The Legacy of the Legacy of The Late Show

Santo Cilauro and Rob Sitch on The Late Show circa 1992

 

Between 1992 and 1993, Australians were treated to the short-lived, low-rent insanity of The Late Show on ABC TV. Not to be confused with the slick, professional late night American talk-show of the same name, The Late Show was a furiously ill-planned exercise in stupid audacity, with a simple format of pre-filmed segments and comedy sketches broadcast live in a 10pm time-slot on Saturday nights.

Featuring a cast of local comedy stars who met while attending Melbourne University, the show featured partly-improvised sketches parodying current affairs, skewering celebrities, and taking cheap shots at the local culture of suburban Victoria. The writers displayed a deep-rooted love for vaudeville comedy delivered with a sardonic edginess that befits a show of such reckless vision. Aging Australian celebrities earned their second-wind on the show, including musicians John Farnham and Kamahl. A raft of Australian sporting and political figures appeared on the show (often appearing in off-kilter musical performances) and one episode featured a young Russel Crowe in a brief guest spot in character as “Hando” from Romper Stomper.

The show that introduced the phrase “champagne comedy” into the Australian lexicon was a cult success, spanning no more than two seasons on government broadcaster ABC but helping to launch the entertainment careers of many of its regular players. Cast members have gone onto mainstream success with primetime radio shows, television shows, and profitable movies under their collective belts.

That vein is, in fact, deeper again than just these successes. Indeed, the group sprang from an earlier show with a slightly larger cast of familiar faces. This group, and their show, was called the D Generation, and this collective of comedians from the sandstone recesses of Melbourne’s oldest university have quietly imposed their influence on Australian comedy television and film for over 30 years.

The Original D Gen

The group was formed from comics based out of the University of Melbourne, with extra writers and performers joining in the second season to round out the cast. Between 1986 and 1992 they produced two series, four specials, and three albums including the ARIA award-winning The Satanic Sketches.

The cast would include Late Show alum including Rob Sitch, Santo Cilauro, Jane Kennedy, Tom Gleisner, Mick Molloy and New Zealand comedian Tony Martin. The show also represented the earliest performances by Australian comedy icon Magda Szubanski, who has gone on to international success in the years since.

A young Magda Szubanski in an early D Generation skit

 

Sketches were frantic and brimming with surreal humour and the kind of utilitarian costuming and effects that have exemplified Australian comedy shows since. The juvenile, prankster comedy mixed with incisive observations of local life gave the show a relatable quality; there was a naïve charm which offset the low-budget anarchism on full display.

Between 1986 and 1992, the group appeared in a regular weekend radio show on Triple M Melbourne with a rotating cast of D Gen guests before television commitments appeared to take priority. Long-time duo Tony Martin and Mick Molloy would later revisit radio with their drive-time show Martin/Molloy, garnering commercial success and fairly comfortable careers as radio and television talking-heads. Their relationship came to an end around 2008 when the pair had a public falling-out and they have not worked together since.

The Other Late Show

By Source, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33239902

Approaching The Late Show’s 30^th anniversary in 2022, it is worth revisiting the unlikely success that the show created. Hosted by the duo of Martin and Molloy in happier times, the show took on a late-night variety show format, bringing characters and guests into the frequently anarchic show.

Not a well-rehearsed show, the players would frequently “corpse” (industry parlance for laughing during a take) during their nationally-broadcast performance, with wild impressionist Rob Sitch and hyperactive Italian Santo Cilauro often doing whatever they could to encourage it during more ludicrous sketches. The players would be barely able to contain their own laughter, sometimes to contagious effect, as the show went out live to screens across the country.

The charming carelessness that went into many of these moments became a comforting and relatable factor, and a sharp and precise production could have very quickly derailed the train-wreck comedic values.

However, under this silly and barely-managed exterior beat a deeply thoughtful and relevant show. It regularly employed Sitch’s extremely physical impressions of celebrities and political figures against Tom Gleisner’s relatable straight-man journalist character to make variously savage or childish swipes at the news of the day. The lackadaisical charm and snide sarcasm of Mick Molloy and Tony Martin’s quick repartee lent their comedy an anti-establishment quality while still plumbing the familiar rhythms of vaudeville comedy.

 

Tony Martin hosting an awkward Vox Pops on a Melbourne Streett in 1992

 

Tapping the rich vein of community television, the show pre-empted many of the ideas employed in later comedy shows. Parody ads for fake local businesses, like “Pissweak World” or its cousin “Pissweak Water World”, litter the series, each leaning on the cheap production values of community television and late-night advertising. Segments employ a cringe-comedy vox pops style that finds spiritual kinship with the aggressive, unscripted lunacy of Billy Eichner’s Billy On The Street. Finding its home on a late slot on ABC, a government-funded national broadcaster which has had a poor-to-middling ratings history for most of its existence, the show took regular shots at the network that was funding and producing them completely, effectively biting the hand that fed them in fine comedic fashion.

