Number 96 and resettled in Perth, never to be seen in the series
again.
With these departures six major regular characters who had
been in the series for all or most of its run had disappeared. Now the stage
was set for an influx of diverse new characters and a new approach for the
series.
The episodes after the bombing immediately show the
program’s new style. Now individual scenes seem longer, and episodes have a
slower, more leisurely pace. While before there were many noisy, crowded and
chaotic scenes with action and differing conversations overlapping, now there
were fewer characters in each scene and overall the dialogue came out slower
and things seemed generally more sedate.
Storyline wise the comedy sketches were markedly toned
down. Now straight drama, romance and relationship storylines dominated the
show. Though Dorrie, Herb and Flo, and Mummy and
Daddy, carried on with their comedy scenes as before, with Les and Roma and
Aldo gone, these comedy characters were now more in the minority.
New storylines would focus on the romantic and personal
travails of the often rather flippant Prim who had begun working in the wine
bar and had quickly become a key figure in storylines. Gary Whitaker returns
and takes over the management role in the wine bar with military precision,
and makes his dislike of Dudley apparent.
Gary
becomes romantically interested in Prim who remains cool to his advances,
expecting to be wooed. When David’s mother Celia (Margaret Christensen)
briefly returns, Prim, who had carried a torch for David, is angered to learn
she is actually his wife not his mother. After that Prim shows much more
interest in Gary.
Meanwhile Dudley and Jaja revive their lusty and
forbidden affair which they keep secret from Dud’s lover Don.
Vera’s sumptuous fashion salon opens and becomes a new
location in the story. She soon moves in to Warwick’s vacant penthouse apartment while
Prim takes over flat 7. (The episode end credits now show both Vera and Prim
as being in flat 7.)
Yet more new characters are drafted in. Vera’s prim and
conservative seamstress Eileen Chester (played by Patti Crocker who had acted
in radio soap opera Blue Hills) and her daughters, sullen schoolgirl
Debbie Chester (Dina Mann) and her scheming and rather domineering older
sister Jane (Suzanne Church) move in to the flat vacated by the departed Alf
and Lucy. Debbie is introduced to heroin by a school friend Theresa (Julieanne Newbould), and soon
descends into the horrors of drug addiction.
Flo’s new friend was the loquacious, story-telling train
lover Arthur Partridge (Gordon Glenwright) who came
to Number 96 with a pet cockatoo and his model train set. Glenwright had previously played a gruff Scottish
handyman in Class of ‘74, and as that
series became Class of ‘75 and switched to comedy his character
seemed to be morphing into a Les Whittaker clone. In Number 96 Arthur’s
trains have soon taken over flat 3 and are used as a miniature food transport
service shuttling food from the kitchen to the dining table in the sort of
eccentric invention Les Whittaker would have loved.
Also introduced was Warwick’s
wife Muriel (enacted by Rowena Wallace showing her adroitness as an icy bitch
that would later become celebrated through her role in Sons and Daughters).
Muriel jousted with a shocked Vera who had assumed that Muriel approved of
her affair with Warwick.
In other developments sweet Liz Chalmers married Arnold Feather. They
redecorated the bombed deli and ran the business together and set up home in
flat 2. Flat 2 itself was also redecorated, and
Norma Whittaker even got a new, soft waves ash blond wig.
The late 1975 episodes present engaging drama and a nice
mix of new, varied characters and storylines. Despite this the fallout from
the bomb lingered, with some fans horrified by the level of violence of that
story and the abrupt departure of some of the show’s best loved favourites.
In October 1975 TV Week
reported that though the show’s ratings figures for the week which included
the bombing and its aftermath were up considerably on the figures for the
preceding weeks, the ratings quickly dropped off again after the boost, with
the show’s ratings again running well below their peak. Overall TEN was
placed as third in the ratings behind Channels Seven and Nine, a position it
had not occupied since Number 96 had
premiered. [156]
Though it remained on-air another two years, Number 96 never again achieved the high ratings of
before, and viewers began to drift away from the series. Producer Bill Harmon
later regretted the cast-decimating bomb blast, admitting that he had
panicked at the show’s drop in ratings and had acted in haste.
“I had just returned from overseas to find that the
ratings had dropped dramatically. So we decided that there should be a
gigantic blow-up and that way we would get rid of those characters for whom we were finding it difficult to write. For instance
it was becoming very hard to sustain the bickering between Aldo and Roma. We
were searching around each week for sillier and sillier ideas to involve Les
Whittaker and the character was simply becoming unreal. So we got rid of
these three plus Maggie Cameron and Miles Cooper, during, or as a sequel to,
the explosion. In hindsight, it was a stupid move. I killed off too many
characters too quickly. But it’s done now and we are stuck with it.” [157]
Indeed the loss of so many long running favourites in one
go was a jarring change in the series. Miles Cooper, a relatively minor
short-term character, seemed to be the only disposable character of the
bunch. Later deli scenes with various other characters operating the business
never quite shined as they had before and Les Whittaker, in particular, was
sorely missed. At least Maggie had not been killed allowing the possibility
of her returning for guest appearances in the show, something that would
indeed happen in June 1976 and for the show’s closing episodes.
Of the bombing, Aldo’s portrayer Johnny Lockwood admitted
that “Naturally I wasn’t happy. I was very sorry to be out of it.” [158]
The show’s script editor Johnny Whyte, in June 1976, told TV Week
that “it had to be done.” Johnny Whyte reported that:
“I really hate telling an actor that he’s going to be
written out and in this case it was particularly hard as I love the Les
Whittaker character, but a lot of people had started to say they were
beginning to dislike the character and it seemed the right thing to do at the
time. Now I’m not so sure. Les and Norma were ideal together and I sometimes
feel that something is lacking without him.” [159]
When Number 96 returned for
1976 there were further changes. Most obviously the show switched from
screening five half-hour episodes a week to two one-hour episodes, which
aired on consecutive week nights (The Box had
switched from five half-hours a week to screening as one-hour instalments in
1975). This new arrangement, with its reduced weekly output, would remain
until the end of the series.
Producer Bill Harmon explained the benefits of the new
format to TV Week.
