Good News from Outer Space

Masturbating Yoda, masturbating Yoda. Batteries sold separately. Masturbating Yoda, masturbating Yoda. Educational too." Beneath layers of green prosthetic makeup, Mikey Robbins is tunelessly pushing the envelope of his newly applied Yoda alter-ego. "Yoda’s horny. Yoda wants a beer. Yoda’s not fucking happy," demands Robbins, deeply consumed by his intuitive, sensitive rendition of the very after hours Jedi Master. George Lucas would not be so chuffed either.

"Yoda's not fucking happy!!" he screams insistently, the once familiar Triple J voice bellowing over the Sydney sand dunes that have become tatooine for the afternoon. Paul McDermott, whose anti-hero persona lends itself more to a Trainspotting Ewan McGregor then Obi-Wan Kenobi, raises his eyebrows and threatens to silence the green Robbins with his light sabre. Suddenly Anakin Skywalker aka Darth Vader's defection over to the Dark Side doesn't seem such a bad idea at all.

High on a sand dune not far, far away enough, a merchandising executive's worst nightmare is unfolding as the Good News team plan their own armada of Star Wars paraphernalia including a light sabre which would handily double as a cigarette lighter.

This take no prisoner humour which GNW is infamous for still blisters close to the surface when they're off camera. The satire coming from Paul "I'm trying to get an orgy started" McDermott resonates with an air of expectation. As too does the improvisational rampages of Mikey Robbins, who likes to portray an externally amicable personality of "the guy in the pub who's wandered onto television. "Not one to be bullied by the inter-galactic boys club, the balance to all this is Julie McCrossin, who adds some dignity to the occasion. "It's quite easy for me to maintain integrity. I don't have the capacity to do quick gags, so I can't automatically slip into a standard sex joke or big dick joke." she says without regret.

Between them, McDermott and Robbins have more than enough quick gags. "The competitive side - it's amazing how quickly that takes hold," explains Robbins, whose radio background has equipped him with an ability to verbally decimate the opposition. "This is pathetic, but three and half years in I still feel better on nights that my team wins than on nights that my team loses. It's silly like that. When you get to the structure of Good News it is a game show and that's what gives the programme a dramatic through line. If we ever abandoned the art of assault, if you didn't care who won or lost, then the show would lose that dramatic structure."


Despite the competitive spirit and rock & roll wrestle repertoire, a tremendous camaraderie genuinely exists between McCrossin, McDermott and Robbins. "In some fundamental gut way, we just click," says McCrossin.

Good mates off air and with a great respect for each other's talents, even Robbins gets a bit "hippy" when describing GNW's working family headed by executive producer Ted Robinson. "We are all basically good people who really love working with each other," he says, describing McCrossin as, "the elder sister who is out for the night with her two younger brothers who are playing brandings and she's amused but there are moments that we do genuinely embarrass her."

For Paul McDermott, who has always worked in groups - first in the Doug Anthony Allstars and now with GNW - belonging to a comic clan provides a deep sense of security. "I just prefer having the safety of a group. It gives you a sense of freedom and enclosure at the same time. There are some things you want to do but you can't because you have to be conscious of other people's needs."

Engaged in a ratings war against the Evil empire of light entertainment led by Darth Sommers, only the creative integrity of Good News can challenge prime time TV's conservative status quo. Not just trying to be funny, GNW's satire raises issues that the Australian public at times neither want nor expect to hear.

Leading the rebellion against sanitised smiles and plastic bodies, McCrossin's presence on the idiot box offers an intelligent and refreshing alternative to the blow-up doll girls who keep male variety hosts company.

"If you have the capacity to make people laugh, you get a lot more leeway about how you look on the television and I think that this is a relief for people. People are prepared to pay a higher price for comedy," explains the feisty McCrossin on comedy's great equalising ability. "Comedy is one of the rare places in television that your looks are not a primary determinate."

Meanwhile back on the dunes, the body images of Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda are taking a turn for the worse as McDermott and Robbins use the sabre to ignite a cigarette. " I keep on getting pubic hair in my mouth," complains Robbins of the migrating toupee, leaving the impression that even in deep space there is an RSL.

As though the surreal job requirement of dressing in the Star Wars drag was as ordinary as opening a can of beer, McDermott poses nonchalantly next to the metamorphosised Robbins and the mother of Leia and Luke, McCrossin. For this vulgarity connoisseur, embracing the vandalising good taste is all part f the act. "The thing is, I don't care what you have to go through to get the final product. If it means all manner of hell and tears, that's fine because that's what you have to achieve to get that one moment," McDermott explains of why no personal embarrassment ever finds its way into his performances.

