The Sydney Morning Herald from Sydney, New South Wales, Australia • Page 56

Molt this person had rocks in his head. After all, there were three witnesses who saw Holt enter the water. Others implied that only a man bent on suicide would have gone into the water that day. blithely ignoring the fact that two men went swimming Harold Holt and a man called Alan Stewart and Stewart, who, as he came out alive, obviously didn't go in the water to kill himself. This program reminds me of a newspaper story which in 20 paragraphs describes in detail some dreadful, gory tragedy in South America or somewhere and then the 21st paragraph says: "This report has proved to be unfounded." sullied question mark we have allowed to poison his memory.

"The ocean was a fitting grave for Harold Holt. Perhaps now, at long last, be will be left to restthere in peace." Yuk. And yuk again. The program itself is nicely edited but the re-enactments are less than convincing. The script also keens telling us what a remarkable man Harold Holt was, as if be were the Jack Kennedy of Australian politics and there are endless shots of the pounding surf and seaweed.

The interviews with It is full of purple prose such as: "His (Harold Holt's) election should have beea his crowning success and a gateway to evea greater happiness but for Harold it was the beginning of a hellish pathway that would lead with steady inevitability to the deadly snrf at Cheviot Beach." And bow's this for a closer: "We will never know bow aware be was of what he was doing, bat Harold Holt was not only Prime Minister. He was also a man. A good man with human virtues and human faults who deserves better than the Dame Zara Bate. Sir William McMabon, Malcolm Fraser, John Gorton, and Mrs Mar-jorie Gillespie, the lady on tbe beach, are the high points. But as for the rest what a load of bot air and twaddle.

A lot of the time I couldn't work out just what tbe so-called startling revelations were all about and just what they were supposed to prove. "I don't think be was in the surf at all," said one person, looking darkly and meanfully at the camera, which seemed to prove nothing except that Last week's screaming headlines about how Harold Holt's lover was on the beach the day he vanished into the seas off Port-sea have ensured that viewers in their thousands will tune into the documentary, The Mystery of' Harold Hob, tomorrow Bight on Channel 10 at 8.30. But be warned. Director lain Gillespie's script will have you on the floor writhing in agony. Mike is off and running THE most incongruous sight on Mike Walsh's new night-time program on Channel 9, which to nobody's surprise is called The Mike Walsh Show, was his meeting with Dame Joan Sutherland.

He spent it crouched in a chair with his reminder pad on his knees (as was his custom in the cosy old days) while she loomed above him waving an embroidered cushion or bolster. She was wearing an enormous black tent with a gold awning. She managed to be heard above Walsh's cheerful interruptions, no mean feat as he owns one of the best interrupting mechanisms in the business. Dame Joan said she had ornamented the cushion with needlepoint, executing a lotus design by the painter, Desmond Digby, who designs costumes for many operas in which she appears. Some pretty slides of her Swiss home were shown and in this connection she mentioned the name of James Pope-Hennessy.

Viewers who did not pick up the allu- HAROLD HOLT theories dismissed. even goes for the big three with Neighbours CAN Channel 7 make it three in a row? Next month March 18 is the date being touted around at the moment the channel will add to its soapie stable of Sons and Daughters and A Country Practice yet another locally made serial, a made-in-Melbourne production called Neighbours. By JACQUELINE LEE LEWES IN f.lY VIEW Bzabeth Ridden looks a self-employed plumber, his wife Maria (Dasha Blahoua) and their sons, Danny (David Clencie) and Shane (Peter O'Brien). Then there are the Taylors Marcia (Maureen Edwards) and her husband Neil (Bruce Kerr) and their only child Kim (Jenny Young). Producer John Holmes.

The serial was originally made for the 6 o'clock timeslot but that was before the channel decided to expand its news to one hour and to pull it back to 6 pm. Now Neighbours is scheduled for 5.30 pm. The serial is about the people who live in a cul-de-sac but principally the Robinsons, the Ram-says, the Taylors and Des Clarke and his housemate Daphne Lawrence. Head of the Robinson household is Jim (Alan Dale), a single parent with four children, Lucy (Kylie Flinker), Scott (Darius Perkins), Paul (Stephen Dennis) and Julie (Vicki The Ramsays are made up of Max (Francis Bell), therefore a big decision says Anne. Not a consideration, however, was the thought of being tied up in one production for as long as it rates, which could stretch into years.

Anne is in her early fifties but looks years younger despite the run of terrible luck she has had with her health since 1979. After a massive heart attack which nearly killed her. she had a bypass operation in October 1979. The following year a small cancer growth was discovered in her stomach and she had to have four-fifths of her stomach removed. When she was recouping from the operation, she fell and broke her hip.