“It gives us a number of advantages. Firstly, we have to
provide only two cliff-hangers a week instead of five. Secondly the longer
format will mean less scenes thereby leading to greater development for each
character at a more leisurely and realistic pace. I felt that we were
pressuring too much with five episodes a week. It was not only pressuring the
audience but it was pressuring the actors and writers with five cliff-hanger
situations each week.” [160]
Harmon also noted that the new format will “allow us to do
a lot more exterior filming and we will now spend one day a week shooting
outdoors to give the series a new look”. [161]
Late 1975 had seen an increase in the number of scenes shot outdoors, and the
1976 episodes began to utilise outdoor filming to a far greater extent than
ever before. [162]
At times the real building used to represent
Number 96 - actually located at 83 Moncur Street,
Woollahra - would now be used as a filming location for scenes occurring on
the street outside Number 96. (In one episode of this period Arnold
Feather was heard to discuss a delayed deli delivery and mentioned what was
happening over at “Number 83”.)
The “Sunshine Patio” (basically the cleared-out backyard of
Number 96) was a new recurring location. Scenes set there were shot
outdoors in a small enclosed area that indeed looked just like an inner city
backyard. Special storylines would also feature sections of location footage.
A few months after the broadcast of the bomb storyline,
producer Bill Harmon had conceded that killing off so many characters in one
go had been a major mistake. At that time he also admitted that “we had too
many people in the show last year. Our biggest problem was finding new characters
that could run a long time. So we had a lot of chopping and changing and that
didn’t help.” [163]
Unfortunately the constant cast changes continued and the last
two years of the series are characterised by a high turnover of various new
characters, most of whom fail to last out the
series.
Liz was revealed as a deceitful schemer who was actually
trying to poison her husband Arnold, and she was ultimately packed off to
prison. Eileen was reunited with her estranged husband Ian (Stuart Finch)
before both characters were devoured by a shark (!) in a storyline devised as
a send-up of film Jaws. The now orphaned Debbie and
Jane Chester remained in flat 4 and continued as key characters in the
series. Warwick and Vera parted company; Warwick was out of the storyline and Vera
returned to flat 7.
David Palmer and Prim Primrose and Arthur Partridge had
also disappeared while yet more new characters were introduced. Just prior to
their deaths Aldo and Roma had caught young orphan Kerry Braddon (Ashley
Grenville) shoplifting in the deli, and they subsequently had made plans to
adopt him. After their deaths Kerry became Arnold’s ward and moved in to
Number 96, living with Arnold and Dudley who now shared flat 6.
Sophisticated solicitor Laura Trent (Mary Ann Severne) moved in with Don and they became close friends
and business colleagues. Meanwhile Norma’s new love interest for a time was
garbage collector Weppo Smith (Roger Ward). Gary organised Weppo’s transformation into a professional wrestler with
a penchant for quoting Shakespeare in the ring, with little Herb Evans as Weppo’s trainer.
The biggest cast departure of 1976 was that of the highly
popular original cast member Elaine Lee. After four and a half years of
failed love affairs, as Lee told TV Week, the
producers of the series “felt the character of Vera needed a rest and I
couldn’t agree more. There was very little for Vera to do. She had done so
many things, been through so many emotions and had so many things done to
her.” [164]
In the story Vera Collins was married in June 1976 and
went off to live in Europe. Unfortunately
the producers had not seemed to recognise that as “everyone’s friend”, the
character had seemed to sit at the heart of the show, and one of Vera’s key
functions in the series had been to somehow hold all the disparate characters
together. Her departure would leave visible gap in the ensemble.
As Number 96 chalked-up 1000 episodes,
ready to take over flat 7 was the family of Reg’s
newly introduced sister, the conscientious Fay Chandler (Lynne Murphy). With
an out of work husband Bernard (James Moss) engaging in earnest discussions
about current politics and the economy, and teenage sons Grant (Michael
Howard) and Lee (Stephen McDonald) who deceived their parents by neglecting
their studies, Fay had little to laugh about. Grant hustled cash from anyone
silly enough to part with it - including a smitten Don - while Lee tried his
luck with Laura Trent. Like the Chester
family, the parents were apparently deemed surplus to requirement and
ultimately dispensed with. Bernard moved away before being killed off and Fay
was sent to a mental asylum, and the focus was shifted to Grant and Lee.
Meanwhile Italian Carlo Lenzi
(played by suave international film actor Joseph Fürst)
and his son Giovanni (Harry Michaels) took over running the deli and faced
the difficult task of gaining a following what with the unceremonious way in
which their predecessors had been removed from the series. Stereotypically
Italian and a modern-day Chico Marx, Giovanni’s main schtick
involved his eager-to-please clumsiness.
Giovanni’s awkward and amusing attempts to incorporate
“everyday” Australian idiom into his vocabulary (“Oh stone da crows!”) somehow seemed similar to a couple of earlier
characters in the series. Funny that. Meanwhile dashing Carlo romanced Norma
Whittaker but was eventually succeeded in the deli by Giovanni’s comically
fiery Aunt Maria Panucci (Arianthe
Galani). The comedy duo of Giovanni and Maria would
last out the series.
Meanwhile the jiggling Jaja
Gibson had clearly succeeded in turning a few heads, successfully outliving
the other characters introduced at the time she had joined the series. By mid
1976 Jaja was working with Dudley and the newly
introduced Miss Rhonda (Justine Saunders) in Dudley’s
new hairdressing salon. Rhonda was a beautiful aboriginal hairdresser who
would become embroiled in a love triangle with Dudley Butterfield and Arnold
Feather, and would then be raped by the Hooded Rapist as part of the show’s
latest whodunit storyline.
Despite initial publicity surrounding Rhonda’s arrival
that expected protests over the planned inter-racial love scenes and near
nudity involving the character, Rhonda would be abruptly written out of the
series once her portrayer’s initial contract expired. In announcing the
departure TV Week alluded to the unexpected
nature of the decision to write Rhonda out of the show. Justine Saunders’
quoted comments in the article added to the intrigue.
“I don’t know where you heard about it, but yes, I
suppose you could say it’s true but I shouldn’t really say anything about it
at all. Naturally I’m very disappointed by the decision. I don’t know what
they have in mind for me - whether they plan to bring me back or whether I’ll
be out for good.” [165]
Rhonda’s storyline had involved the formerly camp movie
fan Dudley Butterfield in a heterosexual love triangle. Both Harmon and Whyte
later recalled that one of their greatest regrets was allowing gay Dudley to turn bi-sexual, in the hope that giving him a
female love interest would broaden his appeal with viewers. [166]
The character of Jaja had also
been written out the series at the time with her portrayer Anya Saleky also given notice earlier the same month. The
official reason stated was that scriptwriters had run out of ideas for the
character. [167]
(A few weeks after the announced departures of Rhonda and Jaja
the TV Week gossip column
On the Grape Vine suggested that one of the recent cast axings came after an unnamed actress in the serial
required 17 takes to get one of her scenes right.)
