Is the Logies finally become respectable?

The jokes bombed, winners didn’t show up and the ceremony was as cringe as ever. But among the trainwreck was a significant change.

If you read any headlines about the Logies today, apparently it was a train wreck.

From jokes bombing to wardrobe snags and a whole lot of no-shows, the ceremony sounded exactly like the kind of dated, cringe Sunday night broadcast TV car crash we, thankfully, no longer have to watch because streaming exists.

But you may have missed the significant core of last night’s events if you were distracted by the ceremony’s embarrassments, and that’s the surprising winners.

The Logies, the unapologetic throwback, bogan celebration of soap stars and variety hosts, may now be respectable …? Or as respectable as the Logies could possibly be.

No longer beholden to the whims of TV Week readers and industrious network publicists cutting out voting forms from magazines, the Logie winners are now spread out over a variety of broadcasters and streamers.

It better reflects the pool of talent in the Australian entertainment industry and winners are actually better aligned with talent and quality.

Guy Pearce in a scene from Jack Irish.

Just look at who’s winning the popular categories – ABC stars Kitty Flanagan, Guy Pearce and Tony Armstrong, and Channel 10 shows Have You Been Paying Attention, MasterChef and The Project.

None of these winners draw the biggest ratings nor are they the most targeted by the country’s paparazzi. But what they have in common is that they are great shows or talented artists. They are dedicated to craft more than they are to their Instagram follower count.

Sheer audience volume also doesn’t equate award-winning either. Most of the Popular Logie winners reflect how many fans are compelled to watch something more than how many people like to watch something.

It’s the difference between fervent fandom and torpor-driven viewing – and ratings measure only the quantity and not the quality of that devotion.

Hamish Blake is also a perfectly deserving Gold Logie winner. He works hard, he seems like a good person, he doesn’t take himself too seriously and Lego Masters is a good, family friendly show that recognises talent and not scandal.

Plus, he hasn’t won the past four years in a row.

Yes, these things are subjective but I don’t think anyone used to look at the Logie winners list and honestly believed a plethora of Home and Away starlets were really the best the industry had to offer.

Hamish Blake won his second Gold Logie. Picture: Josh Woning

There used to be such a wide disparity between the winners of the public-voted Popular categories and the judged Outstanding categories but no longer.

Just as many people watched Outstanding Drama Series The Newsreader as they did Popular Entertainment Program Gogglebox – and both those shows would have a swath of crossover audiences.

Logies voters are now much more representative of Australian audiences thanks to the more accessible online voting platform.

ABC, SBS and Foxtel used to dominate the Outstanding categories but they’re now well-represented in the Popular categories too, reflecting the fact the traditional free-to-air networks, but particularly Channels 7 and 9, are losing their once-tighter grip on Australian screen culture.

It’s not confined to the Logies. With streaming and on-demand driving a change in viewing habits, the blind acceptance of whatever mediocre series some programmer decided to sell Woolies ads against is long over.

That’s a relic of the past and the diminishing cultural power of Channels 7 and 9 at the Logies these past few years is showing up on a stage that they once owned.

Of course, it’s not all sunshine and roses because the ceremony itself is still as cringe as a winners list from 1996. Maybe if it wasn’t, a lot more of the winners might have showed up.

And Sonia Kruger, who was found by the NSW Civil and Administrative Tribunal to have vilified Muslims with her 2016 comments advocating for a ban against them entering Australia, was still nominated for the Gold Logie, so we’re not exactly sprinting towards some enlightened future.

Progress is always slow.

Originally published as Is the Logies finally become respectable?