The Espy set to play host to Grand Final edition of The Front Bar

It started out as an online show filmed in a small pub in Richmond, but now the Front Bar is set for its biggest show yet, as it prepares for its Grand Final show at The Espy.

Andy Maher, Mick Molloy and Sam Pang outside The Esplanade Hotel in St Kilda. Picture: Ian Currie

The Front Bar is taking its AFL Grand Final Show to the biggest pub in town.

Co-hosts Mick Molloy, Sam Pang and Andy Maher will stage their popular Channel 7 footy show from The Espy in St Kilda on September 26.

Molloy told Confidential: “It’s like the Willy Wonka chocolate factory for beer drinkers. It’s an amazing joint. It feels like our show has come full circle. We started online, coming out of the smallest pub in Melbourne, a tiny little front bar in the backstreets of Richmond, and now we’re at the biggest pub in Melbourne.”

The Espy holds special memories for Molloy. He did his first-ever stand up gig, alongside comedian Tony Martin, in the pub’s Gershwin Room.

“The most amazing out of body experience I ever had was standing backstage, wondering whether to go on and do the show, or run,” Molloy said. “The Gershwin Room holds a very sacred place in my heart and my journey.”

Andy Maher, Mick Molloy and Sam Pang on The Front Bar. Picture: Channel 7

While The Front Bar has connected strongly with a footy-loving audience, Molloy said it was a slow build that almost failed.

“I thought it was a good show, but I didn’t know what the tone would be,” he said. “Having learned from a few less successful forays into television, I thought we should start off- Broadway, see if it can find an audience, and then we’d bring it to town.”

Initially, the show was screened at various times, mainly after games and post-match coverage, and struggled to find viewers “At one point, we had 60,000 viewers, and I just thought: ‘We’re cooked,’” Molloy said. “It was the last gasp.”

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To Seven’s credit, Molloy says, the network “took a chance and put it bang up against (Channel 9’s) The Footy Show.

“I knew we had a good idea. It was something by the fans for the fans,” Molloy said. “(Channel 10’s footy panel show) Before The Game was the precursor to our show, which was a bunch of comedians sitting around talking rubbish.

“I still believe there’s room in this town for more than one footy show,” Molloy said. “It was (comedian) Trevor Marmalade who said you won’t go broke talking about footy in Melbourne.”