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Friday Flashback: The Flying Doctors

This week marks 35 years since The Flying Doctors series hit Australian screens.

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This week marks 35 years since The Flying Doctors series hit Australian screens (it was first a 1985 miniseries before the 1986 weekly series).

The Crawfords Production ran for nine seasons until 1991, set in the fictional outback town of Cooper’s Crossing, filmed mostly in Minyip in north-western rural Victoria.

The cast included Andrew McFarlane, Liz Burch, Robert Grubb, Lenore Smith, Peter O’Brien, Rebecca Gibney, Terry Gill, Maurie Fields, Val Jellay, Brett Climo, David Reyne, Sarah Chadwick, Brian Mannix, Peter O’Brien, Lewis Fitz-Gerald, Alex Papps, Tammy McIntosh and George Kapiniaris.

In 1993 the show was revamped as RFDS and the setting was changed to Broken Hill with Sophie Lee, Peter Phelps, Simone Buchanan, Belinda Davey, Elaine Smith, Marieke Hardy, Steve Jacobs (not Today’s Jacobs), Lewis Fitz-Gerald, Maurie Fields and Val Jellay. It ran for 13 episodes (NB: Seven will screen an unrelated RFDS drama later this year).

And here’s a “Doctor Doctor” promo for the show… hmmm there’s an idea..

8 Responses

    1. Shane and Ally were famous at the time for their roles in A Country Practice and Sons and Daughters, I guess it didn’t hurt to associate The Flying Doctors with other hit shows.

  2. The Flying Doctors was big in the Netherlands it seems. A friend of mine who lives there said it was her favourite show growing up there in the ’80s and she wanted to be a nurse based on watching the show.

  3. I loved that show so much! It was a fresh idea at the time, with good actors and engaging stories that garnered a huge following. It’d be good to see some remastered episodes one day.

      1. Got the DVD release many years ago, didn’t pay the current asking price, the original mini series with McFarlane and American actor Lorna Patterson is still a good watch. Quality is ok but a good remastering wouldn’t go astray but no financial gain for old Aussie dramas

        1. Yes, a lot of money to spend on an old series that hasn’t been remastered. I didn’t know there was a mini-series. Thanks. I’ll just buy that instead.

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