ASTRA-Women in TV Breakfast, 7.30-9.00AM, 04.09.2014
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ASTRA-Women in TV Breakfast, 7.30-9.00AM, 04.09.2014 Good morning and welcome to the ASTRA Women in Television Breakfast. If you would like to access the live captions via a tablet or laptop, go to ai- live.com, click 'Join My Session', enter AUASTR0409A and click 'Go'. SPEAKER: Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to the annual ASTRA Women in Television Breakfast. Please now welcome to the stage, ASTRA’s CEO, Andrew Maiden. ANDREW MAIDEN: Ladies and gentlemen, I am very pleased to welcome you to the annual ASTRA Women in Television Breakfast. I am especially pleased to welcome our three guest speakers, who you will hear from shortly, together with female leaders from the worlds of media, television and politics. Welcome too to the many women broadcasters in the room this morning, from subscription and free-to-air television. I especially welcome an industry pioneer, Caroline Jones, who blazed a trail for women in this room, first winning a Logie Award in 1972. (Applause) Welcome to the many female political leaders with us today, from both sides of politics, we are joined by the state Minister for Transport, Gladys Berejiklian and the Minister for Women, Pru Goward. (Applause) Former Premier Kristina Keneally and former Liberal leader Kerry Chikarovski, the only women to have led political parties in NSW. Both, I’m pleased to say, regulars on subscription television screens. (Applause) And a former senator, once responsible for the status of women, Amanda Vanstone. Welcome too to Patrick Delany representing our major sponsors today, FOX SPORTS, without whose support this event would not be possible. As you know, each year ASTRA contributes a portion of ticket sales to help organisations that help support women in our community. Today I’m pleased to announce that beneficiary with be African Women Australia, which builds the capacity of African-born women to participate in Australian civic life and to develop skills to positively develop their communities and families. I am pleased to welcome the Chief Executive Officer of African Women Australia, Juliana Nkrumah. Now it’s my pleasure to introduce your moderator for today, one of Australia’s leading sports broadcasters and journalists. Kelli Underwood is the first woman to call an AFL match on Australian television and has now covered 15 seasons as a radio or TV reporter, boundary rider and commentator. She joined FOX SPORTS in 2013 as a panellist on the weekly entertainment show 'The Back Page' before moving into the co-host chair earlier this year. This morning she is your moderator, Kelli Underwood. (Applause) KELLI UNDERWOOD: That is the first job done – just getting up those steps. (Laughs). Thank you to Andrew, it is truly great to be here. The theme, women in media, reminds me of my very first day in television, about a decade ago in the sports department in Melbourne. I was asked, on that day, to head out to an AFL training session with a cameraman. I jumped in the car and the cameraman turned to me and said, “Can I ask you a very personal question?” If I knew then what I know now about cameramen, I should have said no. I said, “Sure, no worries, fire away.” He said, "Are you a natural brunette?” I said yes. He said, “You're not a blonde?” I said yes. He said, “And the boss hired you?!" Yes. He said, "Gee, then you must really know something about sports!" That was my very first experience, and my very first day in television. Things obviously have improved quite a bit in the last decade, and to help us analyse, debate and dissect the issues facing women in television, we have assembled a first-class panel for you this morning. Starting with someone who is a household name in Australia, for many years. From the highs of an international modelling career, she successfully made the transition into television where he currently hosts the ‘Movie Show’ on Arena. She is also featured on FOXTEL’s Bio Channel; she has hosted several top-rating programs – the list is too long to read out – 'Location Location', 'Amazing Homes' and 'Celebrity Overhaul' among them. She has also proven that she can adapt to the fast changing nature of media; currently overseeing a highly-successful LifeStyle website, 'Balance by Deborah Hutton'. