A Country Podcast

06/01/2025

Hey pals!

I do some 4am news shirts at ABC ULTIMO and look who's on the tv as I walked in? On Parkinson!

I'd not seen this before - have you? Surely it's on iview! X

15/12/2024

🎊 The Pod team wishes the fabulous and timeless Georgie Parker a very happy 60th birthday! 🎊

We can't wait to see you on stage in our Mel's original, Australian, (probably) record-breaking, (likely-to-be) award-winning play, "How to Plot a Hit in Two Days" at the Ensemble Theatre in 2025!

02/11/2024

Hey A Country Pals!

I thought you'd enjoy this pic of our first read through of HOW TO PLOT A HIT IN TWO DAYS.

The play tells the story of two days in the ACP story room as they kill off Molly.

I think you'll recognise some of these actors?

It was a terrific day. I have so much work to do before we open in 2025!

Melanie xx

19/08/2024

Dear A Country Pals,

I really have some news!

For the last two years I've been enabled by Ensemble Theatre to write some theatrical fan fiction and GEORGIE PARKER will be the play's star!

HOW TO PLOT A HIT IN TWO DAYS imagined what it was like for the writers of ACP to kill off Molly. It's my warped imagination, but it couldn't have been written without the support of Judith Colquhoun and the late James Davern - and many other ACP cast and creatives who chatted with me about working on the show.

It's going to be directed by the brilliant Lee Lewis.

I hope it has the spirit of the show we love so much, and the creators (even if the characters have different names and are a bit of a mash up of people I've heard about and met over the years).

Essentially, it's about the nature of creativity... while five people in a room plot the most memorable episode of TV in Australian history.

Hope you'll all be able to come!

29th August - 11 September 2025 (NEXT YEAR)

https://www.ensemble.com.au/shows/how-to-plot-a-hit-in-two-days/

Melanie ###

01/08/2024

Heads up for the new pod from Aussie TV historian and former A Country Podcast guest, Andrew Mercado!

Welcome to the new TV Gold podcast from Mediaweek’s Andrew Mercado and James Manning. A podcast for people who love great television.

17/06/2024

Hey A Country Pals! It's Melanie here.

Just wanted to let you know this brilliant woman and I are cooking up something we know you'll love.

More info... in August.

###

13/06/2024

Um... forgive my Stars Without Makeup look... but look what I just found in Marrickville Salvos!!

M xx

06/06/2024

Power-walkin’ into the weekend like…

12/05/2024

Happy Mother’s Day to all the 1980s and 1990s mums that watched A Country Practice, hoping that one day Dr Elliott might randomly turn up in their own GP clinic.

Enjoy this interview with Shane Porteous from Andrew Mercado and the TV Icons YouTube channel.

Shane Porteous will always be remembered as Dr Terence Elliott from A Country Practice. But before Wandin Valley, this diverse actor had appeared in Crawford...

12/05/2024

Hey Podpals! Have you had a chance to check out Andrew Mercado’s new TV Icons YouTube channel?

Here’s his tribute to Brian Wenzel…and he’s got an interview with Dr Terence “Snakehips” Elliott coming up soon!

Sad news that A Country Practice favourite Brian Wenzel has passed away. What's been missing from his tributes is the TV role he was best known for before Wa...

06/05/2024

Thanks for the memories, Sarge 😢

Woman’s Day can reveal that beloved Australian actor Brian Wenzel has sadly passed away aged 94. Brian was best known for A Country Practice.

09/04/2024

Hey team -

Melanie here. Thought you might find these things interesting.

I spent the morning at the incredible NFSA - National Film and Sound Archive of Australia in Canberra looking at some ACP stuff for an upcoming play.

Couldn't go without seeing the scene breakdown for my fave ACP eps...

💗💗💗💗💗

03/03/2024

Hey A Country Pals,

Melanie here.

Not sure if we ever talked about this on the pod, but did you know when MARGARET MITCHELL is credited with an episode, it means no writer would put their name to it?

Makes me laugh every time I see her. This is MY WAY part 2, and as it goes, the first so after Molly's death is written by the late writer of Gone With The Wind too.

Xx

29/02/2024

A Country Pals -

It's Melanie here.

I think I've told you already I'm writing a play about ACP for a 2025 season?

The first draft is due on Monday, and so I'm deep, deep into it.

It occurs to me that you will be the only people who get every easter egg, and I'm a little worried it's so easter egg laden that it won't make sense to people who aren't fans of the show.

eg. I just made myself laugh with a little joke about Mozart's Birthday - will anyone else find it funny but us?! Time will tell. And hopefully you'll pack out the audience.

LOVE YOUSE XX

PS. Am so loving writing it. It is super hard to find conflict though as basically everyone ever involved in ACP was lovely.

21/11/2023

Everybody say “Awwwwww” for Grant Dodwell and his lovely mum, featured in the New Idea, May 12 1984 😍

14/11/2023

A tribute to the creator of A Country Practice (and many other Australian TV shows), James Davern OAM, with audio from A Country Podcast.

14/11/2023

Incredibly sad news today that the creator of A Country Practice, James Davern, has died.

We'll share more tributes as they come to hand, but we send our love to his wife Philippa Davern and their family.

Many, many times on the podcast we heard about what a happy, nourishing place ACP was - and how that came right from the top - from Jim.

What a huge contribution he made to so many lives.

These pictures were taken only a few months ago at Jim's home, where he was generously welcoming with coffee and chocolate biscuits, and full of the most incredible positive energy, sharing stories about ACP.

Love, Team A Country Podcast