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Who will be inducted into the Hall of Fame?

There's really only one rightful choice this year....

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The name of the inductee for Logies Hall of Fame has been kept under wraps ahead of TV’s big night.

No leaks here…..it could be a single person or a show.

There are still only 3 women in the Hall of Fame: Ruth Cracknell, Noni Hazlehurst and Kerri-Anne Kennerley. In contrast there are 28 men and 5 shows: Four Corners, Neighbours, Play School, Home & Away and 60 Minutes.

It has been three years since the last Logies and we’ve lost a lot of big names in that time, including 5 Gold winners: Bert Newton, Brian Henderson, (both already inducted) plus Jeanne Little, Ernie Sigley, Lorrae Desmond.

In my opinion, pioneering journalist Caroline Jones, who sadly passed away last month, is frankly the only right choice this year.

Joining the ABC in 1963, Jones worked at This Day Tonight, after which she became the first woman to anchor Four Corners,.With a weekly audience of 2 million viewer, she blazed a trail for women in television and media. She was associated with Australian Story since its inception in 1996 -with 5 decades at ABC.

Amongst her achievements were a Logie award in 1972 for an investigation of inner-city slum landlords, a Walkley Award for Outstanding Contribution to Journalism, 2013, an Australian Media Hall of Fame, becoming Women in Media patron, made an officer of the Order of Australia and named a ‘Living Treasure’.

But she was never inducted into the Logie Hall of Fame and it’s a crime this never happened when she was still with us. Given a posthmous induction can only happen in the ceremony immediately after someone’s death, Caroline Jones would be the rightful honour for 2022.

That said, I won’t be happy until Denise Drysdale is also inducted -another Gold winner, Ding Dong started in 1958 on The Tarax Show. The woman is still working, as part of Studio 10 and I can’t think of anybody who matches such career longevity.

But there is a parade of women who deserve recognition: Noeline Brown, Ita Buttrose, Jana Wendt, Lorraine Bayly, Sigrid Thornton, Rebecca Gibney, Claudia Karvan, Rachel Griffiths, Deborah Mailman, Sandra Sully, Liz Hayes, Tracy Grimshaw, Gina Riley / Jane Turner / Magda Szubanski to name a few.

I don’t understand why Daryl Somers isn’t already inducted, and this needs to be rectified too, if not Hey Hey It’s Saturday itself. Prisoner is another omission.

I haven’t even started to list television executives (Brian Walsh), producers (John Edwards, all of Working Dog) or the late writer Reg Watson -where would we be without his soaps: Neighbours, Prisoner, The Young Doctors and Sons & Daughters?

Sometimes I feel like a lone voice pointing out that TV is now so old that we risk doing posthumous inductions just to keep up.

I’d like to see this expanded to a separate event with 1 man, 1 woman, 1 show inducted, similar to the Kennedy Centre Honors. The ARIAs have also held separate events where other acts perform the songs of the honouree.

In 2019 then-editor of TV Week Thomas Woodgate told TV Tonight “Maybe Hall of Fame is one we are rapidly approaching that needs an overhaul. I think you raise a very good idea.

“We don’t want to wait until people pass away. We want to be able to see them shine in the spotlight while they are still here.”

15 Responses

  1. I see the reasoning for the posthumous rule, but I don’t think it would be unreasonable to expand the number of years a bit (at least until the effects of the missed years have passed). Maybe passing away within the last three, or five years would work.

  2. The problem with “one man, one woman, one show” is it enshrines the gender imbalance that already exists. I’m absolutely for a separate broadcast each year where we have 7-9 inductees (probably the right number to fill two hours?), with either a minimum quota for women and shows until the balance is fixed or, preferably, a maximum number of men instead. Maybe even quotas based on public and behind the scenes roles, or by longevity? There are people who would make valid inclusions who’d never get picked because they’re still working through figures from the 1970s and 1980s to try and avoid posthumous inclusions (Larry Emdur, for example).

  4. Commentator Bruce McAvaney is the latest HoF inductee! I know this as he’s the cover story on the latest TV Week which came out today.

  5. Denise should of been inducted years ago. To think that someone who started in TV in 1958 and who is still on air is incredible.Thats 8 decades!! Come on Logies, get your sh*t together.

  6. I somehow think moving forward two things need to happen to the Logies HOF.

    1. Standalone ceremony with multiple inductees absolutely makes sense (perhaps hold it the weekend of Logie noms in a theatre: e.g. rotate the event between Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne every year).
    2. Posthumous induction rule needs to be quietly retired after 2022. The number of potential inductees is going to shrink dramatically in future years if this rule is kept.

    David, you aren’t alone about worrying about posthumous inductions, I can tell you that.

    (By the way: troy_story’s idea of a two tiered Australian television HOF (where our greatest ever to grace the TV screen are elevated to legend status) is one that needs to be pitched if something happens in the next few years, and the Logies are somehow ended by TV Week.)

  7. So many deserving names as mentioned in the article and comments here. As we’ve missed 2 (or 3??) years, multiple entries this year is warranted (but time of the telecast is an issue). Shame as some big names will miss out while others are on a very long waiting list.

    1. Totally agree. The last thing we and the industry needs is someone to pass away without being inducted. That would be a heck of a shame. We do need multiples of at least 2 per year, to get the above list down. There must be a (good) reason as to why the above people havent as yet been inducted.

  8. Ernie Carroll could be up there as well, The Tarax Show, In Melbourne Tonight, Cartoon Corner, Hey Hey It’s Saturday, wrote for Graham Kennedy, a Producer as well who hired Daryl Somers for Cartoon Corner and only stepped in when Peter McKenna had to leave.

    However yep, 1 man, 1 woman and 1 show inducted would be good and yes Caroline Jones should absolutely be one of those, especially with part of “a posthmous induction can only happen in the ceremony immediately after someone’s death,” then that means either one will miss out or both if it’s someone else.

  10. Caroline Jones would be a fitting addition this year. Ita Buttrose, Denise Drysdale, Heather Mitchell, Rebecca Gibney should be considered inductees too.

    Surprised Daryl Somers isn’t there either., as to of the likes of Ray Martin and Bruce McAvaney.

    The AACTA Awards have a separate event (was know as the Luncheon) where they presented more of the “smaller awards”, and have been doing so since 2012. Surely the Logies can have a separate event too where then give out awards – particularly the Hall of Fame where there should be multiple inductees per year “to catch up”.

  11. The AFL recently had their HoF event and the way they do it is fantastic and I’ve always believed the Logies should do a similar thing.
    I’ve also always thought it should be a seperate event from the actual Logies… with a small acknowledgement during the event of course.
    In my opinion, the Logies HoF ceremony should be sandwiched in between the announcement of the Gold Logie nominees and the Logies themselves… how wonderful would it be for momentum to have a HoF event leading in to the ‘TV Night of Nights’. Whilst not exactly the same, it’s why the acting awards in Jan-Mar each year get so much momentum leading to the actual Oscars because of all the events beforehand.
    All they need to do is induct a small amount of people each year and then elevate a Hall of Famer to Legend status when appropriate. Again the AFL only induct a Legend so it equates to 10% of the total Hall of Famers. So if there’s 150 HoF inductees, that means there will be 15 Legends… quite the exclusive honour.

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