The shadows growing long over the dunes, the masturbation jokes exhausted, the GNW team reload back into JUICE's version of the millennium Flacon. McDermott refuses to smile, Robbins asks if he can keep the ears and McCrossin laughs over what she would later reflect as, "A totally surreal way to lead your life. I find it amusing on a very deep level. There is something so silly about us on a sand dune. There is something very absurd about being so intense about something so silly. One of the things I really enjoy about Good News Week is that we are so intense about something so absurd."

Published in Juice Magazine June 1999

News Hounds

On the set and behind he scenes with the Gucci-wearing, human-hating Good News Week crew.

There's half an hour to go before taping starts on the first episode of the Good News week Night Lite and there are just two items outstanding. The first is Mikey Robins' black shirt, which was mistakenly sent for cleaning and has now hurriedly recalled via courier; the second is guest Brooke Satchwell from Neighbours, whose cab has broken down somewhere on the way from Sydney airport to the studio in North Ryde amid Friday night peak hour.

Considering there's an expectant live audience already filing into their seats and the show is due to he broadcast the following Thursday, no one appears unduly alarmed. Familiar faces - including monotone man of the people, the Sandman, and dada enigma Flacco - wander in the side entrance, past the carefully dismantled Breakers sets, and make their way to makeup or their dressing rooms. Just outside makeup, Robins is quizzing the wardrobe mistress. "What about some Gucci?" he asks, referring to the lack of tie around his neck.

"No Gucci tonight," she tells him.

"You're keeping the Gucci for Paul, aren't you?" he replies, all mock petulant and tanty-hound.

"You know only you get the Gucci, Mikey."

Robins laughs and wanders off, pausing briefly to smile and tell me: "I'm a tie slut, if you didn't know."

They're a well-heeled crew at Good News Week, which is emphasised as Paul McDermott emerges from his dressing room in a sleek, obviously expensive grey number. But whether the suit maketh the man is a different matter. Short and vocal, McDermott fizzes with a brittle, incisive energy. Unlike some comedians who are on when they need to be and most definitely off the rest of the time, McDermott has a compulsive, somewhat alarming presence. He can be friendly and provocative at the same time: a firecracker with an uneven fuse.

Looking around the antiseptic corridor, McDermott sizes up the situation. He spies a publicist from Channel Ten, the new home of the News Week empire since its departure from the ABC, and strides to her. "I want the last three episodes of the X-Files that I missed," he says playing the star. "On my desk, Tomorrow." He looks around suddenly wide-eyed and discreet, whispering an addendum. "And also the last three Party of Five."

Seeing a journalist with an open notebook he starts dictating: ", Channel Ten are filthy and disgusting! I knew nothing about the move!'

Before anyone can reply he's off to makeup, where Robins is already ensconced, still awaiting his errant clothing. "Is my shirt here yet?" he calls out to no one in particular, his booming voice echoing down the corridor.

Of course McDermott knew about the move. Most people did. With its budget trimmed more by an antagonistic federal government, there was always great doubt that the ABC could retain Good News Week. Nor had Ted Robinson, whose company produces the show, made any bones about the fact that he wanted to develop the show on the ABC and, if it worked, take it to a commercial network.

But because he controlled the show, Robinson was able to bring it to Ten en masse, instead of just slipping a few names into a new set-up. GNW has kept the same key performers - McDermott, Robins and Julie McCrossin - plus writers and technical staff, which has made the transition fairly easy.

"We're actually getting away with more at Ten," claims Robins. "They have censors who look at the show and - MY SHIRT!" The wardrobe mistress has walked by with a garment still in its dry-cleaning wrap, but it is not the one. "To he honest, I was worried when we moved, but there's been some Virgin Mary gags that never would have aired at the ABC. Here they were like, 'Sure, fine'."

For Robins it's not the first time with a commercial network - "I've been fired by Seven four times," he happily boasts - but apart from the odd flirtation with Liz Hayes on The Today Show while in the Doug Anthony Allstars, it's new territory for McDermott. He remains sanguine about the change and their prospects.

"I actually think Channel Ten are trying to do something good," he says. "They're trying to get a younger demographic and they're trying to get more extreme, volatile and Australian people onboard doing work.