After Jaja’s long run producer
Bill Harmon in October 1976 described to TV Week
the search for a replacement sex symbol.
“I never thought I would say it but I believe that the
days of total nudity on television are just about through. A few years ago
the shock value of nudity dragged the huge audiences. You only have to look
back on the early days of Number 96 to realise
that. But there has been so much nudity on television that the shock value
has just about gone. That is why we may not necessarily be insisting that the
girl chosen as the new sex symbol should have to shed all her clothes.” [168]
According to the report, the series had recently reduced
the number of sex scenes - partly due to the difficulty in finding the right
girl to radiate sexuality.
“We are desperate to find someone who radiates sex appeal
even when she is fully dressed. It’s not enough that she has to be attractive.
She could be sensationally attractive yet not project sex appeal. And it
doesn’t follow that she has to be an experienced actress. Good actresses
don’t necessarily project a sexy image. There must be some magic about her -
and that magic is damned hard to find. A few years ago we had it with
Abigail. She was able to project that magic but we really haven’t been able
to capture it since.” [169]
These comments came as a prelude to a nationwide search
for the right girl to become the show’s new sex symbol. By this stage, not
all actresses joining the series had a nude clause in their contracts.
“I’m not insistent these days about actresses having to
strip. When they first join the company I always ask them whether stripping
bothers them. If it does I point out that they would only be asked to strip
if it was essential to the script - not just for the sake of taking their
clothes off.” [170]
Harmon also described the program’s planned new youth
focus.
“There will be more stories of appeal to younger viewers
and we are already working on some of these scripts.” [Of the mid 1975
ratings slump, ratings had by then] “recovered to a
satisfactory level. We made changes to the show this year which worked well.
We did more filming outdoors and all of this filming had a point to it. We
just didn’t show cars going down streets. And the series was lengthened to an
hour and shown twice a week instead of five half hours a week. Segments
became longer, and this, plus the extra half hour we gained each week by
switching to the hour format, enabled us to spend more time on production. It
showed. We are the only locally produced dramatic series on commercial
networks which has been a ratings success this year.” [171]
Meanwhile the departure of Les had sparked an outcry from
viewers of the series and after the deluge of complaints,
the show’s makers had a rethink about their decision to kill off the
character. So twelve months after the bomb Gordon McDougall was returned to
the show playing Les’s long-lost look-alike brother Andrew, the Earl of McCraddanow (a tongue-twisting name reportedly invented
by the show’s then production manager, Paul Seto).
For his new character Andrew the Scottish McDougall spoke with a slowed-down
version of an old-fashioned East of Scotland accent and grew a beard, which
was specially dyed for that grey streak look. [172]
Andrew proved to be somewhat unlike the popular Les having
been devised as a stereotypical penny-pinching Scot, though he had a similar
warm and friendly manner. Aside from the beard McDougall now had a different
hairstyle and wore the smarter Tweeds of a distinguished Dandy, making him
also seem somewhat a clone of the recent Arthur Partridge character, a
train-loving eccentric who had a similar smart wardrobe and grey-streaked
beard.
Like Arthur, Andrew moved in to flat 3. In the flat Andrew
took the place of Flo, who had married Sir William Mainwaring (Les Foxcroft) and moved to Point Pipier for a time. Flo was
now credited in the centre corridor spot reserved for guest characters and
recurring actors whose character did not reside at Number 96. Thankfully
popular Flo fell into the latter category, remaining a lead character in the
program’s storylines.
Gordon McDougall summarised his activities away from Number 96 for TV Week.
“When I was written out I was disappointed, but the long
run in the show had allowed me to put a bit aside so it wasn’t as if I was
suddenly destitute. And I had plenty of notice to organise other things - a
season with the South Australian theatre Company first then various bits and
pieces in television and the movies. I finished up my spell out of the show
with a season at the Old Tote here in Sydney
so I was never unemployed.” [173]
Unfortunately the depiction of Andrew as a mysterious and
apparently sinister character who was diametrically opposed to loveable Les,
and who neither looked nor sounded like him, seemed to defeat the purpose of
having Gordon McDougall back in the series. But nevertheless it was good to
see him back. In any event Andrew never really caught on and was written out
of the show after six months.
As part of the drastic revamp of the series for 1976
Johnny Whyte switched from acting as story editor of Number 96
to a new role developing new projects, and he enlisted Joel Kane, top US
comedy and soap opera writer, as a special writing consultant on Number 96 and to help develop new projects. [174]
Back on Number 96, story editor duties would
now be handled by Ross Napier. [175]
It was decided to spin-off various characters from Number 96 into their own series, and by the end of
1976 pilot episodes for these speculative new projects were shot. The footage
from all these pilots went to air, cunningly incorporated into episodes of Number 96. Proposed spin-offs included a gritty
60-minute legal drama entitled A Law To Himself
in which Joe Hasham would reprise the role of Don
Finlayson... except rumour had it that in this new show the character would
no longer be gay.
Joe Hasham’s co-stars in the
series would be fellow Number 96 actors Dina
Mann and Suzanne Church who played sisters Debbie and Jane Chester. In A Law To Himself they would act as Don’s
assistants. [176]
The other spin-offs were all planned as 30-minute
situation comedies. Mummy and Me starred
those popular Number 96 stalwarts Mike Dorsey
and Wendy Blacklock in a series following Reg MacDonald’s misadventures as an advertising executive
with he and wife Edie living in the penthouse apartment above the office. Mummy and Me would also feature the returning
Nigel Morgan (John Allen), seen in Number 96
as Reg’s work colleague at the TH who boarded in
flat 5 for two lengthy stints where his boisterous manner usually upset
regimented Reg’s routine.
Then there was Fair Game, a
saucy comedy about three divorced women sharing a Kirribilli flat. The cast
included Elaine Lee returning as Vera, with Lynette Curran and Abigail
playing her flatmates. With Abigail’s original Number 96
character Bev earlier transformed into Victoria Raymond and then killed off,
she here portrays a new character named Eve, a sexually aggressive playgirl
who Vera had befriended in Europe. Their
co-star Lynette Curran was known for her long running role of the sexy Rhoda
in Bellbird,
and had appeared nude in the 1973 sex comedy film Alvin Purple.
Here her character, Samantha Minerver, is a straitlaced recent divorcée intent only on reviving her
marriage.
