January 29, 2025 • 10 mins
Actor Anna Torv and Producer Michael Lucas join Clairsy and Lisa to talk about the award-winning and much-loved TV series ‘The Newsreader’, which is back on screens this weekend with a new Season 3.
The Newsreader Season 3 begins this Sunday 8:30pm on the ABC and iView.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
In my humble opinion, although I do like to think
of myself as quite discerning. The Newsreader is one of
the best shows that has ever been on Australian television.
Season three starts at eight thirty on Sunday on the
ABC and ABC iView and we are so lucky to
have the wonderful star at a torf and creator Michael
Lucas with us this morning.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Good morning, morning you two.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
What a beautiful introduction.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Yeah, well we're going to start singing. Please don't go.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
What a beautiful Let's not think about that yet, okay.
Synopsis The Newsreader, in case you're not after date with
It explores the personal and professional lives of the journalists
and crew in a nineteen eighties Australian newsroom. As Helen Norvel,
played by Anna trv It becomes the first female newsreader
of the ratings dominant News at six. Now full disclosure,
(00:48):
I started in this job in radio newsroom, but I
also worked weekends in a television newsroom and it was
the second half of the eighties. So I am here
to tell you the nastou level. The accuracy of this
show is so spot on. Michael Lucas, you do not
look old enough to have been able to get this
(01:10):
as spot on as it is.
Speaker 4 (01:13):
Well, I can assure you, well, look, I was a
kid in the eighties. Yeah, but I certainly remember news
rooms of that area. I did actually do work experience
in a newsroom. But in nineteen ninety four, ye, a
bit afterwards that a lot of the you know, a
lot of a lot of the same people, characters and
situations were still occurring.
Speaker 5 (01:33):
Then right, absolutely, mate, a lot of things got nailed,
and of course.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
We definitely you were there as well as well.
Speaker 5 (01:42):
While I got fired by Bill Mcinni's I think made
eighties technology from the right from the get go, that
first episode Series one with Dale answering his answer checking
his answering machine. Did you have all kinds of people
out scouting and sourcing this old tech to get it?
How it was so on point?
Speaker 4 (01:58):
Yeah? Well, actually we were really cancerned about that how
we would get all that old analog technology. But it
turns out there's a lot of nerves out there that
have kept a lot of stuff in their garages, and
they're all on Reddit forums. And so you go to
these sort of specialized Reddit forums and you find out
that pretty much everything, and they've taken great pride in
(02:19):
keeping them in perfect working order, so generally we're able
to rig them and have them work just like they
did back in the day.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
Yeah, and you must be you must really believe in
and love this show, because we could have lost you
to you know, wider pastures. You're in mind Hunter, you're
in the Last of Us. You've been doing amazing things
and yet here we have you on Australian TV still
as well.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
But i love working in Australia, and I've always tried
to do that. Yeah, Like, to be honest, I mean,
I would pick season three The news Reader over anything
else I've done. I've just loved it. It's just been
just such a joy.
Speaker 4 (02:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
That's quite so great, it too, because it's it's one
of my favorite projects.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Yeah, it was.
Speaker 5 (03:03):
It one of those ones when you first read Helen's
story and you went, I've got to do this, yes, yes, yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:09):
Yeah, And it was also yeah, and it was you know,
Emma Freeman at that point was attached to it. We'd
work together before, and I loved her, and Joe Werner
we'd work together as well, and I loved her, and
Michael was it actors. When I was at NIDER we
did me and I don't remember.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
They were just like point me to the shoulder pads.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
I mean, yes.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
The first two series cover off such big news stories.
