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TV Tonight turns 10!

Industry faces come together to mark a TV milestone...

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Standing L to R:
Fiona Choi (The Family Law), Harrison Feldman (Upper Middle Bogan), Brett Climo (A Place to Call Home), Matthew Richardson (Seven’s AFL), Brian Nankervis (RocKwiz), Mal Walden (TEN News), Joel Creasey (I’m A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here!), Jo Hall (Nine News), Gamble Breaux (The Real Housewives of Melbourne).

Seated L to R:
Joe Klocek (Nowhere Boys), Kat Stewart (Offspring), John Deeks (Seven), Colette Mann (Neighbours), Shareena Clanton (Wentworth), Keegan Joyce (Please Like Me), Barry Cassidy (Insiders).

TV talent from all networks have come together to mark 10 years of TV Tonight.

Since January 5th 2007 the site has now racked up nearly 50,000 posts, over 400,000 comments and broken more than a few scoops. More on the retrospective soon…

I thought long and hard about the best way to mark 10 years for my blog.

The date falling in the first week of January meant any kind of physical event was difficult -and in the end I decided it should all be focused online for readers, wherever they are.

So I settled on a group talent photo. Coming together in one place for one purpose would be a statement in itself.

I began discussions with networks about who we could corral. Wow, what a task. Having dealt with publicists for a decade I certainly got a quick lesson in just how hard it was to orchestrate smoothly. I now appreciate their work a little bit more!

Collectively we had to juggle the right mix, availability, concept, approval, fees (nobody took any), hair & make-up, outfits, transport, refreshments. With late cancellations it was a moving feast right to the end. Finally with 16 people all posed on the floor, a 17th was on the phone saying they were running late, could we please hold? Sorry, no! Click!

But I am proud as punch of the final shot -snapped in record time. Nobody could quite believe how smoothly it went.

The 16 personalities you see are drawn from Drama, Comedy, Reality, Light Entertainment, News, Sport, Music and Children’s Television.ABC, Seven, Nine, TEN, SBS & Foxtel are all represented. I wanted a range of Diversity, with veterans sitting alongside rising stars – hallmarks of the site for the past decade.

It’s also fitting that Colette Mann is sitting front and centre. Decades ago Colette was instrumental in helping me attend the set of Prisoner for an article for the school newspaper. Guess I’ve come full circle….

Thank you to the talent, publicists, agents and pals who assisted on the day in making this happen, plus photographer James Penlidis & Sanjeev.

You will also see industry birthday galleries & posts today and beyond, with posts acknowledging the occasion for a while to come.

Of course today is my day to thank you, loyal readers, who are here day in and day out, on weekends, public holidays, after hours, most more than once a day. Whether in the industry or audience, it’s a mutual passion that has kept the site alive.

If you wish to send any birthday messages via social media feel free to use the hashtag #TVT10.

David.

Photo: James Penlidis

73 Responses

  1. I used to tune in to Joy FM at 5.30 on my drive home specifically to hear TV Tonight so I remember when you first announced the blog on-air and I’ve been here ever since. Congrats David on a fantastic achievement of 10 years.

  2. Happy 10th Birthday TV Tonight! Congratulations David on such a sensational achievement! Like countree_boi, I’ve been a daily visitor to this site since you mentioned you were doing a blog on Joy FM all those years ago.. and I’m pretty sure I’ve probably read 99% of those near 50,000 posts!! Wonderful stuff.. love your work 🙂

  3. Congratulations, David. Ten fantastic years. I’ve been lurking since the orange days and commenting from purple (it’s a much nicer colour).

    Really appreciate your commitment and all the time and effort that goes into making this the absolute best TV blog in the known universe. I watch bugger all FTA these days but your site is still an important port of call for me in the morning and usually again in the evening.

    Here’s to another ten years.

  5. Congratulations David!

    I’ve been visiting this site, probably for the full 10 years it has been running. It’s one of the first sites I look at in the morning (usually before facebook) and I check back multiple times per day, this is despite my hours spent watching free to air TV dwindling.

    Thank you for the interesting articles and your dedication to maintaining a truly engaging site for TV fans to visit.

  7. Well done David. Your page is one I’ve been coming to for info and entertainment for the 10 years you’ve been doing it. Here’s to the next 10! Cheers!

  12. Congratulations on the great photo – as you note, its fitting the image reflected all the major Aussie networks. More importantly, well done on achieving ten years of consistently high-quality, reliable and entertaining material on all things TV – a real achievement to be proud of. Here’s to the next ten years!

  13. Congratulations!!! What a wonderful and eclectic group of people.
    You must be soo chuffed, David. You deserve all recognition you get. Your passion and patience is amazing. Here’s to 10 more years. First site I go to every day. Even before Hotmail!!
    T

  14. Congratulations David on this fantastic milestone. As an avid reader of this site and keen tv viewer I appreciate this site and all the hard work that comes along with it.

  18. Oh my…I can remember back to the orange/black days…
    And funny…you look at pics like that and do not realise …well I didn’t…what it takes to make it happen…Happy Birthday TVT.

  20. Happy 10th birthday to David and TV Tonight! What a milestone. I’ve been coming here since 2008 when the blog was orange themed in WordPress. I have enjoyed coming on here and following the latest news, TV scoop and comments. Hopefully this site shall have many more birthdays to come!

  21. Congratulations on 10 amazing years and to many more. I stumbled across this blog after listening in the afternoon to you on the Drive show on Joy FM and haven’t looked back.

    1. Happy birthday TVT ??? What a great photo showing the diversity of talent on our screens. Here’s to many more.

      I decided to post underneath my brother’s comment given he introduced me to this site so many years ago and between the two of you I keep up with my TV news as there is no other reliable source.

      And like my brother said thanks for taking time to individually reply to comments whenever you can.

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