"At the end of the day the commercial stations are about making money and you become a commodity. But you can still do good work as a commodity."

Ten has obviously decided that Good News Week is a valuable commodity. The comic game show has been given the Prestigious 7.30 Sunday evening timeslot, up against Nine's perennial giant 60 Minutes (home to the ABC's other recent high-profile defector, Ellen Fanning) and Seven's American sitcoms 3rd Rock from the Sun and Home Improvement. GNW Night Lite, styled as a variety show, has been given 90 minutes on Thursday nights, beginning at 8.30.

"Everyone thought it was game to go up against 60 Minutes," reasons McDermott, "whereas to us, if you're going to do commercial TV you might as well go in the deep end."

So does he now understand the more crucial ratings figures? "I understand the ratings, but I'm not really interested in them." He pauses and laughs quietly. "I think that's causing a little bit of dismay when I talk to the people at Ten."

Brooke Satchwell has arrived, been whisked through makeup, given a glass of red wine and is now being introduced to McDermott. "I've been standing by the side of the road for an hour and a half," she says, explaining her late arrival.

"You should have hitchhiked," replies McDermott, attempting to smile in a friendly way, which is not easy for a self-confessed misanthrope who considers humanity a seething virus.

Another guest, Sacha Horler, the star of Praise, is also introduced to McDermott. He tells her he liked the film and gives her some hints to surviving a show that can bury timid guests alive, "Talk loud and talk often," he declares.

The on-air regulars gather just outside the door to the studio floor while staff make last-minute adjustments. McDermott has a technician behind him wiring up a radio microphone, while the wardrobe mistress in front of him straightens his tie. "I like being touched by people," he says, smiling lasciviously, "but this may be a little much."

After much anxiety Robins has received "The Shirt", but now he's wearing it, it appears to have losts its lustre. "It's just a plain black shirt," he observes as they wander onto the side of the soundstage. Ted Robinson, who also directs Good News Week, speaks to the audience before unleashing the well-primed cast. A balding, somewhat rumpled figure in his mid-40s, Robinson runs through some instructions before making a final plea: "If we achieve nothing else tonight, we want to make a TV show that doesn't resemble Hey Hey its Saturday in any way."

It was Ted Robinson who bought Paul McDermott back to television. "He's the only person in the industry I trust," notes McDermott of Robinson. Their association goes back 15 years and Robinson has been a supporter ever since, even during the Allstars' widely savaged sitcom, DAAS Kapital. After the trio split up, McDermott entered what he calls "the stupor", staying at home to paint, his lifelong passion. Robinson encouraged him to perform again and eventually won him back.

McDermott has now gotten back to regular ways. At this year's Logie Awards in Melbourne he had a fist fight with Hey Hey host Daryl Somers in the men's bathroom. talk of the rumble spread so quickly that Bert Newton mentioned it on air during his morning show on Ten. The only problem is that a mystified McDermott didn't even attend the Logies.

"I think it was Bert's way of saying, "Welcome to Channel ten and by the way you had a fight with someone from Nine, " " speculates McDermott. The rumour-mongers never decided who won the punch-up between the two, so does the GNW host think he could take Mr Hey Hey? "I don't know," he muses. "It depends what he's like after a few glasses of good red."

If Paul McDermott is unsure about whether he could out-biff Somers, there's no doubt that it would be a knockout victory when it comes to performing live. Onstage with Robins, McDermott is preparing the audience to holler uproariously for the GNW cameras. The pair also prerecorded two sketches which, by the process of stretching the lower halves of their heads, turns Robins and, especially McDermott into (respectively) a boneheaded Kerry and James Packer. The second taped piece features a wildly libellous comment about the scion of one of the most powerful families in the country which leaves audience jaws on the floor. Virgin Mary gags may be one thing, but the sketch never makes it to air the following Thursday (although a revamped version runs the next week).

"I thought it was rather a cruel thing to do at the time, but at the same time quite funny," says McDermott on reflection a few days later.

Cruel and funny. It is, agrees the man himself, the best summation of his strain of humour. "It probably has been for a long time," he says. Paul McDermott is the anti-Somers, the comedian who packs a vicious punch into his best lines, walking the line between shock and witty fascination. He's at his best when he pushes those listening a little too far and they waver, questioning whether they should laugh. You can feel the snarl in his voice as he turns on their indecision, telling them to get stuffed, flinging an enraged arm out at them.

