As far as ABC budget cuts go this one hits hard. ABC 7.30 has told comedian Mark Humphries, who has been producing satirical sketches for the program since 2018, that his services are no longer required. In an email to 7.30 staff, executive producer Joel Tozer thanked Humphries and his co-creators Evan Williams and Chloe Angelo for the “wit, creativity and dedication” over the six years ahead of their final sketch going to air.
Sarah Ferguson bid farewell to the trio on 7.30 on Thursday night and Humphries told his Twitter followers he would be leaving to pursue other things.
After five years, tonight’s sketch will be our last at 7.30. Thank god for that, I hear some of you say. To everyone else, thank you for watching and for supporting both our work and my pivot to a beard. pic.twitter.com/EeugOqYFIK
— Mark Humphries (@markhumphries) August 24, 2023
You know what this means?
— Norman Hermant (@NormanHermant) June 21, 2021
He’s back.#BarabbusLoins pic.twitter.com/gaOjFLAom5
Tozer said it was a difficult decision, “but in a tight budgetary environment this change will allow us to expand the range of journalism we can pursue on the program”.
“7.30 has and will continue to ensure comedy has a rich tradition in the program.”
Humphries said it has been a great honour to be part of 7.30: “I’m enormously grateful that the show’s producers allowed Evan and I to sully the show’s good name for so long.”
Anderson stays put
A little higher up the chain at the ABC, Ita Buttrose’s parting gift has been to ensure David Anderson was reappointed as managing director for another five years. In her final months as chair Buttrose proposed to the board that Anderson’s term should be extended because Aunty was sailing into five years of turmoil as it moved away from traditional broadcasting into digital-first delivery.
Weekly Beast understands Buttrose was not keen to embark on an international executive search for a new MD and preferred the steady hand of Anderson. The last international searches produced Jonathan Shier and Michelle Guthrie, both of whom were sacked by the board.
The board agreed and Anderson was re-signed in April, with the new term to start in July and an announcement planned for September. But the news leaked out this week and the re-appointment was hastily confirmed.
“Following the announcement that ABC chair Ita Buttrose will not seek a second term and to end speculation about the tenure of ABC managing director David Anderson, the ABC board is pleased to confirm that David Anderson has been reappointed for a further five years effective 1 July 2023,” the ABC said on Wednesday.
Former managing director Mark Scott was similarly extended for another term back in 2010.
Sources say the delay between reappointing Anderson and announcing the decision was due to the the looming restructure which was announced in June and involved the loss of 120 jobs.
Peace mission
Another big departure this week was Stan Grant, who has resigned from the ABC and accepted the position of inaugural director of the Constructive Institute Asia Pacific, based at Monash University. In May the Kamilaroi and Wiradjuri man stood down from Q+A after receiving “grotesque racist abuse”.
Before he boarded a plane to Denmark where the institute is based at Aarhus University, Grant told Weekly Beast it was an exciting adventure and just where he needs to be.
“You know, there’s been so much speculation about why I’m leaving the ABC,” Grant said. “I’ll be going back there to work with them through this role but I really need to do this work. This is what I need to do. I’ve spoken at writers’ festivals about how I want people to find each other. This endless conflict, we have to find a love and respect for each other. We have to allow each other to have our views and disagree without getting our tribes and going to war against each other.”
Mogul meet and greet
The prime minister opened Seven’s state-of-the-art newsroom and studios on Thursday night, a high-tech facility built in South Eveleigh in Sydney which will be home to the head office as well as Seven News and Sunrise.
In what was a demonstration of the enduring power of media moguls, Albanese posed with Seven West Media chair Kerry Stokes and Seven CEO James Warburton, as well as soapie stars and newsreaders.
“Seven has long been part of our shared story – entertaining us, informing us, creating shows that bring us together,” Albanese said. “They’ve shown how to adapt, how to innovate, how to look to the future and be ready for what’s coming.
“The recent broadcasts of every Matildas game is an example. What a joy that was. What an amazing moment in Australian sport. You did a great job at bringing it to all the millions of Australians who couldn’t squeeze into the stadiums.”
Full marks
The 2023 Kennedy awards’ journalist of the year trophy went to the excellent Australian Financial Review duo Neil Chenoweth and Edmund Tadros for their coverage of the Price Waterhouse Coopers tax scandal.
There was one award we really chuckled at: the one the Kennedys gave to Kennedys founder Adam “our own legend” Walters for his “outstanding contribution to the foundation and growth of the Kennedy awards”.
Set up 12 years ago by the friends of the late Daily Telegraph and Fairfax Media crime reporter Les Kennedy, who died aged 53 in 2008, the Kennedys was named the “Bogan Walkleys” by the AFR’s Michael Roddan when he picked up a trophy for financial journalism in 2021. The organisers were not impressed and he was ejected from the event but the name has stuck.
“Our own legend, Adam Walters, received, much to his surprise, a trophy for his outstanding contribution to the foundation and growth of the Kennedy awards,” the foundation said.
“His impromptu speech was terrific despite his concerns afterwards that, after a bottle of champagne, he’d mucked it up. He hadn’t, not for a second.”
Well deserved award. Adam, you have been the heart of the Kennedys for so long. We appreciate everything you have done. @kennedyawards https://t.co/pp3phRB9it
— Natalie O'Brien (@NatalieJourno) August 19, 2023
Comics cut
Fast on the heels of a reduction in the frequency of daily editorials in June, the Age has dropped its syndicated comic strips from the paper’s print editions. The reason given by editor Patrick Elligett is the limited budget.
“The cost of running those syndicated comics across our papers is greater than the average annual salary in Australia,” he said. “In terms of value for money, our subscribers and our state will gain a lot more from having more journalists on the beat, holding power to account.”
Local cartoonists and artists including Matt Golding, Jim Pavlidis, Joe Benke, Matt Davidson, Cathy Wilcox and Andrew Dyson will continue to appear. The Sydney Morning Herald has also dropped its strips.
Rundle returns
Two months after deleting an offensive article by correspondent-at-large Guy Rundle, Crikey has welcomed the writer back into the fold, and judging by the comments on his piece the subscribers are happy. Rundle has been in the wilderness after being condemned for an opinion piece about Brittany Higgins, in which he said the former Liberal staffer had “about as much motive as anyone has ever had to make a false sex crime claim”.
The independent website eventually apologised to Higgins and apologised twice but remained silent for weeks on whether Rundle would return.
Perhaps it was a coincidence that Rundle’s return was overshadowed by Crikey’s announcement on Tuesday that the Fox Corporation CEO, Lachlan Murdoch, had paid them $1.3m in legal costs for his dropped defamation suit.
The two parties cannot agree on the motives behind Murdoch handing over $1.3m instead of the $1.1m Crikey asked for. Privately, Crikey says it did not expect an additional $200,000 and it must have been an “administrative error”. Murdoch says he wanted to pay Crikey’s costs in full so the donated $588,735 from a Crikey fundraising campaign is paid to the Alliance for Journalists’ Freedom. The total legal costs incurred by Private Media were more than $1.3m but the court usually doesn’t award the full amount so they only asked for $1.1m.