Also in the Fair Game pilot
footage was Peter Flett, who previously portrayed
Marilyn MacDonald’s beau Michael Bartlett in 1974. Here he would play Joe Minerver, the womanising ex-husband of Samantha who falls
into a sexy trap laid by Eve. Presumably intended as regular character for Fair Game was Vera’s houseboy, the monolithic blond
bodybuilder Hans Schmidt (Horst Pladdies). As Hans
learned English from Australian wharfies his few
English phrases are rather crude, with his standard greeting being “You getting any?” His general ineptitude with the language
meant his dialogue usually consisted of a few short repeated phrases, and
grunts.
Finally Hope’ll Help would have featured Chelsea Brown, the former
star of US
sketch comedy series Laugh In and now a
regular fixture on Australian television variety and panel shows. In the
spin-off Brown would continue her newly introduced Number 96
character, vivacious American singer and all-round do-gooder Hope Jackson, in
her new job working for a small telephone answering service.
The footage from all pilots went to air within standard
episodes of Number 96 where it was spliced in
with the show’s usual day-to-day action. Most of the pilot footage went to
air in late 1976 episodes while the Hope’ll Help segments were seen in April 1977.
In his TV Week column,
Terry Fetherston would later reflect on the quality
of the four spin-off pilots. He commended Mummy and Me
for being funny and for being sufficiently different from Number 96
to allow the series to work, while singling-out for praise the strong
performance of John Ewart, who plays the harassed
chief of the advertising agency. [177]
However Fetherston deemed Fair Game the best of the pilots. He noted that
“Abigail is the surprise packet of the pilot and proves that, given the
chance, she is a most competent actress with a flair for comedy”. Also
commended is actor Terry O’Neill, with his character described as an
“excellent foil for the divorcees in the role of the prissy and distinctly
square landlord”. [178]
Of A Law To Himself
Fetherston praises the “tension, the tight story,
believable dialogue, and a good performance by Joe Hasham”.
However, he ultimately judges the idea to suffer from an “identity crisis”,
and detects problems in the transformation of “gentle, tormented homosexual
lawyer Don Finlayson into an aggressive legal crusader operating outside the
confines of his profession and, presumably, heterosexual into the bargain”. [179]
Sadly Hope’ll Help is deemed unfunny. While its star Chelsea
Brown is praised for her good acting and talent for comedy, Fetherston feels that this show, lacking as it does much
in the way of action, is not the vehicle for her. [180]
Unfortunately the characters seemed unable to make the
successful transfer to another genre. Outside the familiar formula and
framework of Number 96 where they had originally
been developed, the characters and the comedy surrounding them did not seem
to work.
In the case of Fair Game,
the bedroom farce antics seemed more silly than funny. Also, the
transformation of Vera to a flippantly lascivious and witty wise cracker -
though well played - was a bit of a stretch. Despite this, Abigail is great
fun, gives a good performance, and looks fantastic in the footage.
Neither the broadcasts of the pilot footage within Number 96 episodes nor the special presentations to
the Networks and the press after Number 96
ended provoked much interest. Sadly none of the spin-off ideas got off the
ground.
In November 1976 Abigail discussed with TV Week the circumstances of her return to Number 96 for the Fair Game
footage.
“A few months ago Bill Harmon asked me if I would
consider going back into Number 96. I refused
the offer. I felt the two and a half [sic] years I played Bev Houghton was
long enough to be tied to one thing - even though, of course, I would be coming
back as a different character. So Bill went away and came back with the idea
of the spin-off series, with me playing an entirely different sort of
character - an older lady, more mature than Bev was, and with more brains I
suppose. This time I was interested. The idea appealed to me because there
were elements of comedy in it and I felt the character, Eve, was so very
different to Bev Houghton.” [181]
At the time Abigail also reflected on her overnight firing
from Number 96 in 1973.
“There were problems and something had to give. Without
going in to details it was me who had to go. And overnight Vicki Raymond came
in as Bev Houghton. Poor love, I didn’t envy her having to take over a role
like that. It must have been terribly difficult taking over an established
character. But it had been done in series such as Peyton Place
and viewers accepted it in time. But any bitterness there might have been,
either on my part or from elsewhere, ended a long time ago. I first worked
with them again on the 1000th episode special Cash Harmon made and
I suppose that was an indication that the hatchet had been completely buried.
It felt a little strange going back to the studio - but at the same time it
was nice.” [182]
Abigail said that while she missed the limelight after
first leaving Number 96, she didn’t miss her
original character who was prim and flirty and yet secretly a virgin afraid
of sex.
“The character of Bev Houghton was really quite
ridiculous and completely unbelievable. Surely nobody is quite like she was.
That’s why I was so interested in the spin-off idea. Eve is so different to
Bev - a very self-confident lady, very self-assured - and I’m sure she would
be much more fun to play in a series.” [183]
By 1977 the ratings of Number 96
had fallen further, and the time slot changes made the previous year had not
helped. In March 1977 emergency meetings between producer Bill Harmon and
Channel Ten executives were held to decide the show’s future, and at that
time Harmon announced that unless the show’s ratings improved significantly
within a few weeks production on the series would end. [184]
The pragmatic imperatives of the production were clear in Bill Harmon’s
comments to TV Week.
“I’ve always said that if our average rating got down to
a 16 I’d think very seriously about the future. Well, as you know, our figures have got below that mark and now is the time to
have a good hard look at the situation.” [185]
At the time it was no secret that the program’s popularity
was on the wane, and there was much media speculation about the show’s future
and reports of its declining fortunes. Press reports following the
appointment of new Ten Sydney general manager Ian Kennon
noted that in future all Number 96 scripts
would be closely vetted by the station. Bill Harmon was quick to reply that
these reports were misleading. “That’s exactly what has been happening all
along. The scripts have always gone to the station for approval before
production starts,” he said. “These reports make it sound like something
new.” [186]
Bill Harmon at the time observed that ratings fluctuations
were a fact of television life, noting that “We’ve had our ups and downs
several times over the years and each time we’ve come back. Every series goes
through periods like that and we’ve been no exception.” Harmon reported that
at this time, the ratings dip was something experienced across all Network
Ten shows, not just Number 96. “I’m very
optimistic about the future. We’re bringing in a whole line-up of new
characters and new situations which will give the show a whole new look and a
new feel.” [187]
True to Harmon’s word there were several changes and new
developments in the series. Publicity described yet another “new look” for
the show, while Network Ten gave assurances that the show has “improved out
of sight”. [188]
Meanwhile several long running characters were to be written out of the
series. Norma Whittaker, Gary Whittaker, Andrew Whittaker, Lee Chandler,
Laura Trent, and Flo’s new husband Sir William Mainwaring were all slated to
go. Their portrayers were in late 1976 given notice that their contracts
would not be renewed. [189]
What with the thinning of familiar faces in the cast, the
producers were lucky enough to re-establish Point Piper socialite Lady Claire
Houghton in the series. A highly popular semi-regular during the show’s early
years, Thelma Scott reprised the role making many appearances during the
show’s final months in which Claire acted as Svengali
to her young boy-toy Grant Chandler, attempting to arrange a singing career
and television stardom for the young gigolo.