It's no wonder those in the front row inwardly cringe when McDermott's gaze alights on them. "Got any eccy?" he suddenly demands of one woman. "I've been in Melbourne for a while and let me tell you, no matter how much other people urge you, don't eat you own shit."

With taping about to begin, a floor manager hooked up to the control room via a headset calls out some instructions to the duo. "Can you imagine what she'd be like in bed?" wonders Robins. "Up, down, stop, start, left, right...."

"And she'd be wearing that headset," marvels McDermott.

The audience can't stop laughing. the Anti-Somers and his sidekick prance around the stage like the happiest people alive. The show is most definitely ready to begin.

Published in Rolling Stone Magazine July 1999 issue 563

SORRY VIP'S ONLY!!!!!!

Suddenly, the door to the green room flies open and in bursts Channel 10's chief censor Sally Stockbridge. "No, no," she's saying. "You can't have fellatio on Good News Week. It's prime time, don't forget."=

Sally looks around the room in exasperation, at the writers lounging together on a couch and a selection of easy chairs against one wall, at the stars of the show ebulliently pouring in after saying the word during the taping, and at the sliced meat, pot of pasta and plate of cheeses in the corner.

No-one seems particularly worried. Mikey Robins has made a dive for the tiny kitchen and is surreptitiously sneaking a cigarette under the No Smoking! sign and tucking into a sandwich, while Paul McDermott has one of the guests on the show, Federal Sex Discrimination Commissioner Susan Halliday, against the ropes.

"Before you arrived, we made a lot of sexist and racist jokes," he said. "Then we took footage of you on the show laughing and smiling. no we're going to play those jokes and cut to you giggling."

Her grin is a tiny bit uncertain.

It's here, in the green room, where so much of the action takes place - before a TV show or directly afterwards. Guests are asked to sit here, watching the show on a big TV in the corner, before they're called on to the set. The writers keep track of how their jokes go down, bitching about lines left out of badly delivered. And it's here that the stars come to greet everyone before curtain up, and chill out after the credits have rolled.

In the heady old days, green rooms were notorious settings for drinks, drugs and illicit couplings after the tension of a TV show, but today they're markedly more sombre.

"Those days went the way of the 80s," said Robins. "Today it's just about having a couple of beers and the same bloody cheeses every week." "And," added McDermott, puffing on another cigarette, "you're not even allowed to smoke now."

Yet often life here is still even more dramatic than what we see on screen. We never saw, for instance, the increasing uneasiness on Bronwyn Bishop's face as she sat in the green room before the show, realising what she'd let herself in for - or the moment she told producers she couldn't go through with it.

Nor the time one of the writers picked up one of the props for the show, a joke milk carton, and managed to spray everyone there with milk. And not even the time a high profile news personality left with a guest on the show, only to report, disappointingly, that he'd collapsed shortly afterwards in an alcoholic daze.

Published in the Sun Herald Television............

Teary Mikey Ties The Knot

It was Mikey Robins's own good news week. And the best news is, The Diary can share it with you.

An exuberant and teary Robins wed his partner of four years, Laura Williams, in a private ceremony at a harbourside restaurant during the week. But even though he is TV's brightest, most irreverent comedian - and more than 100 guests, including some of the biggest names in comedy, turned out at Blackwattle Bay's Boathouse Restaurant - the couple tried their best to keep the whole thing secret.

With Steve (Sandman) Abbott serving as Robins's best man and Andrew Denton, Paul McDermott and Paul (Flacco) Livingston on the guest list, some guests may have been expecting the occasion to evolve into a comedy feast.

But Robins, 38, was too absorbed in the solemnity of the occasion.

The Good News Week panelist and former Triple J breakfast presenter, renowned for his sarcastic wit and crafty put-downs, was, by all accounts, "very emotional" when Williams arrived for the 3 p.m. ceremony. Williams wore an ivory silk georgette dress over a woollen lace sheath with a cropped jacket by couturier Jo Mitton and carried a bouquet of old-fashioned white roses.
Guests included Robins's Good News Week co-star McDermott, the ABC's Greg (H G Nelson) Pickhaver, Triple M's Denton and partner Jennifer Byrne, Amanda Keller and her producer husband Harley Oliver, artist Katrina Greenwood and her actor partner Hugo Weaving and SBS newsreader Indira Naidoo.

