Langbroek’s advice to Bickmore on retirement

As Carrie Bickmore retires from The Project, co-panellist Kate Langebroek offered up some unsolicited guidance, based on her own experiences.

Often, the most innocuous anecdotes shared by TV personality and comedian Kate Langbroek about her busy and chaotic life are the ones that cause the most ructions at home.

Just recently, the mother-of-four tells Stellar, her teenage daughter Sunday “cracked it” because Langbroek had casually mentioned on her radio show that the family shared toothbrushes.

“Which, by the way, Sunday doesn’t do because she has a separate bathroom,” she clarifies with a playful laugh.

“But she was mortified. She was like, ‘How dare you say that?’ And I was like, of all the things I’ve said, that’s the thing [that upsets you]? But I didn’t want to say that to her directly… because that would just draw attention to the other things I’ve said.”

Even after her dressing down, Langbroek maintains that nothing is off the table when you sit down for a chat with her.

And she notes with wry self-mockery that any self-censoring happens “retrospectively rather than proactively. My work is a fusion of the personal and the professional, or rather, they intersect.

And sometimes I say the wrong thing, but sometimes I just say something interesting.

“I often think of [comedian] Judith Lucy saying, ‘When I hear famous people say, “I don’t talk about my personal life”, I always think, why not?’ And it’s true.

What do they think they’ve got going on that’s so different to anyone else? It’s all so tedious.”

Kate Langbrooek: ‘there is also something beautiful about mature people finding each other’ Picture: Sam Bisso for Stellar

Langbroek is also a regular panellist on The Project and happened to be in the studio on the October night that founding co-host Carrie Bickmore announced that she would be leaving the show after a 13-year run.

Although Bickmore didn’t ask for any guidance from Langbroek, who first worked with Bickmore in the mid-2000s on Melbourne’s Nova 100 breakfast show Hughesy & Kate, “of course I offered some because I always offer advice,” she says mischievously.

In fact, Langbroek wasn’t shocked by the news because she had been a sounding board for Bickmore behind the scenes, the pair’s experiences often running parallel.

Both women have taken European sabbaticals with their families at the height of their popularity, and, like Bickmore, Langbroek left her high-profile job in 2019 to have more quality time with her family.

“That was similar again insofar as walking away from a full-time job, although she still has a job,” Langbroek says with a laugh. “Let’s not forget, as Pete Helliar said, she’s retiring to a full-time radio job.

Because she’s got such a tremendous work ethic, she’s basically been working two full-time jobs. Three, if you count her family and her foundation commitments.

Anyway, I just told her a bit about what I learnt in that process and what was initially an epiphany for me.”

Langbroek acknowledges that stepping into the unknown is indeed a big and brave decision.

But she doesn’t regret for a second her own choice to leave breakfast radio and later turn down the opportunity to re-join her former co-host Dave Hughes in Sydney for his new show once she returned home from Italy.

“I couldn’t say to my parents, or the kids, ‘Guess what? We’re coming back to Australia, but we’re moving to Sydney!’” she says. “And I couldn’t get up at 4am again. I know it sounds ridiculous, but I just don’t want to do that.”

After spending so many years sleep-deprived and working long hours, Langbroek is happy that none of her current on-air roles require early starts or a full-time commitment.

“It’s fantastic,” she admits. “I can dip in and dip out – and what I’ve learnt about myself is that I love to dip out.”

Or does she? Aside from appearances on The Project, Langbroek has a current gig as host of the Nine Network’s newest dating show My Mum Your Dad.

While she enthusiastically declares that she “loves love”, Langbroek also concedes that she doesn’t get a lot of time to sit down and watch potential rivals on TV.

“I have four children and a husband who watches the History Channel perpetually,” she explains.

While many of the dating shows on Australian television are populated by people under 30, the point of difference with My Mum Your Dad is that it involves single parents navigating modern dating with the help of their children.

Langbroek isn’t surprised it’s taken so long for older singles to have their quest for love become the focus of a dating series.

“It’s because nobody wants to see us [over 40s] kissing,” she says. “This show says it’s all right for us to kiss.

Look, Shakespeare didn’t write Romeo And Juliet about two 55-year-olds from Wantirna, did he? There’s something beautiful about youth and the passions of youth.

But there’s also something beautiful about mature people finding each other.”

Kate Langbroek features in this Sunday’s Stellar. Picture: Steven Chee for Stellar

Although Langbroek has been married to her husband Peter Lewis since 2003, she knows many single parents who have put their romantic lives on hold to focus on their children.

“You picture yourself in that circumstance, and the thought of bringing a stranger into your family’s life or into your kid’s life...” she says. “No matter how many children you have, it’s a really daunting prospect and not one to be done casually.

I can imagine, and I do know people that, as a consequence [of not wanting their children to be hurt], don’t end up dating at all.”

Langbroek suspects that the secret to her own long-lasting relationship lies as much in luck as it does in compatibility.

“You don’t know when you marry someone what life is going to throw at you,” she shares. And you don’t know how that person is going to navigate you and the circumstances.

“Peter is so beautiful. But I don’t want to jump on the couch with Oprah [like Tom Cruise famously did to declare his adoration of his then-girlfriend Katie Holmes]. Because I hate people who gush about their partners.

“It’s just gross, isn’t it? I always think, ‘Why do you need to talk like that?’ But he’s really a very lovely man. I mean… he’s not perfect, but he’s perfect for me.”

My Mum Your Dad premieres at 7.30pm tomorrow on the Nine Network.

Originally published as Langbroek’s advice to Bickmore on retirement