Fast Forward was Australia's highest-rating and most critically awarded commercial television sketch comedy show, broadcast for 90 one-hour episodes from 12 April 1989 to 26 November 1992.
Charles Nelson Reilly was an American actor, comedian, director, and drama teacher known for his comedic roles on stage, film, and television. Reilly performed in the original Broadway casts of Bye Bye Birdie, Hello, Dolly!, and How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, for which he won the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical. His television credits include The Ghost & Mrs. Muir and Match Game. A recording of his autobiographical one-man play Save It for the Stage: The Life of Reilly was adapted into a 2006 independent film.
Kingswood Country is an Australian sitcom that was broadcast on the Seven Network from 1980 to 1984. It was created by Gary Reilly and Tony Sattler and produced by their production company, RS Productions. The series starred Ross Higgins, Judi Farr, Peter Fisher, Laurel McGowan and Lex Marinos, and was a spin-off from a series of sketches on the comedy sketch series The Naked Vicar Show.
The Comedy Company was an Australian sketch comedy television series that first aired from 16 February 1988 until 11 November 1990 on Network Ten. It was created and directed by cast member Ian McFadyen, and co-directed and produced by Jo Lane.
Noeline Mabel Brown, credited also as Noelene Brown, is an Australian actress and comedian. She has appeared in numerous films, television shows, theatrical productions and radio programs dating back to 1959.
Crawford Productions is an Australian media production company, focused on radio and television production. Founded in Melbourne by Hector Crawford and his sister, actress and voice artist Dorothy Crawford, the company, also known as Crawfords Australia, is now a subsidiary of the WIN Corporation.
Margaret Helen Dence is an Australian actress of stage and screen, with a career spanning some seven decades. She is equally at home in both comedy and drama roles.
The Naked Vicar Show is a satirical Australian radio and television series. The classic Australian sitcom Kingswood Country was spawned from sketches in the series.
Ross Higgins was an Australian vaudevillian, character actor, television host, comedian, singer and voice actor. He was best known for his role as Ted Bullpitt in the 1980s television situation comedy series Kingswood Country and brief revival Bullpitt!. He was also a commercial advertiser who provided the voice of animated character "Louie the Fly" in the television ad campaign for Mortein, over a 50-year period as well as Mr. Pound, when decimal currency was first introduced in Australia.
Alexander Francis Marinos is an Australian actor. Notable for his acting role as Bruno, the Italian son-in-law of Ted Bullpitt, on the 1980s Australian comedy television series Kingswood Country and as host of Late Night Legends on ABC2, he was also a presenter on radio station Double Jay in the late 1970s with Ted Robinson.
Gary Peter Waldhorn was an English actor and comedian known for his roles in British television and theatre. He is particularly remembered for his work in the main casts of several British sitcoms. Notable roles and characters played by him included Councillor David Horton in The Vicar of Dibley and Lionel Bainbridge in Brush Strokes.
Colin McEwan was an Australian actor, host, comedian and radio announcer. He was best known for appearing on both the stage and TV versions of The Naked Vicar Show, and the sequel on which it was based, opposite Ross Higgins playing Ted Bullpitt's brother Bob Bullpitt in Kingswood Country and also appeared in the miniseries Day of the Roses. He worked as an announcer on Melbourne radio stations 3AK and 3XY, and was a regular guest on TV variety program In Melbourne Tonight.
Bullpitt! was a short-lived Australian television comedy series which screened in 1997 to 1998 on the Seven Network, reprising the main character in the 1980s sitcom Kingswood Country. It was written by Gary Reilly and Tony Sattler.
Gary Reilly is an Australian radio and television producer and writer. He is known for his work on a variety of comedy series including The Naked Vicar Show, Kingswood Country, Hey Dad..! and Bullpitt!. He won several Australian Writers Guild awards and Logies, as well as being inducted into the Australian Writers' Hall of Fame.
Daily at Dawn was an Australian sitcom that screened in 1981 on the Seven Network. The series was written and produced by Gary Reilly and Tony Sattler, the team behind other popular Australian comedy series such as Kingswood Country, Hey Dad..! and The Naked Vicar Show.
A sitcom is a genre of comedy centred on a fixed set of characters who mostly carry over from episode to episode. Sitcoms can be contrasted with sketch comedy, where a troupe may use new characters in each sketch, and stand-up comedy, where a comedian tells jokes and stories to an audience. Sitcoms originated in radio, but today are found mostly on television as one of its dominant narrative forms.
This article is a summary of 1980 in Australian television.
Australian comedy refers to the comedy and humour performed in or about Australia or by the people of Australia. Australian humour can be traced to various origins, and today is manifested in a diversity of cultural practices and pursuits. Writers like Henry Lawson and Banjo Paterson helped to establish a tradition of laconic, ironic and irreverent wit in Australian literature, while Australian politicians and cultural stereotypes have each proved rich sources of comedy for artists from poet C. J. Dennis to satirist Barry Humphries to iconic film maker Paul Hogan, each of whom have given wide circulation to Australian slang.
Tony Sattler is an Australian television writer and producer most famous for his development of the Australian television comedies The Naked Vicar Show and Kingswood Country with writer Gary Reilly.
