In a shock twist for Australia’s television awards, the Logies, the comedian Tom Gleeson took home its top prize after mounting a campaign that relentlessly mocked it.
Gleeson – who hosts the ABC comedy quiz show Hard Quiz, and appears on The Weekly – brought a glass of red wine to the podium at the end of the long ceremony, and admitted he had been “drinking heavily” throughout.
“I have ruined the Logies, and it’s never going to happen again,” he declared cheerfully to the room of industry figures gathered at the Star Casino on the Gold Coast. “Our industry is dying, and I’m part of that!”
Administered by the listings magazine TV Week, the Logies are often criticised as a cheesy celebration of celebrity culture, with many major awards boiling down to popularity contests.
The Gold Logie, for instance, is championed as one of the industry’s top honours but to win it, nominees are expected to campaign for public votes.
In place of a serious campaign this year, Gleeson unleashed a “ludicrous” one. Launched by The Weekly, he ran a series of faux attack ads on social media against his fellow nominees, including the beloved TV personalities Waleed Aly, Amanda Keller, Costa Georgiadis and Rodger Corser. He also axed his own show, promising to bring it back if he won.
The stunt did what it was meant to: it seemed to rub Gold Logie hopefuls the wrong way, and made headlines in the process. Keller, a favourite to win this year, called it “irritating” (“there’s no need to make it personal”), and Denyer – who won the 2018 Gold Logie thanks, in part, to another mocking campaign by Gleeson – lamented that the prize had “become a joke … I’m worried if [Gleeson] wins, that’s it for the Logies forever.”
Accepting a prize he had been ridiculing for years, the comedian acknowledged he was in a “tricky spot”.
“I like it and I hate it at the same time ... I do host the highest-rating gameshow in Australia. So somewhere in the joke people forgot that this is mine.”
Gleeson said he was “going to take this as a win for the ABC”. The public broadcaster hasn’t won a Gold Logie since 1976, when the satirist Garry McDonald collected the prize in character as Norman Gunston.
Gleeson wasn’t the only one to stir up this year’s Logies. After being inducted into the Hall of Fame, the retired journalist Kerry O’Brien delivered a powerful, no-holds-barred speech celebrating the ABC, criticising government attacks on it, and calling for Indigenous reconciliation and action on the climate emergency.
O’Brien, who stepped down as the host of Four Corners in 2015 after 40 years at the public broadcaster, was introduced by Waleed Aly as “a master” and given a standing ovation.
Opening his speech, O’Brien said although he had worked at every commercial network, his “natural home” was always the ABC, where “the pursuit of excellence wasn’t just permitted, it was expected”.
“There have been the tough times; the budget cuts to the ABC – again, and again, and again – driven more by a desire to punish and by an ideological obsession than because the public broadcaster was inefficient,” he said.
He said the ABC had never been threatened more than it was today and was still “confronting the same sad – and now even the federal police, some of whom have themselves leaked to us in the past, have seen fit to raid the place”.
O’Brien’s passionate speech was at odds with what tends to be a lightweight TV event. He didn’t let journalists off the hook, delivering a call to arms to the profession which shares “great responsibility for the great failures of our time” – including society’s failure to act on climate change. “We the journalists have not cut through the fake news effectively. We have not properly held politicians to account.”
He also spoke of “the failure to reconcile Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australia,” and called for the ratification of the Uluru statement of the heart. “The Uluru statement represents no threat to a single individual in any corner of this country, and certainly no threat to the integrity of parliament – and if you’re told that, don’t you believe it,” he said vehemently. “We like to be seen as one nation made up of many parts. Now it’s time to prove it.”
It was a big night for the ABC, which won in 10 of the 20 categories it was nominated in – including two for Gardening Australia. The show, which celebrated its 30th year this year, was awarded most popular lifestyle program, with the host Costa Georgiadis winning most popular presenter against fellow Gold Logie nominees Gleeson, Aly and Keller.
The animated series and runaway success Bluey won best children’s program, Four Corners won best news coverage for its program on the Thai cave rescue, Mystery Road won most popular drama, and Bloom won most outstanding miniseries and best supporting actress, for Jackie Weaver.
The basketball and tennis champion Dylan Alcott, who hosts the ABC music show The Set, won the Logie for most popular new talent, and delivered a moving speech about the importance of disability representation on screen.
“I used to absolutely hate having a disability,” he said. “One of the reasons was that when I turned on the TV I never saw anyone like me, and when I did see someone like me it was a road safety ad where someone drink drives and has a car accident and the next scene is someone like me – whose life is over. And I was like, that’s not my life.
“I wanted to get a job on TV because I love sharing stories but also to show that people with disability can be talented, funny, humorous – just normal people enjoying their lives.”
But Luke McGregor, who won most popular actor for his role in Rosehaven, was responsible for one of the shortest and sweetest speeches of the night: “I’m single, I’m at the afterparty, thanks.”
Other major awards went to Deborah Mailman (most popular actress for Nine’s Bite Club and ABC’s Mystery Road); Scott Ryan (most outstanding actor for Foxtel’s Mr InBetween); and Jenna Coleman (most outstanding actress for ABC’s The Cry).
Ten’s Have You Been Paying Attention? won most popular comedy show and most outstanding entertainment program and Wentworth (Foxtel) won most outstanding drama series.