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Deborah Hutton. (Applause) While Deborah just makes her way up to the stage I will introduce our second guest. Our next guest is an Emmy award-winning journalist with NBC. Sara James traded in the bright lights of Manhattan for the Macedon Ranges in country Victoria, moving there about seven years ago with her Australian husband and two children, two daughters Her career in New York included stints as NBC’s foreign correspondent, filling in on the 'Today Show' for Katie Couric and newsreader, Ann Curry. In Australia, she continues to file stories for NBC. She is also a regular contributor to ABC ‘News Breakfast’ as well as completing her latest book, 'An American in Oz'. Put your hands together for Sara James. (Applause) Our final panellist this morning is one of only a handful of senior female media executives in this country. Nicole Sheffield's career in television included a role as head of FOXTEL's LifeStyle Channel and LifeStyle FOOD. She has since gone on the become the head of News Corp lifestyle division, NewsLifeMedia, where she overseas 25 magazines and websites including 'Vogue', 'GQ', the ‘Sunday’ magazine and news.com.au, which is Australia’s leading news source. She also happens to be a mother of four. I feel exhausted just reading this out! Please welcome to the stage, Nicole Sheffield. (Applause) Are you right? Do you need a hand? (Laughter) Before we get started, we can take questions from the floor in the next 45 minutes or so, so you can tweet through your questions, jump online at #ASTRA2014. I have a snazzy iPad here. Hopefully, if it works, I should be able to read them out. So, Deborah, we might start with you, 30 years in television, you must have started when you were about three! (Laughter) Is TV something... obviously, when you were a teenager you were involved in modelling, did television pursue you or did you pursue the television, how did it come about? DEBORAH HUTTON: It’s interesting, when you are modelling, and it was only for a short time. It is a natural progression to get into doing commercials, That is your first exposure. Funnily enough, my very first live television event was the Bicentennial of 1988, and I’m sure some of you remember that. They had the Bicentennial Wool Fashion Parade at the Opera house and I was asked to co-host that with Michael Parkinson, a big deal, Parky, I was a huge fan! That was my first live TV. I was so nervous about the whole thing, I looked like a doll, I had silly hair and big dresses. It was a very interesting exercise – that was my first. My very first real job was given to me by Walshy, Brian Walsh. It was to co-host a game show when ‘Midday’ legend Mike Walsh had gone over from Channel 9 to Channel 10, when he finished his ‘Midday’ show. I was asked to be the co-host with big shoulders and big hair. It was a show called 'Super Quiz', it was a rip-off of a Bob and Dolly Dyer show, 'Pick A Box'. Half of the room wouldn’t even know what that is, it’s all a long time ago. It was a whole thing where you had to sit there, there was ‘cones of silence’, asking questions. Mike Walsh was great raconteur and a wonderful speaker so he couldn’t get the whole ‘you’re in a cone of silence and you’re not’... (Laughter) So, after all these weeks, he end up swearing so much. He rang me one day, and I wasn’t too good at twirling around and doing things to do with game show hosting. He said, "Listen, I think we should call it quits." I said, “I couldn’t agree more. Up not having much fun up here.” We now jokingly refer to it as 'Super Quick' because it only lasted six weeks on television. From there, it was interesting. From there, back to the era of Sam Chisholm at Channel 9. As he parted ways with Channel 9, and headed to work for Rupert on BSkyB, they got the contract for Lotto. So he dragged me in with John Mangos – news reader John Mangos – and said, “You two are doing Lotto for a year.” What?! I don’t think so! He said, “Here is a very big cheque, you are doing it for a year.” I said, “Fine.” There is something unnatural about talking while a ball rises every eight seconds. When that year was up I was pretty much out of there. (Laughter) A very strange start, but from there I went on to LifeStyle. I worked for Channel 9 for about 15 years, through different shows. It is a very blokey, still very blokey, environment, very different experience to working to FOXTEL. When Walshy invited me to come along to join the Bio Channel, and subsequently the 'Movie Show', he said I would find it different, and I have. It is quite extraordinary working there compared to – and you would know that – compared to working in an environment where it is very inclusive. And they have a lot of women working in subscription television at FOXTEL.