Meanwhile the wonderful Marilyn MacDonald (Frances
Hargreaves) who had left the series in June 1975, also returned, playing a
key role in the show’s storylines for the final few months. As reported by TV Week Hargreaves had been one of the show’s most popular
characters in her day, receiving hundreds of fan letters each week.
Hargreaves seemed happy and enthusiastic about her return.
“I think it’s marvellous, I’m happy about it and really
looking forward to starting work. When I was written out Marilyn was sent on
holiday to Spain.
I don’t know how she’ll be written back in. I’ll just have to wait and see -
just like everyone else. [190]
Don and Dudley, who had long since split, remained friends
while Don took up with a new boyfriend, American architect Rob Forsyth (John McTernan). Unfortunately a scheming Jane Chester set her
sights on Rob, and made several attempts to seduce him and to break up his
relationship with Don. Dudley meanwhile
briefly became a television star until he was fired from the network due to
interference from Claire Houghton.
Meanwhile Arnold Feather temporarily departed and was
replaced by his ocker, womanising twin brother Chook Feather, also played by
Jeff Kevin. Chook had Aunt Maria in romantic pursuit while saving his serious
romantic attentions for young Debbie Chester.
The resultant episodes did seem rather eccentric. Veteran
comedy characters Dorrie and Flo and Mummy and
Daddy MacDonald continued their vaudeville antics while the intervening
dramatic storylines hit new heights of shock and violence. Dispensed with was
the location film work. Outdoor
street scenes set outside Number 96 would
again be shot on the studio set representing the building frontage. In the
title and credits sequences the filmed shot of the building taken for the
1973 feature film version of the serial would be replaced by a water colour
painting of the building.
Duddles Disco
In perhaps the silliest change, Norma’s Bar was closed and
replaced by Duddles Disco. Opened by Dudley
Butterfield in partnership with Lee Chandler, the disco featured ghastly
disco covers and even worse decor which included what seemed to be a large
urinal fitted above the bar.
In conjunction with the disco came the addition of
American actor and television comedienne Chelsea Brown to the cast. TV Scene reported that Brown’s arrival was part of
the show’s “new young image in a determined bid to boost ratings and win over
a younger audience.” The wine bar would turn “swinging”, said the report, and
several regulars including Norma Whittaker would be “phased out for short
periods.” Brown would also sing in the series, and was reportedly just one of
“several new young regulars introducing more comedy to the series”. A few
nude scenes were reportedly planned for 1977 too,
however these would be “just glimpses – to keep audiences guessing”. [191]
With appearances in the film Sweet Charity (1969) and
a regular role in comedy series Laugh In under her belt, Brown’s credentials for the “swinging”
comedy role certainly seemed in order. In her role of American singer Hope
Jackson, Brown indeed brightens things up with her vivacious personality.
Along with cast member Michael Howard she would occasionally take to the tiny
stage in the disco to belt out bouncy love songs or slow ballads.
Aside from these performances, other disco music was
provided by The Executives (a band that also performed the highly catchy
theme for series The Young Doctors).
Various tracks performed by The Executives, Chelsea Brown and Michael Howard
would subsequently be featured on a spin-off record album.
Producer Bill Harmon explained the changes to the series
to TV Scene.
“We’ll be adding some new faces - people on the fringe,
rather than residents of the apartment. Number 96
isn’t going disco, though. There will be a swinging
wine bar and comedy characters – audiences get tired of too many hard
stories.” [192]
The report also noted that falling ratings for Number 96 had worried executives for some time.
Harmon said that Number 96 “lives and dies by
its ratings. After five years it is still in the top 10 in Sydney, but there is no way we could
maintain the enormous audience we had at the beginning. The other channels
have been fighting like hell to knock us off.” Harmon agreed that 1977 was a
crucial year for the series and that Number 96
would ultimately run its course, “but while we maintain our ratings, we can
continue.” [193]
The show’s makers hedged their bets of course; despite the
infusion of new younger characters and hip new elements, those highly popular
pensioners Dorrie and Flo retained their major
roles in the series. However, seeing them uncomfortably perched in the disco
sipping orange juice amongst the flashing lights seemed wildly incongruous.
With Norma and the wine bar phased-out of the series,
actor Gordon McDougall found himself written out of Number 96
for the second time. His original character Les Whittaker had been killed-off
in the bomb blast, after which the producers quickly realised it had been a
mistake to get rid of him. So, in September 1976, Gordon McDougall was
brought back as Les’s long lost look-alike brother Andrew, who formed a close
association with Les’s widow Norma. Gordon McDougall faced his second
departure with equanimity.
“The character apparently didn’t work and with Sheila
Kennelly (Norma Whittaker) being written out and the wine bar changing into a
disco there really wasn’t any room for me in the show. These things happen in
the television business and I can’t question the decision. But I can’t really
see myself working there again. What would they do with me?” [194]
Of her impending departure Sheila Kennelly told TV Scene that “We were just dispensable. That was
that, darling. The location of the wine bar was ideal for the discotheque.
They want to give Number 96 a younger image.”
Gordon McDougall and Sheila Kennelly finished work on the series in February
1977 with their exits seen in episodes screened in Sydney two months later. [195]
During early 1977 series creator and writer David Sale was
absent for some time while travelling overseas. When he returned he saw
several changes in the series that he thought were ill-advised. In the 2006
documentary Number 96: The Later Years,
Sale reported
that he objected to the increased levels of violence in the series. Sale named Dudley’s
heterosexual liaisons and the transformation of the wine bar into Duddles Disco as especially silly mistakes.
Aside from prompting the departure of two highly popular
cast members, having a suburban disco as the show’s primary meeting place for
its range of different characters seemed ridiculous, and the spin off pop
music album released to tie in with the disco was hardly a chart topper. The
silly disco idea was well and truly sunk less than three months later with
the departure of Dudley from the series,
when actor Chard Hayward decided to leave the show. Poor Dudley
would be machine gunned to death during a hostage drama within Duddles Disco in June 1977, just two months before the
show’s demise.
