ACRAs 2024: Inside Australia’s wildest awards show
Kate Ritchie was shocked when she was presented with an old photo of herself on the red carpet of the radio awards in Sydney.
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Australia’s biggest radio stars hit the red carpet for the ACRAs (Australian Commercial Radio & Audio Awards) on Saturday night.
The event, being held at The Star Sydney, is being attended by Kate Ritchie, Carrie Bickmore, Tommy Little, Will and Woody and Amanda Keller to name just a few.
News.com.au played a little game on the red carpet where we presented stars with old/embarrassing photos of themselves.
You can see what happened in the video player above, but it’s safe to say some of them did NOT enjoy the vintage pics.
The ACRAs are basically radio’s version of the Logies, but there’s one main difference … the ACRAs are 10 x more wild.
Radio stars take full advantage of the fact the ceremony isn’t televised and happily indulge in the open bar throughout the night.
“It gets loose,” Fitzy from Nova 96.9 told news.com.au. “You sit down, you have a beautiful meal, but you are drinking the whole time and there are so many awards that you have to get through.
“It’s like throwing everything into a slow cooker at the start of the day, and at the end of the day when you get home from work it’s ready to burst!” Fitzy said.
“And towards the end, that’s when the heckling really starts,” his co-host, Wippa said.
The Nova duo said the ACRAs used to be even more loose back in the day.
“I heard a story that some of the Nova team had been smuggling in alcohol,” Wippa told news.com.au, before Fitzy owned up to the fact it was him.
“I used to do it every year,” Fitzy said. “I would bring two really nice bottles of wine and I would put them in bags and I would say to (security) on the red carpet, ‘this is a gift for someone in our team,’ and I would get them through every time.”
Just like the Logies, the ACRAs also used to invite some big international guests to attend the ceremony, including Sharon Osbourne back in 2012.
“One year the special guest was Kelsey Grammer (from the TV show, Frasier),” Fitzy recalled.
“My mum made me get a photo with him,” Wippa laughed.
“There was a moment halfway through the night where Kelsey Grammer was on stage and I swear he was thinking to himself, ‘where has my career gone that I’m on the Gold Coast in Australia doing a radio awards night?’” Fitzy said.
The nominees
71 awards are up for grabs at this year’s ACRAs with the big award, comparable to the Gold Logie, being ‘Best On Air Team (Metro)’.
This year’s nominees are WSFM’s Jonesy and Amanda, KIIS FM’s Kyle and Jackie O, Gold FM’s Christian O’Connell, Nova’s Jase and Lauren, the Hit Network’s Carrie and Tommy, and Nova’s Fitzy and Wippa with Kate Ritchie.
The category has previously been dominated by Kyle and Jackie O (they’ve won four times in the last 10 years) and Jonesy and Amanda (they’ve won three times in the last 10 years).
The other big award at the ACRAs is the Individual Talent of the Year Award.
This year’s finalists are Christian O’Connell (Gold FM), Ray Hadley (2GB), “Ugly” Phil O’Neil (WSFM), Jackie O (KIIS FM), Fifi Box (Fox FM), Kate Ritchie (Nova), Ricki-Lee Coulter (Nova) and Ben Fordham (2GB).
We’ll tell you who won what later in the evening.
What’s in store for the ceremony
There’s no main host for tonight’s ceremony. Instead, a variety of radio stars will present throughout the night.
They include Melissa Doyle, Richard Wilkins, Ray Hadley, Fitzy, Wippa, Kate Richie, Tim Blackwell, Joel Creasey, and Will and Woody.
As for the entertainment, there’ll be performances from Dean Lewis, Baker Boy and the Screaming Jets.
Originally published as ACRAs 2024: Inside Australia’s wildest awards show
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