A show of its time, many of the risks taken here would simply not work in such a sensitive and competitive climate as exists in the 21^st century.

Full Frontal Stupidity

Some other members of D Generation’s early lineups went on to success on the Channel 7 sketch comedy show Full Frontal. The show was a ratings success in Australia, indirectly competing with the legacy of The Late Show and featuring Magda Szubanski, Michael Veitch and introducing Eric Bana to Australian audiences.

The show employed a more zany and broad comedic style, including a lot more recurring characters and a more apolitical tone. Sketches didn’t tend towards the controversial, instead making easy targets of safe cultural stereotypes and broad situational comedy sketches. Lasting seven seasons, the show became a major influence on Australian sketch comedy.

Bana, who has since gone on to international success and acclaimed dramatic performances, developed his early iconic character “Poida” on the show. “Poida” (which is just “Peter” in effusive parody of blue-collar Australian dialects) was a fantastically relatable bogan everyman, with just enough education to offer idiosyncratic life lessons in unlikely settings while swigging cheap beer from a can.

Eric Bana as “Poida” on Full Frontal

 

Bana unexpectedly parlayed this promising comedy career into a leading role in the heavily dramatic crime film Chopper, playing the eponymous real-life crook Mark “Chopper” Read. For this role, Bana underwent a major physical transformation and delivered a performance that earned acclaim from Hollywood, audiences, and critics. The film was an international success and earned Bana his first serious acclaim. The frightening menace of his character is marked by his sharp comedic sensibilities, and the role proved Bana’s presence as a serious acting contender. He has since gone on to roles in major Hollywood films and is considered one of Australia’s biggest movie stars.

Magda Szubanski also turned her appearances on the hit show playing broad, bogan characters into a long and storied career in television and film. In 1994 she appeared in the female-led sketch comedy show Big Girl’s Blouse on Channel 7. This show, roughly mimicking the format of Full Frontal, includes the first appearances of the characters that were later developed into the lead cast of hit show Kath And Kim. Kath And Kim has since gone on to international acclaim for its charmingly silly representation of Australian suburban life. In 1995, Szubanski appeared in Oscar-winning family film Babe, alongside film legend James Cromwell, earning wide praise for her performance in the groundbreaking feature. She also appeared in the sequel, Babe: Pig In The City, which was directed by Mad Max creator George Miller.

Other cast members have gone on to various other quiet successes. Michael Veitch, who became one of the show’s breakout stars, became a fixture of Australian comedy shows for a number of years, appearing in short-lived shows and hosting Arts Australia for several years. Marg Downey later made appearances alongside Szubanski in Kath And Kim.

Working Like Dogs

Tom Gleisner, Rob Sitch, Jane Kennedy, and Santo Cilauro went on to form a production company called Working Dog Productions in 1993. Australian audiences may be familiar with their production plate gracing the closing credits of popular television shows.

Among the company’s most popular properties is the bumbling and colloquially friendly character “Russel Coight”, played by sometime-Full Frontal guest Glenn Robbins. The show, called All Aussie Adventures, followed a simple mockumentary-style format as the outback survival expert character guides audiences through his disastrous travels in the Australian bush. The show ran for two seasons initially, between 2001-2002, but has seen enough grassroots support to warrant the production of a telemovie in 2004 and a limited series in 2018 to trade on the show’s nostalgic tone and long-running cult appeal.

Some of the greatest commercial successes this group of creators were Channel 10 prime-time shows designed for a broad, largely apolitical audience, firmly in the category of easily-consumed media. The company created the long-running talk-show The Panel, the format of which is an apparent template for longer-running replacement The Project, and devised the improvisation comedy show Thank God You’re Here. TGYH became an unexpected commercial success and spawned imitators and franchises overseas, including in the US market which was a moderate success.

The group have made more ambitious forays into the world of film, having made three features to varying degrees of success. The latest, 2012’s Any Questions For Ben?, was met with a lukewarm critical response and has been relatively forgotten. Their previous film, however, stands as one of the highest-grossing Australian movies ever. The Dish, an ambitious tale about Australia’s role in broadcasting the Apollo moon landing to television audiences around the world, grossed over $17 million – a remarkable sum for an Australian film.

