Set in 1986, The Newsroom has plenty of retro drama, including the Chamberlain case, Challenger disaster and of AIDS crisis. Creator Michael Lucas talks to Matt Myers.
Australian television has a history of award-winning and enthralling dramas. In recent years, shows such as Underbelly, Redfern Now, Offspring, A Place to Call Home, Mystery Road and Rake have etched their way into TV folklore. Always at the root of any great show are the creatives, and one such person is Michael Lucas, creator/writer of Party Tricks, Five Bedrooms and new ABC drama The Newsreader.
Over the last ten years, Lucas has written for several productions, introducing some memorable gay characters and stories. As with many of us, the writer’s childhood was filled with creativity and escapism, in an era where the big budget film made a lasting impression.
Michael Lucas (right) with The Newsreader cast members Robert Taylor and Marg Downey
“I was one of those film and TV nerds,” says Lucas.
“I was obsessed with Star Wars, Indiana Jones and Disney movies, and I knew I wanted to work in film and television. I did a lot of short story writing and such, but it was just like any other normal school kid. I only started to specialise in writing once I studied at a tertiary level.”
For Lucas, his foray into television was not unlike that of a movie. Being amidst his peers, it took some ingenuity, persistence and of course talent, to be noticed and get his big break.
“I worked for many years as an assistant for different film and TV companies,” he says.
“I tried really hard to get a script on a show and didn’t get any, but finally in 2009 I was picked to write a script for Offspring. It was a new show, and I came in right from the start, and was very lucky because it was so successful and ran for several years. At the same time, I was doing a lot of my own writing and I not very subtly, would pass on copies of my work. I let them know that if a screenplay were to come my way, I would certainly love it! It took a couple of years, but it finally all came together with Offspring.”
“It was very different with conversations that questioned if we should show two men kissing.”
Since then, the writer and now producer has carved a successful career working on shows such as The Wrong Girl, Wentworth, Tangle, Sisters and Rosehaven. Dramas such as these have never held back on introducing pivotal LGBTIQ characters – something Lucas has helped to perpetuate.
“In season two of Offspring we introduced the gay brother of Eddie Perfect’s character, and pretty much every show I’ve worked on since then, has had at least one gay storyline.
Anna Torv and Sam Reid in a scene from The Newsreader
“It’s something I’m always keen to get in there,” says Lucas.
“I guess it’s just my own life experience, and all the shows I’ve been involved with have been relationship dramas. It’s my reference point and comes up a lot. But I’ve really seen a change since I began writing back in 2010. It was very different with conversations that questioned if we should show two men kissing, and the idea that Australian audiences would switch off. People would even throw statistics at you, suggesting if we include a particular scene, we’d lose thirty percent of the audience. But I was incredibly lucky to be on productions where the actual people making it were also keen for what I wanted. Often the other creatives were gay as well.”
“I found that commercial news was uncomfortable putting gay AIDS sufferers on television.”
Having already created Party Tricks and Five Bedrooms, Lucas’s new production The Newsreader, has also included gay characters and storylines embracing the very ‘newsworthy’ decade of the Eighties. Set in a 1986 Melbourne newsroom, the story centres around the inexperienced yet ambitious TV reporter Dale Jennings, played by Sam Reid (Lambs of God) and the relationship he forms with the successful news anchor Helen Norville, portrayed by Anna Torv (Secret City). Amidst a group of diverse characters, the backdrop covers major stories of the time including the Challenger disaster, Halley’s Comet, Lindy Chamberlain, Chernobyl and the Russell Street bombing. A poignant focus is also given to the AIDS epidemic and how, for a time, gay men were demonised, particularly when the disease spread through blood transfusions.
“In my research, I found that commercial news was uncomfortable putting gay AIDS sufferers on television,” says Lucas.
“However, if it was a woman or child, they became a big focus in the media.
The Newsreader creator and writer Michael Lucas
My father was an infectious diseases doctor and my mother a nurse, and they both worked at Fairfield Hospital which was the main AIDS hospital in Melbourne. That was a huge part of my childhood and part of the reason I’m obsessed with news from that era. My family was fixed on the news and my dad appeared on it quite a bit. I was also in the difficult position of being a gay kid, not that I really knew it at the time. But I was unusually quite close to the AIDS crisis and literally found out what being gay was from hearing my dad on the news. He would be talking about what AIDS did to people, and of course that made it really hard to reconcile my sexuality as I grew up.”
