William McInnes, one of Australia’s best-loved entertainers and authors, takes a look at the Aussie obsession with sports and pop culture in his new book Full Bore.
I Dream of Jeannie was one of a number of television sitcoms that for some reason were thought to be suitable entertainment for schoolkids in the late afternoon.
There was a raft of this late-afternoon entertainment, all about ten to fifteen years out of date by the time it was screened. All of the sitcoms seemed to be based on the premise that the shows were as silly and inane as possible, and almost all were devoid of children which meant the adults were required to behave childishly. The men were all puerile idiots, more like mid-teenagers than the astronauts, lawyers, architects, professors or advertising men they supposedly portrayed. All professionals and all new can-do careerists of the postwar West. Whereas even though women could have magical powers, they spent most of their time in the kitchen or, in Jeannie’s case, the bottle.
Yet there were moments from these shows that stayed with me long after those afternoon telly sessions. There was one episode of I Dream of Jeannie where Roger, the astronaut friend of Major Nelson, somehow got his hands on the next day’s newspaper with the next day’s news.
How did he use this glimpse into the future? To subvert history and change the course of the world for good? No, Roger headed for the racing results and proceeded to make a killing, picking all the winners for that day’s races. I remember looking at the screen and thinking, if only.
Behind me, my father, home early from work, muttered, “If only.”
I turned to see him standing and looking at the telly. “You don’t have to be Irish to see the glory of this, sunshine. If only.”
Years later at a Melbourne Cup barbie, I helped the hosts cut up the newspaper with the names of the horses running that year for the sweep.
The male host, whom I knew slightly, stopped and stared at the newspaper. “If only I had Roger’s newspaper.”
I didn’t really need to ask but I did anyway. “I Dream of Jeannie?”
He nodded. “The one with the paper from tomorrow.
Every Cup Day I think of it. Bizarre, really. “Did your parents like that episode?” I asked.
He rolled his eyes. “Oh my God, I don’t think they ever had a bet on anything in their lives, not even on Cup Day, but I can remember them saying, “If only”.”
Those afternoon telly shows became a part of my mind simply because they were repeated so many times and so would reappear at a moment’s recall. On a f light to Canberra one Saturday winter’s morning, we were diverted to Wagga because of bad fog. Wagga has quite a serviceable airport and is a lovely part of the world. But when one is confined to a tiny airline terminal lounge together with the passengers on another Canberra-bound f light, all huddling together waiting for the f lights to resume, the experience can be a little too much.
There was a television high in the corner of the little terminal and it was tuned to the local regional station. It was showing a camping show about a man in a big hat with a big ute pulling a big caravan around Australia.
You couldn’t really hear the television so nobody paid much attention as the big-hatted man, who also sprouted a beard, nodded and winked at the camera. It felt as if it was the end of whatever it was he was doing for that week.
I looked away and heard a man sigh. He had been on my plane and he was working on his tablet. He tapped a few times and then swore softly.
He tapped a few more times and then left a phone message for a business associate that he would have to meet them on the Monday morning instead as his flight was cancelled.
He hung up and groaned again, then leant back in his seat and closed his eyes.
Everybody had to be somewhere and right now the only thing any of us had in common was that we were all late.
I heard someone in the next row say, “This is the one where Peter is Benedict Arnold.”
Before I even turned to look at the television I knew it was The Brady Bunch, another staple of afternoon telly that was being rerun, forty-plus years after it was created, on winter’s Saturday morning in Wagga.
The show was about a blended family, a widower with three sons and a widow with three daughters, and how they all shared a big house with a clinker chimney, and a bustling maid. It was about how they all got on together as a typical family. A typical American family.
In real life the bustling maid was a religious fanatic, Mr Brady was gay and some of the Brady kids would come to work stoned off their melons. But it was just another piece of wholesome afternoon telly accepted as a staple of the day.
It was insane, really, that I could remember this episode about the middle son, Peter, not wanting to be Benedict Arnold in the school play. Arnold was a figure from America’s War of Independence with the British and was so reviled a character that, according to Brady lore at least, if you were a bit on the nose and untrustworthy, someone would call you “A Benedict Arnold”.
What interest Australians would have in this minor piece of America’s history is doubtful, it probably went in one ear and out the other, or perhaps it lodged there as seemingly useless bits of knowledge can and waited for a question on trivia night to reach in and mine it.
I looked at the TV and saw Peter grumpy and I knew why. He was sloping into the kitchen and the bustling maid, Alice, was a little worried.
I said, without thinking, “Not everybody can be George Washington.”
The man beside me, who had had to reschedule his meeting to Monday, laughed.
I looked at him and he had opened his eyes and was now looking at the television. “Old Alice has got it figured and…” he waited for a moment, “here’s the song.”
The show had gone into its hypnotic simplistic theme song and around the terminal people sang bits and pieces of the song. There was laughter and a few groans.
“The Brady Bunch, shit, can the day get any worse?”
The man next to me laughed again, “I know this song better than the national anthem.”
I looked at him.
“Well at least I know all the words to the Brady one; how many people know all the verses to “Advance Australia Fair”?” he said, smiling.
It was my turn to laugh. It was probably true.
“Yes. The old Bradys,” as if they were a family that grew up around the corner.
We watched for a moment and the man said to me, “Do you know I had this theory that I would try to have relationships with girls who were like the Bradys?”
“Really?”
“Yes. It was insane. Marcia, the smart pretty eldest; Jan, the hardworking middle daughter; and Cindy, the cute youngest.
With a speech impediment.” He shook his head. “Insane.”
As conversations in airports go this was turning out to be a bit more entertaining than usual.
“How did that work out for you?” I asked.
“Crap really, the Marcias were all a bit boring, some of the Jans were okay but hard work and the Cindys just felt like The Elephant Man after a while.” He shook his head.
“You try finding someone with an attractive lisp. I even had a thing for an older woman.”
“Because of Mrs Brady?”
“No,” he laughed. “The parents were off limits. Because of Alice.”
“Alice?” I nearly shouted.
A couple of people turned their heads and a few laughed quietly.
“Yeah, the crazy God-botherer. I thought she was soothing and kind. Instead of a lunatic, with that seedy butcher Sam bringing her brown paper bags of meat.”
“You had an Alice period?”
“Look, mate,” he laughed. “It took me two decades to work out I was gay. I went up a lot of dry gullies.”
We both laughed.
“Nothing for Greg or Peter or the other one?”
“Bobby,” he said, giving the name of the youngest Brady boy. He shook his head, smiling, “No, I didn’t really know what was going on with myself there, but you know in hindsight, I suppose Peter was the nicest.”
“Benedict Arnold,” I said.
He laughed. He paused for a bit and then shook his head again. “Although I ended up with a partner called Jan.”
“Is he a middle child?” I asked.
“As a matter of fact he is.”
“What about you?” he asked me. “Do you reckon you used this sort of stuff as a form guide for life?”
Now that’s a question, I thought.
“I don’t know, maybe.” I had a bit of a think. “I was more of your I Dream of Jeannie type.”
“Oh yeah,” he said rather analytically. “I can see that.”
I nodded.
“The episode with the paper. The race results.”
I shrugged my shoulders.
“I can definitely see that.”
He was still for a moment. “Bloody hell, you’ve got a
whole dossier on me and we’ve only been chatting for about ten minutes.”
“Power of The Brady Bunch,” I said.
He nodded and then looked up to the TV. “I like Peter the best, I think, he seemed the most normal.”
Full Bore by William McInnes, Published by Hachette Australia, RRP$32.99
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