Local drama will make the difference for TV in 2012

It may only be September, but with Seven’s 2012 upfronts launch on Wednesday night and Ten’s back in August, only Nine is yet to declare its hand for next year.

And it’s already clear that what will separate the winning network from the others is the proportion of successful local content that succeeds.

It may even come down to the local drama content. In a close year, it often does.  

Seven has arguably the most reliable slate. Packed To The Rafters remains rock solid. Winners & Losers has some life left in it yet.

And yet another new show from Bevan Lee, A Place To Call Home, was also announced, although details on tat one were sketchy.

Plus, Seven’s current dip into historical drama, Wild Boys looks to have plenty of life left in its next season.

For Ten, there are fewer certainties. Certainly there wil be interest in the TV version of Puberty Blues. Ditto Underground – The Julian Assange story. With the right casting it could be amazing – and of course have some global appeal too. Based on Nine’s success with Underbelly, Ten’s Bikie Wars seems a reasonably good bet too.

As for Nine, as it hasn’t done the upfronts yet, we know less. But the gossip from the ad agency guys on Wednesday night was that we’ll see Underbelly 5 – with a Queensland backdrop – early in the new year.

Tim Burrowes

Network Ten is looking for a Producer - Breakfast
Looking for a job? Got a position to fill? Check out the Job Board.

September 23rd, 2011 at 1:11 pm

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Comments


  1. Horace Goodenuf
    24 Sep 11
    2:08 PM

    2. Thanks Tim – these commercial offerings all sound unbelievably, unviewably BORING -BORING-BORING!!! But what else could we expect from the likes of Bevan Lee or the Underbelly shonks? Plus SBS hasn’t two cents to rub together and what they do put up as entertainment is grusomely poor anyway. But the badge of shame goes to the ABC who had money and have squandered it on making soap opera when they promised drama. Let’s pray they have the sense to keep importing real drama from the UK. Let’s face it – we Australians have no idea what TV drama is – and definitely haven’t a clue how to make it.

  2. Brian
    26 Sep 11
    6:03 PM

    3. So no new local comedy? Awesome. Another year of importing the US & UK sitcoms

  3. Jeff
    27 Sep 11
    10:09 AM

    4. I think the underbelly franchise is scraping the barrell so hard, that they might have to start commissioning acts of crime to start driving their threadbare, exploitive pissy narratives that seem to swivel around shock and awe with story somewhere in the background. We Australians do have an idea of what effective comedy and drama can look like, its just that those that do know..are very rarely given a shot and those that do the commissioning and programming have a very suspect sense of taste for what the audience might want. We have let dramatic standards drop so low..that the overarching defence now utilised by those that develop this crap is..”the lighting is great” “the camera work was pretty good” “its alright” “the actors are hot”..these are all tell-tale warning signs that we have lost the collective narrative plot. We have allowed standards to drop so low…that we now cringe at the majority of dramatic comedy reflections of our own culture. And those that keep offending couldn’t give a stuff..as long as they’re making a buck, promoting hollow careers, funded by us..such shocking cynicism shocking, dressed up as “optimistic can do spirit”, yeah you can do but at what cost to our culture? Why do we allow people who think so little of our culture run one of those most important communication devices invented, what right do these cynics have to be commissioning and producing anything? Maybe they should leave comedy and drama alone and go and work in the banking sector. Innovation is dead and we have allowed real cynics to run our creative culture. RIP OZ TV.

  4. Brian
    28 Sep 11
    1:16 PM

    5. Has anyone ever asked the executives at these networks about the shows they choose to make/commission/show? Encore? I don’t know if you’d get an answer from the commercial’s, but surely the ABC would be obliged to respond.

    It would be nice to know if the reason such utter s*** gets produced is because:
    1. There are no better alternatives being offered by Australian writers, producers and creatives
    2. An executive turned down a lot of other quality submissions and selected the s*** show under some misguided belief it would be popular/’good’.
    3. The executive purposely picked the worst show to stifle the industry in Australia.

    For all of the complaining we do, we rarely hear from the people responsible. If it’s a lack of talent providing good TV, then fair enough but I’d like to know if that is the problem. The lack of transparency in these networks (particularly the publicly funded ABC) is what leads to us assuming the worst, that good shows are tossed aside because of an out of touch executive.

  5. Brendon
    28 Sep 11
    10:59 PM

    6. Come on guys, it’s not that bad, when millions of people tune into comedy/drama Packed to the Rafters each week, and we laugh at that don’t we :-) things can only get better, in the top 10 shows this week, three were Australia drama, two were x factor, that’s 5 out of 10 being Australian, each of these shows draws 1-2 million that’s good news! We’ve had The block which was a runaway success, the idea sold overseas, Masterchef (reborn in Australia) etc. The way I look at it TV’s getting better and the really good shows are on free to air not pay TV, how lucky is that :-)

  6. Bronwyn
    3 Oct 11
    1:43 PM

    7. I agree with Brendon, it’s really not all that bad – the ABC have some (hopefully!) good new shows starting – locally made dramas like The Slap and Phyrne Fisher – both adapted from popular Australian books, and a new ob doc series featuring Myf Warhurst, and these are just the ones I have heard of.
    Personally, I am looking forward to them all, especially given they are not imports or re-hashed re-makes. The ABC are definitely trying to make interesting new content, and let’s be nice to poor SBS, as long as they can afford to keep buying up decent overseas shows, especially good UK documentaries, then they are OK in my book – someone has to filter out the rubbish for us.
    Given that lame import Two and Half Men was recently our highest rating show, it’s understandable that commissioners would shrink from the idea of being too edgy if they feel it’s not what the bulk of the public wants. Ultimately, broadcasters need to make money, and shows like Masterchef Australia are well made and hugely successful, even abroad, so the thinking behind it is understandable.
    At least homemade dramas like Rafters, Winners & Losers and Offspring do what they do pretty well – they’re no Downton Abbey, but no-one is pretending that they are.
    I think we’re in a better place than we have been for a while.

  7. Richard Moss
    31 Jan 12
    5:52 PM

    8. To those who think, as Horace Goodenuf seems to, that quote: “we Australians have no idea what TV drama is – and definitely haven’t a clue how to make it. ” unquote.
    I am moved to say this. I have worked in the Australian television drama industry for many years, beginning with Homicide in 1972 until the present . In this time, I have worked on productions for Crawford, Grundy , ABC and a host of private production companies.
    There is absolutely no truth in the opinion that there is no talent or very little talent in Australian television drama production, there are actors, producers, directors, writers and crew as good as the best anywhere in the world. There is a problem however, and that problem is in the approach to the craft. For some reason, entirely unfathomable in my mind, a culture has been allowed to form which is based, it seems, upon the crusty old foundations of 1930s corporate structure, and a strange departmental way of thinking. There is still a general fear of drama and theatre as some kind of quirky or arty farty sham, a mistrust of the process of theatre. Rehearsals all too often consist of a line run to satisfy someone that the actors now the lines, and a few moments shuffling into positions that suit. I once (not many years ago) found myself on the set of a television drama with a director who told me that I would not be seen in the particular scene we were preparing to shoot because I was behind the camera, he somehow thought that I needed to know, he later told me that I would not be face on in the scene, because he was shooting the faces of the two actors I was in dialogue with, over my right shoulder. I had been a television actor for about thirty years at the time, the director, I later discovered had been a school teacher until the year before this shoot. Corporate structure is important, a careful hand on the tiller is also needed, but, as with the technical crew, the creative process is vital, and yet it’s the one component so very often overlooked.

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