Chook Feather then found himself with far greater problems
than fending off an amorous Aunt Maria. After attacking a bikie who had
insulted Giovanni, Chook found himself on the receiving end of torture and
torment at the hands of a gang of vengeful Nazi bikers.
Unfortunately the Nazi bikers
storyline backfired badly on the makers of the show when several members of Sydney motorcycle gangs
took exception to the portrayal, and executives of the show were in fear of
reprisals after receiving what were interpreted as veiled threats.
In the storyline Giovanni is crucified by the biker gang,
and later Chook Feather is tied to a stake and a fire lit around him.
According to TV Week these scenes, along with
the overall portrayal of the bikers as brutal sadists, provoked complaints
from the Bikers’ Brotherhood of New South Wales, as well as from general
viewers who considered the scenes to be unnecessarily violent.
Actor Harry Michaels who, as
Giovanni, had already been crucified by bikers in the show, soon received a
visit from some local bikies who complained to him about the media giving all
bikers a bad name. “They said that by making the bikie gang on Number 96 excessively violent we were only making
the image of bikies worse,” He told TV Week.
Michaels advised the bikers that they should direct their concerns to the
producers of the show, and soon afterwards a member of the brotherhood
arrived at the offices of Cash-Harmon, presenting executives with a letter of
complaint. [196]
The producers ultimately agreed for a disclaimer to be
read at the beginning of four episodes of Number 96.
The disclaimer reiterated that all Number 96
storylines are purely fictional and not based on real people or events. It
also specifically apologised to the Bikers’ Brotherhood for the portrayal of
the bikie gang. [197]
This last-ditch revamp also entailed an influx of new
characters to hopefully help freshen-up the show. Edie MacDonald’s
psychiatrist Dr Harold Wilkinson (Dave Allenby) moved in to flat 7, setting
up consulting rooms there. Harold was pursued by a love-struck Marilyn and
had his hard-living granny Opal (Nat Nixon) as boarder. A drinker and
gambler, Opal was always luring the residents of Number 96 into card
games and lottery draws, which quickly led to an on-going feud with a
disapproving Dorrie.
In other developments Marilyn was bound to a bed clad only
in black knickers while an apparently kinky attacker Manuel (played by Elaine
Lee’s ex-husband Garth Meade), whips out a torch and magnifying glass, slips
down her panties, and takes a peek at her bottom. As Marilyn later informs
the police, Manuel’s weapon was “big and black and it had a magnet on the
side”. It is later revealed that Manuel was searching for the number of a
Swiss Bank account which was reputedly tattooed on Marilyn’s bottom.
Then a jealous Claire Houghton takes some racist pot shots
at the African-American Hope Jackson who has been spending too much time with
Claire’s young chauffer Grant Chandler. Claire finally realises her ambitions
to seduce Grant, but feeling remorse the next morning seeks the advice of Dr
Harold Wilkinson, before firing Grant, who tells her to rot in hell.
And what of Dorrie and Flo? Well
with Herb away on a lengthy overseas tour they discovered oil in the back
yard of Number 96 and attempted to take out mineral rights with a shyster
lawyer. Meanwhile in flat 5, Mummy and Marilyn struggled to keep secret the
news that Reg was soon to receive a knighthood, or
so they thought.
A new whodunit storyline was launched when Jane, Rob and Claire
all receive poison-pen letters. Various characters attempt to deduce the
identity of the anonymous author. Don lashes out at Debbie after deciding she
has written the letters. Claire accuses Dr. Harold of writing them, and he in
turn accuses his granny Opal of listening at the door to hear the various
secrets revealed by his patients, causing Opal to have a heart attack.
Ultimately, Rob received a blackmail demand and went to
the designated motel room to make payment. There, in the episode’s cliff-hanger,
he was seen to angrily confront the blackmailer…
…in the next episode it is revealed that Rob has
confronted his own alternate, evil personality in the mirror. Revealed as the
psychotic blackmailer with a split personality, Rob subsequently sent Don to
a motel room for a blackmail payment of his own, having set a rifle to fire
on who ever opened the door. However the scheme did not run as planned and
Rob accidentally fell victim to his own booby trap.
However the most famous 1977 development was the nude
antics of Harold’s patient Miss Hemingway (Deborah Gray), who shocked many of
the residents with her habit of not wearing any clothes at all. Bill Harmon
had previously announced the show’s new sex symbol would only need to radiate
sex appeal and not necessarily go nude. Apparently the show’s makers had been
unable to find the right girl, or perhaps the viewing figures had prompted a
panic response? In any event with ratings in decline the makers of the show
had gone back to the original selling point of Number 96
and returned sex and nudity to the series. [198]
Miss Hemingway’s schtick
featured her slinking into Harold’s consulting rooms in an expensive mink
coat, which she soon slipped off to reveal that she wore nothing at all underneath.
The scenes would showcase full frontal nudity in a big way,
however the storyline was played for comedy rather than titillation. In the
story, as Miss Hemingway’s treatment progressed, the mink would be slipped
off to each time reveal that she had added an article of clothing. She
gradually became fully clothed.
Deborah Gray’s unveiling was publicised as being Australia’s
first ever full frontal television nude scene, and she has gone down in the
Australian TV history books as holding that honour. Officially, a distant
skinny dipper had been glimpsed in police drama Matlock Police,
male and female naturalists were shown full frontally nude in wide shot in
the nudist retreat episode of The Box in May
1976, while a bit part actress fleeing Dudley’s burning bedroom had already
revealed a brief frontal flash when her towel slipped in Number 96
in November 1976.
Nevertheless the uninterrupted views of Gray’s anatomy
were the first time full nudity was displayed front and centre in mid shot on
Australian television. Rather than a quick flash Miss Hemingway would parade
around nude for an entire scene. She would be shown in medium and mid shot,
and the nudity was the focal point of her character.
Soon other characters were getting in on the act. Within a
week’s worth of episodes that first aired in early June 1977 viewers were
treated to more female full frontal nudity, and full
male nudity too. Giovanni’s latest conquest Candy provided yet another
glimpse of full female nudity after Aunt Maria unexpectedly returned home in
a bedroom farce comedy sequence. Meanwhile when Jane Chester became a
prostitute and was horrified when her client was revealed to be
recently-arrived fellow Number 96 resident Toby Buxton (Malcolm
Thompson) expecting to be whipped, viewers finally saw full frontal male
nudity in the series, albeit in a split-second flash.
