Ozzie! Ozzie! Ozzie! How? How? How? Maurice Terzini’s challenge in rebooting Jacksons on George

Sydney hospo king Maurice Terzini wants the reborn Jacksons on George to be a ‘very Sydney’ pub. Does that mean bouncers every ten paces in an over-regulated city, asks The Mouth.

Aussies head to Jacksons on George to celebrate a soccer win over Japan during the 2006 World Cup. Picture: News Corp

Say you want to open a bar, and say again that you want that bar to be “themed” along the lines of one or another of the world’s great drinking cultures.

Chances are the first thing you are going to do is figure out where to get a bunch of tatt to put on the walls.

If your theme is Irish, you could be opening anywhere from Lyon to Bangkok and you’ll go to the same warehouse that hands out fake shillelaghs and coats of arms and mirrored signs for Paddy O’Punchdown Dublin Drinkery.

If you want to do an American style sports bar, you’ll raid Harvey Norman for the biggest TVs you can find and put up a bunch of college football gear and install deep fryers the size of oil drums.

But what do you do if you want to do something quintessentially Australian?

"Kelly from The Tele", Katherine Hynes, left, comedian Vince Sorrenti and Penthouse Pet Kristie Moore at Jacksons on George for celebrity pool competition in 1994. Picture: Supplied

This, of course, is the great dilemma that must be facing Maurice Terzini as he contemplates opening a “great f … ing public bar” that’s going “to be very Sydney” on the site of the old Jacksons On George.

But what the hell does that mean? Part of the problem is that the reality of Australian – and particularly Sydney – night-life is very different indeed from the cultural perception around it.

Former cricketer Dennis Lillee at a party at Jacksons' On George in its heyday. Picture: Supplied

The original Jacksons on George.

For three decades, remember, the rest of the world has imagined we all drink Fosters (thanks, Crocodile Dundee and, later, Homer Simpson).

Is the idea a kitsch outback pub? The great beer barn from the greatest Australian drinking film ever “Wake In Fright” (and what do you mean, you don’t like the Yabba?).

Or, closer to reality, perhaps it could be a trenchant commentary on the over-regulation of Sydney.

Just imagine: Thick-necked security at the door and every 10 feet thereafter, searching for the slightest sign of intoxication as a pretence to chuck you out? Fun!

Terzini, of course, is best known for Icebergs, which indeed is about as quintessentially Australian in all the best ways you can imagine – particularly for lunch on a sunny day when overseas guests can be wowed by the expansive scene of Bondi and beyond.

Will this vision translate to downtown George Street, particularly to a site where so many bad decisions (personal and professional) have been made over the decades that it would be best to call in a Monsignor before breaking ground? Well, as the man, said, “we’ll see”.

— The Mouth is an anonymous critic and bon vivant who pays his own way around Sydney and beyond.