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Airdate: 2019 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras

10 News anchor Narelda Jacobs will join SBS coverage with Joel Creasey, Patrick Abboud & Zoë Coombs Marr.

In a rare example of network alliance 10 News First Perth anchor Narelda Jacobs will join the SBS commentary team of the 2019 Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras parade.

She joins Joel Creasey, The Feed’s Patrick Abboud and comedian Zoë Coombs Marr.

Narelda Jacobs said: “It’s a huge privilege to host such an important event. As always, I’m humbled by the courageous attitude of our community, who show the world what resilience and love looks like every day. 41 years of pride and protest is an amazing achievement and certainly something to celebrate. Wishing everyone a very happy Mardi Gras!”

Joel Creasey said: “I am over the moon (or perhaps rainbow) to be hosting the Mardi Gras broadcast again. Last year was an incredibly special celebration of love and acceptance, and this year is a great opportunity to reflect on the fearless, fabulous characters who make our community so wonderful. I am especially excited to be presenting alongside Narelda Jacobs who I have loved and watched read the news in Perth for many years. And for the first time we’ll be joined by the hilarious Zoë Coombs-Marr alongside Mardi Gras regular, the brilliant Patrick Abboud. It’s going to be a truly epic evening!”

Zoë Coombs Marr said: “Hosting Mardi Gras this year feels like a triumph in many ways. After face planting in the middle of the parade as a 19 year old, I feel relieved to claw back some of my dignity. I’m also filled with immense pride to be part of the LGBTIQ+ family, and cannot wait to be on Oxford St with them showcasing my exceptionally bad dance moves.”

Patrick Abboud said: “I’m so excited to be hosting for the sixth year! 2018 was a huge milestone, an absolute honor to celebrate the legends that brought us through four decades fighting for freedom. Now we look to the future. I’m doing something really special this year with the new guard of LGBTIQ+ young people working across the country to make their communities more inclusive. These fearless warriors for change will surprise you, move you, and shock you as their stories unfold across the broadcast. It’s a new format that I can’t wait to reveal.”

SBS Director of Television and Online Content, Marshall Heald said: “It’s an honour and a pleasure to be broadcasting the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras parade again. Every year, the festival is a wonderful celebration of diversity, inclusion and acceptance. SBS is committed to upholding these values across all of our programming, and proud to bring this joyous event to our audience.”

While the TV broadcast by Blink TV takes place Sunday 3 March at 8.35pm, a live stream will be available on SBS On Demand and the SBS Twitter account on Saturday 2 March.

Founded in 1978, the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras remains one of the world’s largest and loved LGBTIQ+ celebrations. This year the festival is themed Fearless, to honour the sense of resilience, activism, protest and celebration that makes up the LGBTIQ+ community and fuels the continued fight for equality.

The television broadcast will feature the most fabulous floats and costumes in the parade, interviews with celebrities and special guests, commentary from Narelda Jacobs and Joel Creasey, as well as on ground coverage from The Feed’s Patrick Abboud and Zoë Coombs Marr. Patrick will also present another very special series of untold stories that will be shown throughout broadcast.

SBS VICELAND is celebrating Mardi Gras throughout the month of February with a Rainbow Pride movie collection, airing every Sunday including Seventeen, A Moment In The Reeds and Hard Paint.

From Friday 15 February, SBS On Demand will host a Rainbow Pride movie collection, including BPM, Beach Rats and 3 Generations starring Naomi Watts and Susan Sarandon. SBS On Demand will also show Thinking Queer, a special collection of documentaries curated by Queer Screen including The Last Goldfish and Rebels On Pointe.

From Sunday 24 February NITV will have a stellar line-up of programming for Mardi Gras which will celebrate the LGBTIQ+ community and explore this year’s theme Fearless. Appointment viewing will include TV series Shade: Queens of NYC and feature documentary Leitis in Waiting, the story of Tonga’s evolving approach to gender fluidity and the group of South Pacific transgender women battling with religious fundamentalism and intolerance.

12 Responses

  1. Love the fact Narelda Jacobs is hosting she brings so much class to it. I still will have the mute button handy as I don’t like Joel Creasey as a host he talks over anyone.

      1. Mardi Gras should be broadcast live. If they can’t do it this year, they should consider it for next year. If there are enough resources, dead space shouldn’t be an issue as it can be filled with interviews or crossovers to other parts of the parade. If NBC in America has successfully broadcast Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade live and ongoing for many years, it can serve as a precedent for broadcasting Sydney Mardi Gras live.

        1. David is right re dead space etc. and do I recall Foxtel did do it live in the past or at least on delayed turn-around. Any pre-packaging of content to fill the gaps involves producers/production staff employed prior to and on the TX day, editing etc. Costs $$$. But there is no remote comparison to make with the Macey’s parade – it’s choreographed to an inch and even rehearsed overnight – and you are talking US FTA Networks’ mega rights and production dollars being thrown at something curated by professional year round organisers with 50 years experience financed by NYC and a massive corporate such that Maceys is. The Aussie Made Gras is done on the smell of an oily rag by the organisers and the broadcaster and, frankly lucky to get any kind of multi-cam broadcast coverage at all. It’s all about the dollars!!!

          1. I wonder if the Mardi Gras organisation committee could adapt the event for live broadcast. Live broadcast could help raise the profile of the event and attract more viewers. It would benefit not only the organisation, but also the sponsors and event partners.

    1. Normally wouldn’t entertain this kind of personal discussion but given the subject matter it is on the table. Narelda Jacobs is openly gay and has been for years. SBS has previously had (straight) gay-friendly hosts in the past too.

      1. You have triggered a question, that even all my dear Gay friends have been unable to answer.
        —With total respect—-, “-Narelda is gay”. Gay means same sex couples. Lesbian is discriminatory female only. Why has it evolved to be the ‘Gay and lesbian Mardi Gras’, when we all totally accept ‘all’ our friends as gay.
        It should still be the ‘Gay Mardi Gras’, –non discriminatory.

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