That's the still, you know, to remind us of the
stories that all happened in the same year, like the
Challenger launch, Hailey's comment, Lindy Chamberlain's release in the Russell
Street bombing, and the AIDS crisis. That was all in
that first season, and then the second ones there was
the Hoddle Street massacre, the bi centennial celebrations, which, by
(03:53):
the way, I cried laughing at the the the promos
that you had to.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
Do that I remember, but I remember so clearly and
watching them like yea, so clearly. This was just so great, Michael.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
Panning across the you know, the crew singing the song
and how I think, So, what have we got in
season three, which is focuses on nineteen eighty nine.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
Well, it's a blockbuster eighty nine. Absolutely, You've got the
Berlin Wall and Square, Exton Velde's oil spill Lockerbie. I
feel like I'm not just talking it up. I think
it's the best year in terms of news events out
of all the three seasons that we've done, and it
was just such a sort of big end to the
eighties and a real sense of turning the page of
(04:38):
history too.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (04:39):
Absolutely, there are so many huge stories there, but it
was things were starting to change and we were trying
to think what are we going to be in the nineties.
Did you feel that you had to change things from
that sort of mid eighties period to there as well
because our thinking started changing at that point in time.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
Yeah, totally. I mean, you know, there was a real
sense that the Cold War was ending and that had
just dominated the entire decade, and also you know, fashion
was changing, and you'll notice if you're looking in this season,
all of a sudden, there's computers in the newsroom all newsroom,
whereas back in season one they were still using sort
of electric typewriters. And so even in the clothes and everything,
(05:17):
we've tried to sort of just look forward a little
bit this time into the nineties that were just around
the corner.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Lockerby to this day is one of the biggest, most horrendous,
tragic stories that has ever happened.
Speaker 4 (05:30):
Yes, it's unbelievable. I mean, a plane crash, you know,
on its own is just unfathomable. But a plane crash
into a town on you know, right on just before Christmas,
it's just the magnitude of it is just horrifying.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
So the logis feature in this season as well. Now
what is that they say about art imitating life? And
so because I mean, Annie, you've won a LOGI for
for the role.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
Actually we all went so we spent a couple of
days shooting the logis in you know, this great big
ballroom and you know, like that weekend we all kind
of came down to the actor rewards, which was very
metu I think for everybody in the from our show.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Yeah, how was that?
Speaker 5 (06:10):
Did you get to go in one of those silver
Ford LTDs that you had on the set, because that
was pretty cool. Well man had one of those things
that brought bake some memories.
Speaker 4 (06:18):
I have to say that.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (06:21):
Weirdly the cars obviously a great deal of care is
taken with the cars. Yes that they are protected so carefully.
I remember one time being attracted by one of those
cars and wanting to go and sit in and take
a picture, and before I knew it, the owner was
right there, just making sure I didn't do anything wrong
with it because he loves that car. Protected some driving scenes.
(06:41):
She is an amazing drive. Really, no sun double necessary.
You can do a very fast point turn.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
That's because my first car was like a nineteen seventy
eight Corona.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
You're the quadriple threat right there. You can drive as well.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
And a seventy seven.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Dat's in one twenty y so they said you can
drive a manual.
Speaker 3 (07:04):
Friend of Wayne apparent both you don't want your car
broken into or you know, stolen, you just got to
get a manual exactly.
Speaker 5 (07:12):
But you're right about those car owners, if they're on set,
they're more protective than the people with child stars. Ash.
Speaker 4 (07:19):
That is sadly true, Michael.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
It's the last season. I'm not quite ready to talk
about that yet. But is it because it's the last
year of the eighties, Is because you're.
Speaker 4 (07:32):
High or there's certainly something that feels right about ending
at you know, at the crescendo of the eighties. It's
really just more of the characters, Like we had a
really specific idea of the kind of character arcs we
wanted to take Helen and Dale, and they've had a
big arc and this like the where they were at
the beginning to where they end up in just a
(07:52):
few years later. It's huge, and you know, rather than
trundle them along and keeping on engineering, we felt like
we wanted to bring them to a specific and kind
of cathartic conclusion that you know, hopefully would make the
whole the series as a whole, feel really satisfying.
Speaker 5 (08:12):
Okay, that's a good point, now, you two. We're into
twenty twenty five. As we know, twenty twenty six is
the time that it's listed to finish, and I speak
of the completion of the new studios and new film
studios here in Perth. Can we any chance we could
see both of you being able to work here in
the West because that a new setup is going to
be wonderful.
