Skippy the Bush Kangaroo is an Australian television series created by Australian actor John McCallum, Lionel (Bob) Austin and Lee Robinson produced from 1967 to 1969 about the adventures of a young boy and his highly intelligent pet kangaroo, and the various visitors to the fictional Waratah National Park, filmed in today's Waratah Park and adjoining portions of Ku-ring-gai Chase National Park near Sydney.
Edward Sidney Devereaux, better known professionally as Ed Devereaux, was an Australian actor, director, and scriptwriter who lived in the United Kingdom for many years. He was best known for playing the part of Matt Hammond the head ranger in the Australian television series Skippy the Bush Kangaroo. He was also involved in the series behind the scenes, Devereaux writing the script and directing the episode The Veteran (1969), for which he received much critical acclaim. Devereaux based the story of the episode "Double Trouble" on an idea conceived by his children, wrote the screenplay of "Summer Storm" and the script for "The Mine". He also played the part of Joe in the Australian 1966 film They’re a Weird Mob. The film was a local success.
Ken James is an Australian former actor and celebrity chef. He is most widely known for his role in children's TV show Skippy the Bush Kangaroo as Mark Hammond to which be became known locally and to international audiences Since his debut in Skippy, James continued to work in film, television and theatre for another 36 years. In December 2009, James was diagnosed with stage three non-Hodgkin lymphoma, which escalated to stage four by 2011. James started chemotherapy, and as of November 2020 the cancer is in remission. James was also actively involved in the Victorian Police Force as an unsworn member from 1993 to 2013.
Jack Thompson, AM is an Australian award-winning actor, who is a major figure of Australian cinema, particularly Australian New Wave.
They're a Weird Mob is a 1966 Australian comedy film based on the 1957 novel of the same name by John O'Grady under the pen name "Nino Culotta", the name of the main character of the book. It was the penultimate collaboration of the British filmmakers Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger.
John Neil McCallum, was an Australian theatre and film actor, highly successful in the United Kingdom. He was also a television producer.
Nickel Queen is a 1971 Australian comedy film starring Googie Withers and directed by her husband John McCallum. The story was loosely based on the Poseidon bubble, a nickel boom in Western Australia in the late 1960s, and tells of an outback pub owner who stakes a claim and finds herself an overnight millionaire.
Barrier Reef was an Australian television series that was first screened domestically in 1971. However, 19 episodes had already premiered on British television on BBC1 between 5 October 1970 and 15 February 1971 and four more aired between 5 April and 3 May 1971 in advance of Australian broadcast.
Lee Robinson was an Australian producer, director and screenwriter who was Australia's most prolific filmmaker of the 1950s and part of the creative team that produced the late 1960s international hit television series Skippy the Bush Kangaroo.
Dust in the Sun is a 1958 Eastmancolor Australian mystery film adapted from the 1955 novel Justin Bayard by Jon Cleary and produced by the team of Lee Robinson and Chips Rafferty. The film stars British actress Jill Adams, Ken Wayne and an Indigenous Australian actor Robert Tudawali as Emu Foot.
Rock 'n' Roll is a 1959 Australian film directed by Lee Robinson. While often referred to as a documentary, it is essentially a complete filming of a rock concert held in October 1959, at Sydney Stadium. The film was commissioned by Lee Gordon to promote a string of 1959 shows entitled Lee Gordon's 1959 Rock'n'Roll Spectacular, mainly showcasing Australian and New Zealand artists. While the show was largely based around native talent, the headline act was the American singer and pop idol Fabian.
Ross Napier was one of Australia's leading radio and TV writers from the 1950s to 1990s, as well as an accomplished novelist. Born in Sydney in 1929, he began writing short stories for magazines while still in high school, selling his first script at 17. Shortly after, he became a staff writer for Grace Gibson Radio Productions, and during the 1950s and 1960s his radio serials were broadcast Australia-wide and internationally. This firmly established Napier as one of Australia's leading drama writers. Whilst at Gibson's he met Ann Fuller, who he married in 1953.
Joy Cavill was an Australian screenwriter and producer.
The Dawn Fraser Story is a 1964 documentary film about Australian swimmer Dawn Fraser. It was made by Joy Cavill, who later made a feature film about Fraser, Dawn! (1979), and had a romantic relationship with her. It is one of the few Australian documentary films of the time to be directed by a woman. It was made by the short lived Waratah Film Productions.
Shannon's Mob is an Australian TV series about an Australian intelligence agency. It was the last TV series from Fauna Productions, who were responsible for Skippy the Bush Kangaroo among others.
Herc McIntyre was head of Universal Pictures in Australia from 1920 until the 1950s. He was important in the career of Charles Chauvel, helping finance several of his films. He was also friends with Lee Robinson and helped him distribute The Phantom Stockman (1953).
Fauna Productions is an Australian film and TV production company established by Lee Robinson, Lionel ('Bob') Austin and John McCallum who met during the making of the film They're a Weird Mob (1966). Robinson, Austin and McCallum wanted to make productions aimed at the international audience and enjoyed great success with the TV series Skippy the Bush Kangaroo and Barrier Reef.
Stormy Petrel is an early Australian television drama. A period drama, the 12-episode serial told the story of William Bligh and aired in 1960 on ABC. It was the first live TV serial from the ABC.
Adventure Unlimited is a 1965 Australian anthology TV series. It was produced by Lee Robinson and associate produced by Joy Cavill. The directors included Ken Hannam. It was made by Waratah Film Productions a short lived company that came out of an unsuccessful attempt to gain a third commercial television licence.
Waratah Park is a heritage-listed former Aboriginal land and fauna sanctuary and now Aboriginal title claim at 13 Namba Road, Duffys Forest in the Northern Beaches Council local government area of New South Wales, Australia. It is also known for serving as the fictional Waratah National Park, the filming location for the Australian television series Skippy the Bush Kangaroo, when the area was still undeveloped Crown land. After the series ended, the Crown land remained mostly undeveloped, with the government granting management of the area to a series of operators until August 2014, when the government passed full ownership of the land to the Metropolitan Local Aboriginal Land Council. It was added to the New South Wales State Heritage Register on 27 February 2015.