Then two years later, she was back in hospital for a second bypass. Now, she insists, she is perfectly well. In fact, she says, she is a much calmer person than she used to be. "It's the little things not the big things. I was a typical A type person and they're the ones who have the heart attack.

I was heading for it, asking for it." NEIGHBOURS: The cast of Channel 7's new soap. up and then no at last weak on TV sion should perhaps send an inquiry for enlightenment to Channel 9. Dame Joan concluded the interview by reciting off the top of her bouffant head her itinerary for the next few months, after which almost anything had to be an anti-climax. Others to appear on opening night were Billy Field, the Batucci Dancers and an Australian joke teller named Maureen Murphy who lives in the United States. Walsh has retained some of his daytime mannerisms, which include a worried look he adopts when he fears one of his guests is going to tell a dirty joke.

The ultimate success of the show will of course depend on the star's ability to attract entertaining guests. The other excitement of the week was a mini-series. Lace, shown over two evenings on Channel 7. It was funnier than The Far Pavilions but not so good to look at, perhaps because there were no elephants. It was about three girls English, American and French who were so naughty at their Swiss boarding school that one of them gave birth to a baby.

Later on the baby turns up, having become a pornographic film star, and asks which of the three is her mother. And just to clarify a point in last Sunday's column. In The Far Pavilions Ben Cross was seen under a topee (a British sun hat) not a toupee. who was producer of Sons and Daughters before this program went into production, said Neighbours was very different from andD. "I've said up to now that Neighbours was a modern-day Sullivans but in fact, it's a gentler program.

I suppose it is supportive rather than destructive in its approach." One of the nicest regular characters is Jim Robinson's mother-in-law Helen Daniels, played by Anne Haddy who played another lovable character, Rosie Andrews in Sons and Daughters. "In Sons and Daughters I had a character part which I enjoyed very much because I was not given many character parts," said Anne. "I usually played the leading female and when I was given Rosie 1 thought, ah, here's challenge which I enjoy very much. 1 got to like Rosie, too. "But Helen is closer to Anne.

She's very supportive, downright, earthy and very modern in her ideas. She wasn't when she was younger but she's developed that way through her experiences." For Anne to be in the serial, she and. her husband actor James Condon had to move from Sydney to Melbourne. It was The system now will be that at the end of each survey, McNair Anderson will release a detailed report which will first have to be approved by the channels, which smacks of censorship. Of course the results will still get out.

Last week, Channel 10's publicity department released them to journalists unaware tbey weren't supposed to. The channel's hierarchy, generally believed to be the prime mover behind the ban, forgot to tell them. A key is needed Actually, some of the figures were wrong which led to some funny conversations with the other channels which complained that their programs were under-rated and, in one case, over-rated. "Well, what did it rate then?" "Sorry, I can't tell you." However, while the figures aren't supposed to be printed, journalists can say whether a program is rating well or not. Perhaps a key would serve the same purpose, something like: rating very well, rating well, rating not so well, rating not very well at all, sickish, and dying.

So, Channel 10 won the first week mainly because Raiders of the Lost Ark rated very well indeed. Perfect Match rated well but not so well as it did last year. It's A Knockout and Star Search rated well as did Eyewitness News which won the first week of the news battle. Terry Willesee rated very well while Mike rated well. Channel 9's Possession is dying and also very sick is Blankety Blanks.

It is going to get mighty repetitious but bear with me because this has a lot to do with freedom of information and all that. The channels themselves created the interest in tbe ratings in tbe first place and now, when the game is serious, tbey have decided they don't want to play anymore. Not very sporting of them, is it? FUNNY about the television ratings, wasn't it? There we all were, geared up for the first week's results and all there was was silence. Previously the channels' publicity people would race to ring journalists with the winning channel usually on the phone first. But apparently late last year the channels' executives agreed that the ratings would no longer be released on a weekly basis.

There was a rumour about this last month. Channel 7 said yes there was an agreement. Sam Cfcisbolm, president of the Nine Network, and George Brown, head of Channel 10 in Sydney, both said they bad never beard of it, which was puzzling. According to Ian McNair from McNair Anderson, it is up to the channels if they want to release the details. McNair Anderson holds the copyright but in previous years if the channels chose to "leak" details McNair turned a blind eye.

DONNIE'S DECADE DONNIE Sutherland's Sounds program will celebrate its 10th birthday next Saturday with a review of the past 10 years of music. The studio audience will be made up of 100 people from the general public and 100 pop "names" including Iva Davies, Smokey Dawson, John Paul Young, Jon English, Angry Anderson, Mental As Anything, Glen Shor-rock. Machinations and Hoodoo Gurus. 3 59 THE SUN-HERALD, 59.