Still from the film The Castle

Arguably, Working Dog’s biggest contribution to the Australian cultural landscape – while somewhat less lucrative at the box-office – was their first film foray, an ambitiously low-key comedy called The Castle. The film introduced phrases into the Australian lexicon that are still commonly uttered decades since its 1997 release. Lines such as “Tell him he’s dreaming” or “It’s the vibe” still evoke a referential humour for many Australians, even when context is loose at best. The country doesn’t have so many widely successful cultural representations, and so The Castle – with its scathing but sweet image of downtrodden suburbia – has filled a larger than usual space in the shared artistic experience of Australians.

Champagne Comedy

It is hard to underestimate such far-reaching influences on Australian comedy, television, and film. Members of the original D Generation have found their homes in many different places, and with such a heavy focus on writing and production, rather than performance or acting, it’s easy to have lost sight of some of the main players over the last three decades.

Indeed, some of the stars of the Late Show have barely been seen in public performances since those days yet they maintain significant influence behind the scenes. Jason Stephens, for instance, came to prominence as another zany cast-member in the second series of D Generation and went on to be a fixture of The Late Show. He had originally come to the show as a writer, however, and his creative chops have continued to service the film and television industry for the decades since. Stephens acted as the creative director for one of Australia’s largest independent television production companies, FremantleMedia Australia, from 2004-2014. His production of The King, a film based on the life of Australian television legend Graham Kennedy, earned three AFI Awards, the most prestigious film and television awards in the country.

Late Show-alum Judith Lucy has built a career from this early success as one of Australia’s premiere stand-up comics and comedy writers, and she has performed internationally to great acclaim for decades at festivals including Edinburgh Fringe and Melbourne Comedy Festival. Her earliest appearance on the show, however, included a comprehensive test – administered by Molloy and Martin – of her comedy talents which including pressure tests to ensure she could continue telling jokes while, for instance, inside a car crash and the immensely silly sketch still stands as one of her most iconic pieces.

Beyond the direct influence of D Generation alumni on the Australian comedy oeuvre, the show and its stars have borne a strong influence on generations of Australian comedians, writers, and creators. The anarchic sketch comedy of D Generation, The Late Show, and Full Frontal helped paint the television landscape in vivid colour, giving rise to some of our biggest stars in the process, and creating a template for live-television during the 90s. Youth-oriented Saturday morning music program Recovery – which has earned its own special place in the cult-television hall of infamy – echoed the unrehearsed train-wreck comedy of The Late Show, complete with ill-conceived vox pops segments and surreal community-television elements written into the fabric of the show.

The heady political comedy that was the foundation of early Working Dog show Frontline, a satire about news reporting, has been retraced by countless imitators to varying degrees of success, although few with the same focus and charm as Working Dog’s own 2008 series The Hollowmen, following the closed-door dealings of Parliamentary policy advisors.

The kitschy surrealism, prankster spirit, and DIY ethic employed by D Gen cast shows clear influence on the likes of groups like Auntie Donna. Their more subdued forays into mainstream media have provided older Australians with comforting replacements for the talk shows and comedy game-shows that used to be the backbone of national television. Their films have quietly provided the template for a uniquely Australian kitchen-sink comedy, and have influenced writers and performers for close to three decades. Their productions have provided a launchpad for some of the country’s brightest stars and have tapped a rich vein of older stars to breathe new life into their flagging careers.

The members of D Generation are not a terribly self-possessed group where self-promotion is concerned, and you’ll rarely see pictures of them unless they have posed for them intentionally. However, they have rarely remained idle during the last decades and have managed in that time to fold themselves into the DNA of Australian culture in unseen ways. Their outsized influence is in fair contrast to the size of their celebrity, and that seems very much by design.

Karl May

The Official Rulebook of the Australian Contact Cricket League

 

Official Rulebook of the Australian Contact Cricket League

Revised Edition (2021)

Written and Edited by KM May, 2021, Australian Contact Cricket League Rules Committee



Originally published in 1984 by the Australian Contact Cricket League and the Australian Death Sport Commission. Official rules are subject to change only by decision of the ACCL with approval from a special committee of the ADSC, to ensure viability and establish liabilities for the League, Players, Officials, and Commercial Partners. The ACCL and the ADSC allow reprinting of elements from this Rulebook where Fair Use may apply, and for the purpose of disseminating the rules of the game to Players or Officials. The authors/publishers reserve all copyrights.



HISTORY

In the early days of Australian colonialism, soldiers, convicts, and free settlers alike found common interests in the fledgling sports of their homelands. Among the more popular sports, thanks in large part to English occupation, was cricket. Variations of the rules were frequently adopted to accommodate inconsistencies with the playing surfaces in the almost-entirely undeveloped new grounds, which were often simple fields adjacent to prisons colonies. Most of these variants were forgotten as the facilities slowly improved. However, one variant of the rules remained: Contact Cricket.