The Newsreader highlights a time where people listened to the New Romantics, wore Ray-Bans and played Nintendo. But what was the actual inspiration to the show’s premise?
“When I first started working on it, it had nothing to do with Newsrooms,” says Lucas.
Sam Reid as Dale Jennings and Chai Hansen as Tim Ahern in The Newsreader
“I was really just interested in the main character of Dale. I’d always wanted to write a protagonist who was trying to live up to an image of masculinity but struggled with it. I then imagined it as a relationship drama with a female lead who did have those stereotypical male traits of being alpha, confident and volatile, but was punished for it. So, I wrote a relationship drama with those characters at the centre and set it in the Eighties. With Dale going for this rigid masculinity, I wondered if he would be a politician, sportsman or actor, then suddenly I thought newsreader!
“I literally found out what being gay was, from hearing my dad on the news.”
The concept and treatment paid off for the writer, with the ABC welcoming an idea that followed through to what is now appearing on their network.
“When I first pitched it to the ABC they got very excited,” says Lucas.
“The thing is, they have a huge news archive and saw a great potential to dig into real footage. They suggested using actual events as a backdrop which I loved, and they would send me the original bulletins of the 7.30 report from the Eighties. I’d spend hours and hours watching the 1986 news and we plucked out the best bits for the show’s backdrop.”
When it comes to the inspiration for the writer’s own shows and characters, it is those moments from everyday life that lead to the creation of a new story. Along with The Newsreader, Five Bedrooms and Party Tricks have also had unique evolutions.
“I had attended a lot of weddings and would meet this batch of people who weren’t living the conventional life of marriage, kids and property,” says Lucas.
“I was in that category and always felt bonded with these people. I’d joke how none of us could afford to buy a house and we should all pull together and by one. I was quite serious, but people would made jokes about communes, and I never managed to convince anyone. So, I wrote a show about it, with my great friend Christine Bartlett, who was in the same category. That’s how Five Bedrooms came about.
Michael Lucas
“Weirdly, Party Tricks came from the 2010 election night between Tony Abbott and Julia Gillard where it ended in a hung parliament. There was a report shown of the two politician’s very long history and all the times they had met over the years. We were sitting there thinking, “Wow, politicians move in the same circles!”. Then it suddenly occurred, what if two people had an affair and later on were faced off in an election?”
While Lucas has made a conscious and welcomed effort to bring more visibility to LGBTIQ characters, in the past they were few and far between. Over two decades we have finally seen a rise in queer themes and stories, but what shows get the tick of approval from Lucas?
“While growing up, the gay characters that made an impression on me were Madonna’s backing dancers from In Bed with Madonna. Even watching Four Weddings and a Funeral as a teenager, I thought it was unusual to see a gay couple in a long-term relationship, mind you they never showed them kiss. Back in the day I also drank up Will & Grace and I got into Glee, but our new era has much more mature and naturalistic dramas, loaded with gay characters. I think It’s a Sin is a masterpiece. Russell T Davies has written so many great shows like Queer as Folk and Torchwood. I also still enjoy Looking, which has great characters. And The White Lotus is also fantastic, with Murray Bartlett from Looking finally doing an Australian accent!
Anna Torv plays Helen Norville in The Newsreader
For Lucas, the journey thus far has been a lucrative one. Having cut his teeth on some of Australia’s best television and film productions, there’s no one more appreciative than he when it comes to the projects worked on and people met.
“I could say great things about all of those productions I’ve worked on,” he says.
“Offsping will always be very special for me, because it was my first gig. I spent so much time there and everyone was like family. I also loved working on Wentworth because it was such a departure for me. I got to work on that big tragic love story between Bea Smith (Danielle Cormack) and Allie (Kate Jenkinson). But in the end, Five Bedrooms and The Newsreader are very special because I created them from a blank page.”
From the blank page to the world stage, Five Bedrooms is a great example of Lucas’s success, with the show selling internationally and second season now streaming on Paramount Plus.
“It’s a pretty amazing feeling,” says Lucas.
“Five Bedrooms now goes all over the world. Being the creator and producer means I also have a big voice with casting, and I feel really connected to such an ensemble group. I’m very lucky, and I hope The Newsreader is similarly embraced and appreciated.”
The Newsreader screens on ABC iview
