Irrelevant Logies won’t be missed in Melbourne

FAREWELL to the irrelevant, cringe-worthy Logies. The Victorian taxpayers won’t miss your D-list celebs and token overseas guests, writes Susie O’Brien.

Can Victoria’s major event calendar survive without an event to lure The Bachelorette stars? Picture: AAP

SO long, Logies. I’m not sad to see us break up. For too long now you’ve been boring, irrelevant and cringe-worthy.

I’m glad we’ve finally pulled the pin and stopped propping you up to the tune of $1 million each year.

For all this money, we haven’t been getting much back in return, you see.

More: Readers say good riddance to Logies

For a long time, dear Logies, you’ve brought us D-list celebs in borrowed dresses and spray-on tans getting their latest taxpayer funded venture nominated for Most Tedious Documentary or Best Hairstyle in a Live Broadcast.

All you’ve given us is each year is five hours of sleep-inducing television filled with cut-rate TV hits and has-beens getting drunk, rambling on and exchanging awkward scripted jokes.

Can Victoria’s major event calendar survive without an event to lure The Bachelorette stars? Picture: AAP

And you keep featuring token overseas guests who are well-known enough to be invited, cheap enough to be affordable and desperate enough to say yes.

Making the announcement, Victorian Major Events Minister John Eren said it was “time to pass on the baton”.

I disagree. It’s time to bury the baton once and for all, and put us all out of our misery.

Mr Eren said you aren’t worth it anymore, and I’d say you certainly never were.

Since when has the Government poured $1 million into a grand party allowing teachers to pat each other on the back? Or nurses? Or police officers?

The only good things about the Logies in recent years have been the stuff-ups.

Remember Morning-After Karl? Not surprisingly, Karl Stefanovic has branded the move “disgusting” but I can tell you Victorians are happy to have $1 million more to spend on things that actually matter to us.

The Logies might mean something to Karl Stefanovic, but most Victorians don’t give a stuff.

In any case, success on Logies night has little to do with what show or person is best or most popular.

It comes down to who’s got the biggest publicity machine behind them.

A lack of

actual on-screen viewers seems to be no bar to success, which is lucky because many of the most feted winners are hardly watched by anyone at all.

Serial Logies favourite The Project is watched by 400,000 people, including just 44,000 in Perth, which is half the audience of the nightly news from Channel Seven and Channel Nine.

Sure, every now and then there are genuinely feel-good moments, such as Carrie Bickmore’s speech about brain cancer and the Samuel Johnson/Molly Meldrum double-act from last

year.

Shows — like Waleed Aly’s — don’t even need to be popular to win. Picture: Julie Kiriacoudis

But they don’t come around often enough, that’s for sure.

Logies host Dave Hughes — who is one of your few bright spots — says Melbourne needs the awards show.

But he’s wrong.

The Logies needs us, but we don’t need you.

Goodbye, Logies. It’s been great, I think it’s best we finally part ways.

We hear you’ve leaving us for the sunny state of Queensland, and we couldn’t be happier.

Don’t call us, we’ll call you.

(Well, probably not).

Love, The State of Victoria.

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@susieob