Speaker 4 (08:29):
Look, we've got a lot of over particularly working in studios.
I have to say that The news Reader was shot
almost all on location, and because it was the nineteen eighties,
they were the most terrible, decrepit old buildings we tried
to pretty up. So the notion of being in a
brand new, perfect gleaming person studio.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Very low araplanes, Yeah sounds good, not a fly path.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yeah, we'll have a car ready for Ana. If you're
working over here.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
We.
Speaker 4 (09:02):
Can't.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
We can't let you go just without asking, you know,
talking about shows that you don't want to leave, and
the reaction to mind Hunter. There's been two seasons and
us smart Hunter fans want another one so bad, and
we're here or it might come, and then he moves
on to working on something else and he sounds.
Speaker 5 (09:22):
A bit fickle.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
And what do you think that there will be another
mind Hunter?
Speaker 3 (09:28):
I don't know. I mean, like, I feel like no.
I think we've all sort of said goodbye, but I
don't think anyone would say no if that if the
phone call came, Yeah, true, yeah, yeah, there was a
lot of work. That was a that was a really
lovely bunch to actually that show you a very different.
Speaker 1 (09:43):
Vibe, another brilliant, brilliant show.
Speaker 5 (09:46):
Speaking of a reaction, the reaction to that scene in
the last of Us, Tessa's final scene, well, there's no
way out of this.
Speaker 3 (09:55):
She definitely isn't coming back Britain.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
A miraculous comeback that will eventually now. Season three of
the Newsreader begins eight thirty Sunday on the ABC and
ABC Ivy. Thank you so much for joining us and
please give our love to that crazy William mckinner, so
we could not love me.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
We love a twenty five minute bill.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
Yes, it's nuts and we love him.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
Oh, thank you very character. Yes, thanks you. It's been
absolute pleasure.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
With cart waiting Sunday night, Bye bye
In my humble opinion, although I do like to think
of myself as quite discerning. The Newsreader is one of
the best shows that has ever been on Australian television.
Season three starts at eight thirty on Sunday on the
ABC and ABC iView and we are so lucky to
have the wonderful star at a torf and creator Michael
Lucas with us this morning.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Good morning, morning you two.
Speaker 3 (00:22):
What a beautiful introduction.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Yeah, well we're going to start singing. Please don't go.
Speaker 1 (00:26):
What a beautiful Let's not think about that yet, okay.
Synopsis The Newsreader, in case you're not after date with
It explores the personal and professional lives of the journalists
and crew in a nineteen eighties Australian newsroom. As Helen Norvel,
played by Anna trv It becomes the first female newsreader
of the ratings dominant News at six. Now full disclosure,
(00:48):
I started in this job in radio newsroom, but I
also worked weekends in a television newsroom and it was
the second half of the eighties. So I am here
to tell you the nastou level. The accuracy of this
show is so spot on. Michael Lucas, you do not
look old enough to have been able to get this
(01:10):
as spot on as it is.
Speaker 4 (01:13):
Well, I can assure you, well, look, I was a
kid in the eighties. Yeah, but I certainly remember news
rooms of that area. I did actually do work experience
in a newsroom. But in nineteen ninety four, ye, a
bit afterwards that a lot of the you know, a
lot of a lot of the same people, characters and
situations were still occurring.
Speaker 5 (01:33):
Then right, absolutely, mate, a lot of things got nailed,
and of course.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
We definitely you were there as well as well.
Speaker 5 (01:42):
While I got fired by Bill Mcinni's I think made
eighties technology from the right from the get go, that
first episode Series one with Dale answering his answer checking
his answering machine. Did you have all kinds of people
out scouting and sourcing this old tech to get it?
How it was so on point?
Speaker 4 (01:58):
Yeah? Well, actually we were really cancerned about that how
we would get all that old analog technology. But it
turns out there's a lot of nerves out there that
have kept a lot of stuff in their garages, and
they're all on Reddit forums. And so you go to
these sort of specialized Reddit forums and you find out
that pretty much everything, and they've taken great pride in
(02:19):
keeping them in perfect working order, so generally we're able
to rig them and have them work just like they
did back in the day.