The show’s earlier nude scenes had always caused the
Channel Ten switchboard to light up with viewers calling to complain,
unfortunately Miss Hemingway’s full-frontal strips, calculated to bring some
much needed controversy and interest to the fast-fading series, provoked just
three complaints. [199]
Was it because viewers had become blasé after so many years of nude glimpses?
Was it because the nudity worked as crucial element of the storyline and was
effectively deployed in a comedic manner, with viewers accepting the comedy
of the situation? Or was no one watching - or caring - any more?
Ian Kennon, the then general
manager of Channel Ten in Sydney,
conceded the change in public taste.
“When a bare breast was shown on Number 96
five years ago, we got two-hundred complaints, but now, when we show
full-frontal nudity, we get only four or five complaints. We have told our
producers the era of nudity is over. It attracts no more complaints, so what
is the use of showing it?” [200]
It was true that the show’s ratings were well down. Though
the Miss Hemingway storyline reportedly resulted in an increase in ratings in
most areas, continued low ratings in the crucial Melbourne market sealed the fate of the
series. [201]
Herb Evans returned in time to witness one of Miss
Hemingway’s final unveilings, and a final raft of new characters was
introduced. Derek Costa (Stephen O’Rourke) was a policeman who becomes Don’s
flatmate and is dubbed a hero for his actions during the siege in which Dudley was killed. Leaving the force he subsequently
worked as Don’s assistant in his new Private Investigating business.
Also introduced was Derek’s girlfriend, travel agent Ros Halliday (played by
Johnny’s daughter Joanna Lockwood) who Jane became sexually attracted to. The
mysterious student Toby Buxton moved in and soon befriended Debbie. Then
future A Country Practice star Shane Porteous came in as a leader of a religious cult.
Later Joanna Lockwood would describe her six-week stint
during the dying days of the series.
“The show was going through its death rattles at the
time, and nobody seemed to care much so long as I said my lines and didn’t
bump into the furniture. I had 70 scenes during that six weeks’ work - and 68
of them were rehashing the same dialogue, trying to persuade my policeman
‘husband’ to give up the force.” [202]
Well if nothing else at least such scenes got her into
shape for playing policeman’s wife Valerie against Peter Adams in Cop Shop.
Despite the continued efforts to revamp Number 96, in late April 1977 declining ratings
finally resulted in the cancellation of the series.
At the time TV Week had
reported that though the recent revamp and reintroduction of nudity had
improved the show’s viewing figures in most areas, in Melbourne the ratings remained low. TV Week surmised that the Melbourne ratings could lead to the show
being dropped in that city. Without screenings in Melbourne, the series would no longer be
viable for the network. Earlier that month the show had been renewed for 13
weeks, and TV Week had suggested that this
might be the program’s final renewal. [203]
On the weekend of 23 April 1977 the decision was made to
cancel the serial due to poor ratings in most capital cities, particularly Melbourne. The cast were
informed of the cancellation on the show’s set at lunchtime on the Monday. [204]
Said cast member Pat McDonald:
“I shall miss it desperately. It’s like the family’s
grown up and splitting up. […] There was a tremendous silence when they told
us.” [205]
The final episode was taped in Sydney on Friday, 15 July 1977. [206]
The finale went to air in Sydney
on 11 August 1977. With episodes now going out in Melbourne at the reduced rate of one hour a
week, it was not seen there until 22 December that year.
Audiences had apparently tired of the sexy drama mixed
with vaudevillian comedy and touches of melodrama, and attempts to shift the
emphasis onto young and funky newcomers had failed. Australian audiences were
switching over in droves to situation comedies and action series flooding in
from the US
such as Happy Days, Laverne and Shirley,
Starsky and Hutch and The Six Million Dollar Man,
while on the soap opera front it seemed broad comedy and camp characters were
out. Indeed The Box, Number 96’s
sexy stable-mate, had folded a few months before.
Producer Bill Harmon remained philosophical about the
demise of the series.
“Not too many local products have as much success over
such a period as Number 96. But obviously
tastes change over a period and lately the series has been falling off in
popularity to the stage where it is no longer an economic proposition for the
network.” [207]
In late 1976 two new Australian serials had been launched
on Channel Nine to overwhelming popular response, thus revealing the changes
in public taste occurring at that time. One of these, The Sullivans,
was definitely at the opposite end of the spectrum from Number 96.
The story of a Melbourne
family torn apart by World War II, The Sullivans
was thoughtful, serious and technically accurate with only subtle comedy
touches, and despite appearances by such actors as Chantal Contouri and former The Box
sex symbol Belinda Giblin, it contained few
outwardly sensational elements.
The other successful new series was The Young Doctors.
Though it may not have won any awards for acting or writing, the show’s
charismatic young cast and romantic storylines attracted a large teenage
audience in its early evening time-slot. The show would run many years, and
on an episode by episode basis it would ultimately overtake Number 96 in longevity, producing 1396 half-hour
episodes to Number 96’s 1218.
In the event Ten launched The Restless Years
at the end of 1977. Again this show eschewed the camp comedy of Number 96 and, as an outward expression of those
elements that Number 96 attempted to introduce
during its later stages, was clearly focused upon younger characters, their
romantic entanglements and the everyday social problems they faced.
As work wound up on Number 96
various actors looked back at their time on the show for TV Week.
Actor Joe Hasham, who had portrayed Don Finlayson
the show’s entire run, expressed both sadness and relief at the demise of Number 96.