The sport’s origins are uncomplicated; a game began in a wide field near the colony of Moreton Bay between inmates and guards. Tempers became flared and as a storm loomed, a lone unnamed prisoner who had been kept off the field of play as a reserve – the feared “12th Man” – approached the field with a spare bat in his hand and began assaulting the guards. This resulted in a small riot in which all guards and inmates were injured but luckily nobody was killed.

The following year, the guards and players elected to face each other in a rematch. This time the game continued in a more orderly fashion, with shortened rounds to speed up play and guarantee a sooner result. However, tensions remained high and all the players were becoming increasingly rowdy as the inmates gained a lead on their opponents in the third round of play.

The long game was soon threatened by looming storm clouds again, just as in the year prior. Unwilling to forego a sure victory over their captors, the prisoners proposed a change to the rules to speed up play further. With this change, all of the players would be on the field at once, and each would be equipped with a bat. The guards, enticed by the opportunity to thrash their prisoners with impunity, agreed. And with that, the first game of contact cricket was underway.

Prisoners beat the guards: 76 – 42, with significant injuries in all rounds of play.

The game persisted in backyards and prison-yards until the deployment of Australian troops in the First World War. After this time, the game was regarded as too dangerous to play as it regularly resulted in serious injuries and occasionally death. It was deemed counter to the war effort, and henceforth banned in schools and jails. Ultimately the game was forgotten by newspapers, media, and eventually the general population as commercial sporting bodies began establishing their safer, more-traditional sports in the Australian culture. The game of Contact Cricket became a relic of our sporting past, played only by historical enthusiasts and violent offenders.

In the late 1970s, coinciding with a marked increase in armed robberies in Australia’s eastern states, the sport of Contact Cricket experienced something of a revival within the nation’s penal system and eventually spilled out into the suburbs once again. This formative era in the sport’s history gave rise to a formal set of rules and standards, which encouraged inter-team rivalries at a local level. This era of sporting achievement provided the story of Contact Cricket with such esteemed legends as Tony “Shinboner” Marsten, Jim “Jimbob” Roberts, and Farouk “Fuck You” Aleem.

The fledgling local league began organizing wider tournaments and garnering grassroots support from the community, until finally in the Spring of 1983 four teams from Queensland, two from NSW, three from Victoria, and a team representing the Northern Territory formed a coalition to formalize the rules and the structure of the sport, and afford the game broader community interest (in light of the high number of arrests and legal actions participants had endured up to that date).

Australia remains the only country where the sport is legally played.

RULES

Contact Cricket is played with a flat wooden bat and a hard, leather ball on a large oval field. Two teams of 11 players each compete to achieve the highest score.

The object of the game is to score “runs”, which is when a player successfully strikes the ball and then runs the distance between each wicket at centre-field. Opposing players will attempt to return the ball to a wicket before the “runner” makes it to the line of safety, called the “crease”.

A traditional 3-pillar wicket is used, as in Test Cricket. The centre-field area where the wickets are positioned is called the pitch. The pitch is generally to be kept dry with extra-short grass, or no grass at all, to increase speed and bounce of the ball. Grass in the field is to be kept short and level to aid the ball rolling unimpeded.

PLAYERS

Each team is allowed 11 players. Due to safety considerations, Contact Cricket does not allow a 12th Man as in the Test Cricket version of the rules.

Two umpires are included in the field of play to ensure adherence to the rules of the game and to call stoppages in case of serious injury or death. Umpires are also afforded the ability to call Fouls where a Player has breached the Rules of Physical Conduct.

GAME STRUCTURE

Contact Cricket is a game that spans over four rounds, called “overs”, over two halves, called “innings”. Each of these overs represents a quarter of the game and spans 15 minutes (as in Australian Rules Football, which derived many of its practical rules by sharing fields and players with early Contact Cricket Players) for a total game-time of 60 minutes. This means that one “team” needs to score more runs over the course of two quarters of play than the other team.

Each team begins “at bat” twice per game. When a team is “at bat”, they have batsmen at each of the wickets. When a ball is hit, the runners can attempt to run to the opposite wicket to score a point, or “run”. If the ball is returned to the crease or strikes a wicket, the Runner is out and must return to the player pool on the field.

The Bowler may sheathe their bats on their backs to facilitate bowling freely. Upon releasing the ball, they may unsheathe their bat and return to a defensive position.