Speaker 1 (02:26):
Yeah, and you must be you must really believe in
and love this show, because we could have lost you
to you know, wider pastures. You're in mind Hunter, you're
in the Last of Us. You've been doing amazing things
and yet here we have you on Australian TV still
as well.
Speaker 3 (02:47):
But i love working in Australia, and I've always tried
to do that. Yeah, Like, to be honest, I mean,
I would pick season three The news Reader over anything
else I've done. I've just loved it. It's just been
just such a joy.
Speaker 4 (02:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (02:58):
That's quite so great, it too, because it's it's one
of my favorite projects.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Yeah, it was.
Speaker 5 (03:03):
It one of those ones when you first read Helen's
story and you went, I've got to do this, yes, yes, yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:09):
Yeah, And it was also yeah, and it was you know,
Emma Freeman at that point was attached to it. We'd
work together before, and I loved her, and Joe Werner
we'd work together as well, and I loved her, and
Michael was it actors. When I was at NIDER we
did me and I don't remember.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
They were just like point me to the shoulder pads.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
I mean, yes.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
The first two series cover off such big news stories.
That's the still, you know, to remind us of the
stories that all happened in the same year, like the
Challenger launch, Hailey's comment, Lindy Chamberlain's release in the Russell
Street bombing, and the AIDS crisis. That was all in
that first season, and then the second ones there was
the Hoddle Street massacre, the bi centennial celebrations, which, by
(03:53):
the way, I cried laughing at the the the promos
that you had to.
Speaker 3 (03:59):
Do that I remember, but I remember so clearly and
watching them like yea, so clearly. This was just so great, Michael.
Speaker 1 (04:08):
Panning across the you know, the crew singing the song
and how I think, So, what have we got in
season three, which is focuses on nineteen eighty nine.
Speaker 4 (04:16):
Well, it's a blockbuster eighty nine. Absolutely, You've got the
Berlin Wall and Square, Exton Velde's oil spill Lockerbie. I
feel like I'm not just talking it up. I think
it's the best year in terms of news events out
of all the three seasons that we've done, and it
was just such a sort of big end to the
eighties and a real sense of turning the page of
(04:38):
history too.
Speaker 2 (04:39):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (04:39):
Absolutely, there are so many huge stories there, but it
was things were starting to change and we were trying
to think what are we going to be in the nineties.
Did you feel that you had to change things from
that sort of mid eighties period to there as well
because our thinking started changing at that point in time.
Speaker 4 (04:54):
Yeah, totally. I mean, you know, there was a real
sense that the Cold War was ending and that had
just dominated the entire decade, and also you know, fashion
was changing, and you'll notice if you're looking in this season,
all of a sudden, there's computers in the newsroom all newsroom,
whereas back in season one they were still using sort
of electric typewriters. And so even in the clothes and everything,
(05:17):
we've tried to sort of just look forward a little
bit this time into the nineties that were just around
the corner.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Lockerby to this day is one of the biggest, most horrendous,
tragic stories that has ever happened.
Speaker 4 (05:30):
Yes, it's unbelievable. I mean, a plane crash, you know,
on its own is just unfathomable. But a plane crash
into a town on you know, right on just before Christmas,
it's just the magnitude of it is just horrifying.
Speaker 1 (05:45):
So the logis feature in this season as well. Now
what is that they say about art imitating life? And
so because I mean, Annie, you've won a LOGI for
for the role.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
Actually we all went so we spent a couple of
days shooting the logis in you know, this great big
ballroom and you know, like that weekend we all kind
of came down to the actor rewards, which was very
metu I think for everybody in the from our show.
Speaker 2 (06:09):
Yeah, how was that?
Speaker 5 (06:10):
Did you get to go in one of those silver
Ford LTDs that you had on the set, because that
was pretty cool. Well man had one of those things
that brought bake some memories.
Speaker 4 (06:18):
I have to say that.