“Almost six years is a long time in one job at my age. At
the end of each year I had to sit down and wonder if I was doing the right
thing staying in the show. But I did, and I’m very thankful for the financial
security it has given me. Although I’ve got to admit it became a bit tedious
in the later stages. It became like any job. After that length of time a
person is likely to start losing initial enthusiasm. But all in all it has
really been a wonderful six years. There were an awful lot of good times -
and some bad times. Bad times like when one of the long-running characters
was written out and we all lost a close friend and a workmate.” [208]
Said Jeff Kevin:
“Probably the greatest thing about working on a show like
Number 96 was the freedom that was given an
actor to develop a character the way he saw it. It gave me the chance to try
myself out as at actor - and it also gave me the chance to fall flat on my
face if something didn’t work. Then there was the marvellous ensemble feeling
about working in a show like that. It sounds corny - but we really were like
a big family and I’m going to miss the whole thing.” [209]
Pat McDonald, who had played the domineering Dorrie through the program’s entire run, said:
“As you know I’ve always been a great supporter of the
Australian television industry and for that reason, more than any, I think Number 96 has made an enormous impression on the
business. It has been a pioneer in a lot of ways and it will be remembered
years from now for that reason, if not for any other. How do I feel now that
it’s ending? Sad, naturally, but also very proud of having been in this show
that gave so much pleasure to viewers and so much work to people like me and
people on the technical side” [210]
Veteran performer Ron Shand, who
played Dorrie’s husband Herb, said that:
“It gave me an enormous knowledge of television
production that was perhaps lacking a bit before I joined the cast. It also
gave me a great feeling of what it’s like to work as part of a team and I’ll
never forget that. [211]
Their main co-star Bunney Brooke
explained:
“The show gave me a regular income but I couldn’t assess
what I have got out of it in monetary terms. You couldn’t buy the happiness I
got from working with such a great bunch of actors and actresses and the love
the public has given me. I am proud of what the public have felt for me and
if I have given them half of what I received back, then maybe that’s what my
job is all about.” [212]
Of sustaining her characterisation Brooke reported that:
“I had to use my wits, intelligence and knowledge because
we worked at a tremendous pace. I am going to miss Flo. She has been such a
part of me, and I am going to miss the funny little flat where Dorrie, Herbie and I lived. We
were three ordinary people, unaware of what was happening in the other flats
in the block.” [213]
Overall Brooke expressed mixed feelings about the program
ending.
“We were a big family and there were days when we loved
each other, hated each other and became angry with each other. But if anyone
was ill, everyone rallied around and helped out and this included the crew as
well. Everyone did a mammoth job.” [214]
Mike Dorsey who had chalked-up three and a half years as
Daddy when the series ended declared that “There will never be another show
like Number 96 on Australian television. It
has to be remembered as one of the greats. I had fun in the show even though
we worked hard. But it was good for my acting and it was good becoming
disciplined in learning lines week after week.” Dorsey found the job of
learning lots of new lines every week difficult at first. “But once I had my
character established it became easier,” he said. Of his main co-star Wendy Blacklock, Dorsey said that “Wendy is a great actress and
we had a great rapport on the screen together.” [215]
Indeed, they had such a great rapport that their
characters lived on after the series ended. As Wendy Blacklock
explained.
“We are not going to say goodbye to Reg
and Edie McDonald. With Bill Harmon’s blessing we are doing a husband and
wife comedy routine in the clubs. We found doing charity performances last
year that the public was greatly interested in seeing ‘Mummy and Daddy’ in
the flesh, so we decided to do an act.” [216]
The series writers who had initially created the
characters for Number 96 wrote most of the
show’s comedy material. Bill Harding, who wrote for The Norman Gunstan Show, contributed material, and Dorsey and Blacklock themselves contributed
some sketches. [217]
In the 2006 documentary Number 96: The Later Years,
Blacklock recalls that these club shows continued
for a period of about 18 months to two years after the demise of the series.
This had not been the only spin-off for Reg and Edie. In January 1978 TV Week
had reported on plans for yet another spin-off idea featuring Mike Dorsey and
Wendy Blacklock and the second television spin-off
pilot trading on their popular Mummy and Daddy characters. [218]
The actors were reportedly set to star in a $68,000 pilot,
titled Oh Mummy, Oh Daddy, to be
offered to the commercial networks. Taped at the studios of ATN7 in February 1978 the one-hour special was based on
comic strip characters - the high cost was due to the copyrights of Superman
and Ginger Meggs - and a series of the same vein
was proposed. Each episode would have a particular theme and open with a
couple - played by Dorsey and Blacklock - emerging
from a dream situation, and the series would combine sketches with serious
acting. Meanwhile the show’s producer, Warren T. Smith, added to the
confusion by noting that it was being planned as a variety-oriented series,
with the involvement of various musical groups. [219]
However television networks were apparently nonplussed, and the series never
saw the light of day.
Despite the eventful nature of some of its earlier
storylines, Number 96 went out quietly in
episodes first screened in Sydney
in August 1977. In the rather downbeat closing storylines the building has
been purchased by a mystery buyer. Dorrie finally
agrees to terminate her lease thereby allowing the sale to go ahead, at which
point - to the horror of the recently returned Norma Whittaker - the mystery
buyer is revealed to be none other than Maggie Cameron. Meanwhile, Arnold’s latest love
Vicki Dawson (Kay Powell) anxiously awaits news of her kidnapped baby son
Simon.
The residents are horrified by the prospect of Maggie
demolishing Number 96 for a new development, however when it emerges
that both Dorrie and Herb’s signatures are required
to terminate their lease, Herb naturally refuses to sign, and Number 96
is saved. Meanwhile Dorrie’s on-going feud with
recent arrival Opal seems finally resolved for good after their latest clash,
a disagreement over a winning lottery ticket, is sorted-out.
There is more good news as baby Simon is found unharmed,
and Arnold and Vicki are promptly married in time to hold their reception in Duddles Disco prior to the show’s final curtain call.
Unfortunately, news that the sale has fallen through does not filter through
to Giovanni in the deli. At Opal’s suggestion (for a cut of the profits) he
had held a closing down sale successfully clearing the deli’s entire stock,
including the cash register, while Marilyn’s pronouncement that she is to
become a nun seems nullified when she falls madly in love with Giovanni’s
newly arrived brother Sergio.
In the end, rather highlighting their depleted numbers,
the entire cast happily gather in the Disco to toast the happy couple, with
even Maggie Cameron making an appearance. Maggie smugly admits that she
wasn’t really the buyer after all, leaving the impression that her prank was
calculated to provoke the residents into fighting the imminent sale.
Despite the fact that a grinning Maggie - the Mad Bomber
who had killed four residents including Norma’s husband - hands Arnold a large
gift-wrapped box, the series does not end with the entire cast blown up in a
bomb explosion. Instead, Dorrie makes the final
speech, but is horrified to learn that Edie is not in attendance. Reg explains she is upstairs working, having been
suddenly gripped by an idea for the novel she has been contracted to write.
“Why wasn’t I told?” gasps Dorrie. “...And will
somebody mind telling me what Mrs MacDonald could possibly find to write a
novel about...?”
...while Edie begins typing her novel:
“Once upon a time there was a building called Number
96...”
And so the story closed. The episode ends on a triumphant
note with many of the cast from over the years the series ran returning for a
traditional curtain call farewell before a live audience, and cast member Ron
Shand is shown switching off the studio lights for
the final time.
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