Forgotten Australian TV Plays: The Pigeon and Wall to Wall

by Stephen Vagg

Like any industry, Australian television drama was prone to a clash of egos, and there were few bigger battles than that between Drew Goddard and Eric Tayler at the ABC in the late 1960s. Neither are particularly well remembered today, but both were considerable figures in their time. Goddard was head of television drama at the ABC from 1965-70; Tayler worked for Aunty as a producer-director during that time, and for more than a decade afterwards.

The two men had many things in common, which perhaps contributed to their antipathy. Both had a background at BBC television, both were foreigners to Australia (Goddard was English, Tayler from New Zealand), both arrived here around the same time, both had blonde daughters who became actresses (Liza Goddard, who was on Skippy and Bergerac, and Sally Tayler who was on The Young Doctors and Shark’s Paradise).

Apparently, a key factor in the clash between the men was Goddard had worked under Tayler at the BBC, but at the ABC, Goddard was Tayler’s superior… this caused resentment on Tayler’s behalf. (Incidentally Tayler had worked on a number of Australian-set TV plays at the BBC including Day of the Drongo and Harp in the South).

Who of the two was in the “right” depends on who you talk to. Alan Burke, a director, loathed Goddard and said the Englishman played favourites with the drama department, blacklisting people such as himself and Storry Walton. John Croyston, one of said favourites, was a big fan of Goddard, and blamed all of the latter’s problems on a whispering campaign by Tayler and, to a lesser degree, Ken Watts, the federal director of television programs. (This information is all contained in Graham Shirley’s excellent oral histories with Burke and Croyston at the National Film and Sound Archive.)

The irony was, for all the behind the scenes tension between Tayler and Goddard, the years when the two men worked together at the ABC, what was produced was among the most successful drama in the public broadcaster’s history. During that period, the ABC re-organised and revitalised the drama department, sorting it into three areas (plays, serials and series) and producing ground-breaking shows such as Bellbird (the ABC’s first soap), The Tape Recorder, Nice n Juicy (the ABC’s first sitcom), Contrabandits (the ABC’s first procedural), Dynasty and Pastures of the Blue Crane. It was a period when finally, the ABC shed itself of loathing for Australian writers and local drama became entirely written by, well, locals.

John Cameron, who succeeded Goddard as head of drama, said his predecessor was undone by a determination to outshine Tayler. The New Zealander had produced Contrabandits, which had been very popular, critically and commercially; Goddard set up Delta, a successor to Contrabandits, and made himself the executive producer, to show he could do as good a job as Tayler (says Cameron, anyway). Delta ended up costing considerably more money without a noticeable increase in quality, and contributed greatly to Goddard departing the ABC in 1970. According to Croyston, Goddard returned to England, dropped out of the industry, and became an alcoholic; I have no idea what happened to him, though IMDB says he died in 1992.

Today, I’m writing about two TV plays that Tayler directed for Australian Playhouse, the anthology series central to Goddard’s ambitions at the ABC.

The Pigeon

There must have been something in the air in the 1960s when it came to working class boys and relationships with birds: the Brits had the novel and film Kes, while a few years earlier, we had The Pigeon. This told the story of school boy Billy (Ross Thompson), who has a mother (Lynne Murphy) dying in hospital, a dad (Don Philips) who has taken a lover (Moya O’Sullivan), a headmaster (Vaughan Tracey) who doesn’t really care for his family, and a brother who has committed a crime investigated by a cop (Kenneth Haigh). The only person who cares for him is a nice school teacher (John Gregg).

Perhaps not coincidentally, this script was written by an English teacher: Peter Finnane. His work was so highly regarded that Goddard chose it to be the first episode of Australian Playhouse. Not only that, the script was published in a 1971 anthology of Australian television scripts from the ‘60s called Close Up.

The Pigeon is a strong piece of drama, clearly influenced by British television plays of the time, with their working class backgrounds and sensitive new age men. Tayler directs with care and Ross Thompson is effective in the lead.

Reviews were generally strong (see here and here) and the episode got Australian Playhouse off to a solid start – a beginning consolidated with The Tape Recorder, which came next.

Finnane wrote another for script for Australian Playhouse, The Widow Thrum, that was filmed but not shown, and is credited on an episode of Skippy. I have no idea what happened to him after that; presumably he kept teaching.

Wall to Wall

This was based on a script by Adelaide writer Anne Kinloch, that had been entered in a 1962 scriptwriting competition held by Channel Nine. It won the competition, but Nine decided instead to film The Valley of Water instead… the first television drama made in Adelaide. Kinloch submitted Wall to Wall at the ABC and they filmed it in Sydney for Australian Playhouse.

It’s about an unmarried woman, Elizabeth (Heather Christie) on her 30th birthday, looking back on her life, in particular several near-relationships: a man who took her to a dance, a potential boarder, and a visitor. It becomes clear that Elizabeth has a major mental illness and no man is going to “save” her.

Reviews were needlessly cruel such as this one, this one, and this one. There were some very fine performances from Don Crosby and Lyndall Barbour as Elizabeth’s parents, and Gwen Plumb as a nosey neighbour.

I don’t know what happened to Miss Kinloch. I think she was the American wife of an Adelaide academic.

Eric Tayler and David Goddard would have greater success with their series: Bellbird, Contrabandits, Dynasty. Their relationship stands as an example of how two people can hate each other, yet still get the job done.