13 schoolyards, Author at Australian Tumbleweeds - Page 26 of 110
Jungle Juice
Finally, an international Aussie comedy success story that we won’t have to pretend never happened in a decade or so: There are just a handful of independent production companies with three or more half-hour series currently on U.S. television. One of them could surprise you: It’s Australian indie Jungle Entertainment, owned by CEO Jason Burrows, director... Read More »
A New Day Dawns
Press release time! This came as a bit of a surprise here, as we’d thought he’d nabbed the top job months ago: Producer Todd Abbott (Please Like Me, Micallef Tonight, Geoffrey Robertson’s Hypotheticals, Judith Lucy’s Spiritual Journey, Rove) is the hot tip to join the Entertainment and Specialist division. ABC has been without a Head of Comedy since... Read More »
Comedy Stans
Press release time! STAN ACCELERATES GROWTH STRATEGY AS NINE THROWS WEIGHT BEHIND ORIGINAL PRODUCTIONS Expanded slate of upcoming Stan Original productions also announced Followed by a bunch of stuff that isn’t really of interest to us here today. Basically, as various international streaming services look to expand their operations, Stan is increasingly in a bit... Read More »
Paper Champions: A Movie Review
Remember movies? Worse, remember Australian comedy movies? Oh sure, there was that Paul Hogan one a few weeks back, but aside from that? Nothing. Well, nothing unless you’ve been scouring the listings for the various Australian film festivals that have been forced to relocate online thanks to 2020 being garbage, in which case you may... Read More »
Vale Retrograde
In the first ten minutes of its final episode Retrograde slapped down the “whoops, someone’s dead, time to get serious” card so hard for a moment we thought we were watching Please Like Me all over again. Was there an eulogy full of “confronting” swearing? Was there a slowed down super-sad cover version of Talking... Read More »
All Just a Little Bit of History Repeating
You can tell when Mad as Hell is angry at the ever-increasing rightward tilt of Australia’s media and politics because they start making jokes about Labor. So it was no real surprise that Mad as Hell came roaring back onto our screens this week with a few extremely cheap shots at the nominally left-ish side... Read More »
Money Changes Everything
Press release time! Screen Australia has announced 14 feature films, eight online projects and 20 television dramas that will share in $1.6 million of Story Development funding. The latest slate includes Toni Collette’s directorial debut with feature film The Best Of, and an anthology of Shakespeare’s works re-imagined by teams of creators including Leah Purcell,... Read More »
Vale The Weekly 2020
“Let’s do this baby one more time” said host Charlie Pickering at the start of the final episode of The Weekly for 2020. Here’s a suggestion: let’s not? Oh wait, Pickering already said he’ll be back for The Yearly as part of his sappy moralising end speech that said we’ll all get through this just... Read More »
That’s Not A Comedy
Probably the most annoying thing about The Very Excellent Mr Dundee (now available on Amazon Prime) is that it didn’t have to be shit. It’s hardly a surprise that it is thanks to a whole range of factors including but not limited to it being an Australian comedy film starring Paul Hogan, but still: watching... Read More »
Shaun Micallef Hits the Piss
If the ABC really wanted to pull a crowd with Shaun Micallef’s On The Sauce, they should have got Mick Molloy to host it. Having Micallef host a mildly anxious series about how maybe drinking is not great for everyone just feels like a natural fit: having Molloy out there desperately trying to fit his... Read More »