Following a short ceremony, McDermott serenaded the couple with a piano-accompanied rendition of Unchained Melody.

One guest described the ceremony as "extremely romantic". "Mikey toasted Laura's parents for creating the most beautiful woman in the world and everyone was moved by his emotional speech," she said. The couple, now honeymooning in Japan, declared their wedding a perfect day. "It was absolutely magical for both of us," the new Mrs. Robins said.

Mikey and Laura Finally Tie The Knot

One of television's biggest talents, Mikey Robins, finally wed his manager and girlfriend of four years, Laura Williams, at a top-secret ceremony at Glebe's Boathouse restaurant last Monday.

And the big bloke (who has been actively trying to shed a few kilos - even had Tracey, his personal trainer, along - thus ensuring he didn't end up devouring the entire wedding cake.

A celebrant did the honours in front of about 100 guests who included Good News Week host Paul McDermott, Andrew Denton, Jennifer Byrne and Hugo Weaving.

The master of ceremonies was none other than the ebullient Tony Squires, while The Sandman made a sensational speech that had even these hardened comic types almost falling off their seats.

Laura and Mikey have headed overseas for a honeymoon at - you guessed it, a secret destination.

I wish them the best.

Hardly good news at all

Despite all the fanfare of its $6 million move away from the ABC, the Good News Week team has suffered a major blow.

Network Ten is pulling the show from its 7:30pm, Sunday, timeslot from tomorrow week and will replace it with Simpsons repeats.

GNW, an irreverent quiz show fronted by Paul McDermott, Mikey Robins and Julie McCrossin, will move to the 9:30pm Monday timeslot, from August 23. replacing the under-performing American drama LA Doctors, which has been dumped after premiering only last month.

GNW averaged only 712,000 viewers last Sunday - to finish a distant fourth in the ratings.

The top show was, ironically, ABC's SeaChange with 2.1 million viewers (Sea Change is Aunty's highest ever rating series). In Adelaide, GNW also finished fourth, with 75,000 viewers (Nine's 60 Minutes was top here with 200,000).

Even more worrying is that GNW has not been successful in the key under 40 demographics - despite pitching itself as a youth network.

Network Ten's programming director David Mott said "due to the competitive nature of the Sunday evening timeslot, I believe the new timeslot.... will ensure an even greater reach for the program."

The move raises questions about the future of the Thursday spin-off show GNW Night Lite, which is also rating poorly.

However, Ten said the network was happy with Night Lite and would not be moving the show.

Published in the Adelaide Advertiser - Sunday 14 August 1999

Blokes we love

Multiple choice: Paul McDermott. Photo: Tim Wimborne

For Father's Day next  Sunday Tempo has identified some of the country's favourite men as nominated by some appreciative women. Ute Junker reports

Gough Whitlam, statesman Nominated by Cheryl Kernot, politician
"What do you mean, I can't have Paul McDermott?" asked a dismayed Cheryl Kernot, Federal Member for Dickson in Queensland. Not quite how it sounds, though - she was simply being told the star of Channel 10's Good News Week had already been the Tempo team's cover choice for our story.

McDermott was the generic choice of the team because: "He's adorable; He's so devilish, like your naughty little brother; He'd make a great Puck in A Midsummer Night's Dream." (Which is why he was chosen. That and the fact he has cross-generational, cross-gender sex appeal - Ed.)

Asked to choose an alternative, Mrs Kernot doesn't hesitate: "Gough Whitlam. Like Paul, he's got a twinkle in his eye." Of course, there are differences, particularly in stature - physical and otherwise.

"Gough's got this amazing intellect, combined with an imposing physical presence. He's got a wonderful sense of humour, a blend of sharp, political satire and self-deprecation - he sends himself up mercilessly. Even in his 80s he's full of wisdom and energy - he's always on top of contemporary issues.

"He reminds us of the qualities prime ministers can have, that they can appeal to your brains, heart and hormones."

Mrs Kernot remembers being enraged by Whitlam's dismissal, even though she didn't agree with everything he did in government. But it was in the quarter century since, she said, that he had really come into his own.

"We love him more as time goes by - he's part of our lives," she said. "How many other people have had a band named after them?"

But Mrs Kernot can't resist turning the subject back to McDermott one last time: "He's got the intellect too, of course," she said. "Paul McDermott for Prime Minister!" (And so say all of us!).

Published in the Sun Herald - August 29th 1999 - Tempo section    (only part of the Article typed)