The Gillies Report is an award-winning and influential Australian topical satirical sketch comedy television series that was broadcast on the ABC between 1984 and 1985. The program was best known for sending up politicians and media personalities of the day such as Prime Minister Bob Hawke and Opposition Leader Andrew Peacock.
The series starred Max Gillies, with a supporting cast that included John Clarke, Wendy Harmer, Phillip Scott, Tracy Harvey, Patrick Cook, Marcus Eyre, Geoff Kelso and Peter Moon. The primary writers were Cook, Clarke, Scott and Don Watson, with extra material by Harmer and Harvey.
Tropes:
- Bawdy Song: Parodied with a 'politically correct' version of The Good Ship Venus (can be seen here
). The first verse went:'Twas on the conventionally powered ship Venus,
By Christ you should've seen us!
The figurehead
Wasn't made of lead
And wasn't shaped like anything in particular!
[The third verse:]
The ship's dog name was Big Balls'
Though no one knew exactly why he was called that.
There was nothing remarkable about the size of his knackers,
And the name was gratuitous and offensive. - Catchphrase: Many of Gillies political impersonations had their own catch phrase. Probably the most famous was Pope John Paul II's "Stop it, it or you'll go blind!", said in a broad Italian accent.
- Calvinball: A Running Gag involving John Clarke describing the results of the Fictitional Sport of farnarkeling. He would describe the game using bizarre terminology but acting as if it was commonly understood and in a completely deadpan manner.And he was soon arkeling the gonad from all points of the grommet.
- Fictional Sport: Featured sports bulletins describing the fortunes of the Australian farnarkeling team, and, in particular, its captain and star player, the accident prone 'Big Dave' Sorenson. From what can be determined from the descriptions, the sport is fast moving, high scoring, and violent. The humour derives primarily from John Clarke's deadpan delivery of bizarre descriptions of the action, and the application of sporting cliches to a sport no one understands.In essence, Farnarkeling is engaged in by two teams whose purpose is to arkle, and to prevent the other team from arkeling, using a flukem to propel a gonad through sets of posts situated at random around the periphery of a grommet. Arkeling is not permissible, however, from any position adjacent to the phlange (or leiderkrantz) or from within 15 yards of the wiffenwacker at the point where the shifting tube abuts the centre-line on either side of the 34 metre mark, measured from the valve at the back of the defending side's transom-housing.
- Major General Song: In "Maralinga, or Wise After the Event", the ghost of Sir Robert Menzies is summoned to appear before the Royal Commission and sings "I Was the Very Model of a Commonwealth Prime Minister":I was the very model of a Commonwealth prime minister
I never had a single thought original or sinister
I echoed the opinions of the British with impunity
And made myself their vassal at the slightest opportunity - Subverted Rhyme Every Occasion: From the musical sketch "Maralinga, or Wise After the Event":But will we act
Upon this fact?
This whole inquiry was a stunt!
I've never seen a bigger...miscarriage of justice! - Trophy Violence: A rare self-inflicted version as John Clarke explains what happened when the brilliant, but strangely accident prone, Dave Sorensen, captain of the Australian Farnarkeling team went to accept the Sportsman of the Year award:Unfortunately, Sorensen suffered a catastrophic personal mishap while mounting the podium to pick up the sculpted tribute. He hadn't looked well since the soup and it was no surprise to onlookers when he fell through a rostrum interstice only seconds later while raising the golden artefact and thanking his immediate family. Organisers said that this was first time since the function's inception that the award had been taken internally.