All other Players are on the field of play. Each is equipped with a bat and safety-wear. Each player must either aid or disrupt play according to their position in the innings; defensive or offensive. Players on the field cannot score runs until they have been called from the player pool for their turn at bat.

SCORING

The aim of the Runner is to score runs. The ball is bowled toward them and they must hit the ball as far into the field of play as possible. If the Runner is struck by the bowled ball, they must remain in place while the opposite Runner stands at wicket. When the ball is hit into the field of play, the Runner sprints for the opposite wicket, making safety when they cross the line marked as the crease. To do this the Runner must deal with the Wicket Keeper.

The Wicket Keeper is equipped with a double-ended bat and heavy protective gear. The Wicket Keeper’s aim is to prevent the Runner getting to the crease. He stands in front of the wicket and will use extreme prejudice to prevent the Runner making a run. The Runners must overcome the Wicket Keepers to score.

If the Player hits the ball out of the field of play, they are given a score of 6 runs, as in Test Cricket, however they are returned to the player pool and replaced by the next in the batting order.

OUTS

Runners can be called out in a limited number of ways, returning them to the player pool until next innings.

If a Bowler strikes the wicket, the Runner is out.

If a Runner is injured by the Wicket Keeper and cannot cross the crease, he is out.

If the ball is returned to the wicket while the Runner is outside of the crease, he is called “Stumped” and is out.

If the Runner otherwise knocks or molests the wicket, this is also called “stumped” and he is out.

Players on the field cannot handle the ball. Instead, Players must hit the ball in the direction of play with their bats.

If a Player or Runner is caught handling the ball, their team is stripped of 2 runs to discourage interference and enforce compliance.

MULTIBALL

Once an inning, and one per side, a randomized alarm will sound signalling the beginning of Multiball Play. Multiball Play will allow Bowlers to use unlimited extra balls each to bowl towards both Runners simultaneously. This will continue for 2 minutes and each ball on the field at the end of 2 minutes will remain in play until the end of the over.

FIELDING

Players on the field will have bats at hand. Players will prevent the opposite team to attack the ball and will attempt to direct the ball in a preferred direction of play.

Contact will be permitted including shin, leg, arm, bat, and body blows. Intentional head hits are not permitted for the safety and survival of players. The ACCL and ADSC regard previous incidents as tragic accidents and no longer condone the use of high-hit tactics, or the modification of Player bats to include spikes, blades, or additional weights. The ACCL’s legal counsel have advised to no longer allow this kind of behaviour for safety and liability reasons.

Players can hit the ball with both high swings and low ground-hits in order to manoeuvre the ball in the direction of play. Incidental contact with other players will be refereed by the umpires based on severity to ensure contact rules are followed and no other interference occurs, but to also ensure the maintenance of the pace of play.

UNIFORM/SAFETY EQUIPMENT

Due to the high-risk nature of contact sports, protective gear is recommended. The ACCL enforces strict safety protocols, and as such Players and Umpires are required to wear helmets rated to a 5-star ANCAP safety rating. Players are also required to wear moulded shin, chest, and spine guards in all A-Level ACCL tournament matches. The ACCL and ADSC regard previous incidents whereby Players have been injured as tragic accidents and no longer condone Players entering the field of play without the proper safety equipment.

Team/Player uniforms must conform to basic standards of decency as regulated by the ACCL Code of Conduct.

CODE OF CONDUCT

Players and Umpires must obey basic rules of conduct. Personal interactions on the field must not include attacks based on race, nationality, class/economics, disability, gender, sexuality, gang affiliations, beer preference, veganism, vegetarianism, pescatarianism, carnivorism, alcoholism, teetotalism, or religion except for the silly ones (which will be judged on a case-by-case basis by a special committee of the ACCL and the ADSC).

Drug testing will be enforced throughout the tournament season at random, with tests administered by the ACCL Doping Commission. Players who fall below minimum requirements will be brought before the Doping Commission, where they may be fined, administered drugs, or stripped of their right to play in Australia depending on the severity of the offense.

DISCLAIMER

Contact Cricket, the ACCL, the ADSC, and all subsidiaries are subject to Trademark protections. Any entity claiming use of the term “Contact Cricket” as intellectual property or actual property is in breach of the Australian Trademark Regulations Act 2001. Any business or entity gaining pecuniary advantage by use of this material or any other Trademarked material owned by the ACCL or ADSC is liable and may incur civil judgement against them in an Australian Magistrates Court.

The ACCL and the ADSC accept no responsibility for actions undertaken by members of the general public in efforts to imitate or exemplify the dangerous nature of the sport. Warnings are readily available, and common sense should prevail. This is not a real sport, I just fucking hate cricket.