Speaker 2 (06:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (06:21):
Weirdly the cars obviously a great deal of care is
taken with the cars. Yes that they are protected so carefully.
I remember one time being attracted by one of those
cars and wanting to go and sit in and take
a picture, and before I knew it, the owner was
right there, just making sure I didn't do anything wrong
with it because he loves that car. Protected some driving scenes.
(06:41):
She is an amazing drive. Really, no sun double necessary.
You can do a very fast point turn.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
That's because my first car was like a nineteen seventy
eight Corona.
Speaker 2 (06:53):
You're the quadriple threat right there. You can drive as well.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
And a seventy seven.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
Dat's in one twenty y so they said you can
drive a manual.
Speaker 3 (07:04):
Friend of Wayne apparent both you don't want your car
broken into or you know, stolen, you just got to
get a manual exactly.
Speaker 5 (07:12):
But you're right about those car owners, if they're on set,
they're more protective than the people with child stars. Ash.
Speaker 4 (07:19):
That is sadly true, Michael.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
It's the last season. I'm not quite ready to talk
about that yet. But is it because it's the last
year of the eighties, Is because you're.
Speaker 4 (07:32):
High or there's certainly something that feels right about ending
at you know, at the crescendo of the eighties. It's
really just more of the characters, Like we had a
really specific idea of the kind of character arcs we
wanted to take Helen and Dale, and they've had a
big arc and this like the where they were at
the beginning to where they end up in just a
(07:52):
few years later. It's huge, and you know, rather than
trundle them along and keeping on engineering, we felt like
we wanted to bring them to a specific and kind
of cathartic conclusion that you know, hopefully would make the
whole the series as a whole, feel really satisfying.
Speaker 5 (08:12):
Okay, that's a good point, now, you two. We're into
twenty twenty five. As we know, twenty twenty six is
the time that it's listed to finish, and I speak
of the completion of the new studios and new film
studios here in Perth. Can we any chance we could
see both of you being able to work here in
the West because that a new setup is going to
be wonderful.
Speaker 4 (08:29):
Look, we've got a lot of over particularly working in studios.
I have to say that The news Reader was shot
almost all on location, and because it was the nineteen eighties,
they were the most terrible, decrepit old buildings we tried
to pretty up. So the notion of being in a
brand new, perfect gleaming person studio.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
Very low araplanes, Yeah sounds good, not a fly path.
Speaker 2 (08:57):
Yeah, we'll have a car ready for Ana. If you're
working over here.
Speaker 3 (09:00):
We.
Speaker 4 (09:02):
Can't.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
We can't let you go just without asking, you know,
talking about shows that you don't want to leave, and
the reaction to mind Hunter. There's been two seasons and
us smart Hunter fans want another one so bad, and
we're here or it might come, and then he moves
on to working on something else and he sounds.
Speaker 5 (09:22):
A bit fickle.
Speaker 1 (09:23):
And what do you think that there will be another
mind Hunter?
Speaker 3 (09:28):
I don't know. I mean, like, I feel like no.
I think we've all sort of said goodbye, but I
don't think anyone would say no if that if the
phone call came, Yeah, true, yeah, yeah, there was a
lot of work. That was a that was a really
lovely bunch to actually that show you a very different.
Speaker 1 (09:43):
Vibe, another brilliant, brilliant show.
Speaker 5 (09:46):
Speaking of a reaction, the reaction to that scene in
the last of Us, Tessa's final scene, well, there's no
way out of this.
Speaker 3 (09:55):
She definitely isn't coming back Britain.
Speaker 1 (09:59):
A miraculous comeback that will eventually now. Season three of
the Newsreader begins eight thirty Sunday on the ABC and
ABC Ivy. Thank you so much for joining us and
please give our love to that crazy William mckinner, so
we could not love me.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
We love a twenty five minute bill.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
Yes, it's nuts and we love him.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
Oh, thank you very character. Yes, thanks you. It's been
absolute pleasure.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (10:22):
With cart waiting Sunday night, Bye bye
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