Chris Bath on why she left Channel 7 and her new ABC radio gig

AFTER sensationally quitting a two-decade career with Channel 7, Chris Bath is about to return to the airwaves.

Back behind the mic: Chris Bath hits the airwaves for her new radio gig on Monday night. Picture: ABC

CHRIS Bath is as excited as she is nervous.

More than a year after sensationally quitting Channel Seven and a TV career spanning more than 25 years, the 49-year-old’s career has turned full circle.

She started in radio, way back in 1988. On Monday, Bath, 49, starts work presenting ABC Radio Sydney, Canberra and NSW’s Evenings show.

It’s a gig which will see her on air from Monday to Thursday from 7pm to 10pm.

So why on earth is she waking up at 3am?

“I keep waking up at 3am, my head abuzz,” Bath says.

“It might sound a bit weird because I’ve been around a while, but it’s old but it’s new at the same time.”

“My brain is spinning around full of thoughts for the show. And I’m still not sure where the delay button is, which is vital for talkback.”

Bath is a technophobe: the brain and skills are willing, but the dexterity and knowledge required to operate the “Starship Enterprise” panel in a radio studio still daunt her.

She had practice last year, filling in for eight weeks for 702 Drive host Richard Glover, but it’s not automatic yet.

“With most of the radio stuff I’ve done before, there’s been someone to push all the buttons, which I’ve been very grateful for,” she says.

“But at the ABC you push all the buttons.

“I was never allowed to push buttons in television, and that was probably best for all concerned.

“I wouldn’t trust me. I still don’t really understand what a megabyte is, and suddenly I have the Starship Enterprise in front of me, with faders, buttons, and computer screen thingos to fire off.

“Basically every piece of sound you hear coming out of ABC Radio Sydney comes out of the presenter’s mouth or their hands.” She muddled through Drive, and loved it.

Have just over 2 hours to remember what all these buttons do ahead of Drive @702sydney filling in for @rglover702 pic.twitter.com/xPpk1RKZb9

— Chris Bath (@ChrisBathTV) August 29, 2016

IT WAS NEVER ABOUT MONEY

Bath’s re-entry into fulltime work comes 16 months after she quit Channel Seven.

The decision to walk away from her role as weekend news presenter and host of Sunday Night prompted scrutiny, some criticism and much speculation.

There were claims she’d walked after being refused a pay rise; that a bigger secret gig existed; that she’d left after feuds with news bosses and Sunrise host Samantha Armytage (who famously named her “Bath Vader” — Bath returned serve by embracing the moniker).

But Bath was adamant she was just unwilling to commit to another three-year-contract, and wanted to try something different after 20 years in the same newsroom.

She did concede it had been “a tough year” of sustained behind-the-scenes tension.

“It’s my choice and it’s probably really boring, but this is a decision about me,” she said at the time, .”

“It’s not about money. It’s never been about money.”

She planned to have a holiday and then look for another job “because I have a mortgage”.

“Only once you live”: Chris Bath and her Seven farewell cake — a nod to her “Bath Vader” nickname. Source: Twitter

‘FUNEMPLOYMENT’

Which is exactly what she did, calling the sojourn, tongue firmly in cheek, “funemployment”.

“I spent 16 months freelancing, and poking at other workplaces, which is not something you get to do when you are tied up with a big network contract,” she says

“I made an active choice to see what else there was, not just in work, but in life. To take a breath.

“I have just emptied my brain. I’ve worked since I was 14, when I was old enough to get a job in some capacity. To have this time off was a lucky luxury I could afford,” she says.

She made a few appearances on Channel Ten’s The Project and Studio Ten. Filed a few stories for Sunday Night. Popped up on ABC panels. Filled in for Glover and Wendy Harmer. Wrote some columns. Filled speaking engagements.

“I haven’t thought about whether I miss TV,” she says.

“I did enough of it in the past 16 months not to miss it.

“At the time I left (Seven) there was a lot of media speculation that there was something dastardly going on.

“I just thought, the truth will out.

“I tried not to make (my exit) controversial. You work somewhere for 20 years, they give you opportunities and you are grateful for it. I was, and remain to this day grateful for two decades of great opportunities.

“And here we are almost 18 months on. There’s still no mystery gig. And it still wasn’t, and isn’t about money, and this (the ABC role) is just the right fit for me.

Reality turn: Bath with dance partner Trenton Shipley, during third series of Channel Seven's Dancing With The Stars. Picture: Supplied

JOB OFFERS

Which is not to say there weren’t other job offers after her exit.

“It was flattering actually how many people wanted me to do various things,” Bath says.

She won’t detail those offers, but admits there was interest from rival TV networks; “there was a bit of a reality show situation”, offers from radio networks, and she did speak “to a couple of people about overseas opportunities. but I have teenage kids, it’s not going to happen”.

The stints she did do especially on radio and on ensemble panels like The Project, showed the relaxed and humorous side of Bath.

“TV news is a serious subject, so people always think you’re Gina Hardfaced B***h (a comedy newsreader character played by Marg Downey on former Aussie comedy show Fast Forward),” she says.

“When you’re talking about Osama bin Laden and weapons of mass destruction there’s not much room for giggling, and that’s as it should be.

“But it was also nice to lighten up. That’s the nice thing about radio, you can afford to not be dreadfully serious all the time.”

The last real look viewers had got behind Bath’s news persona was more than 10 years ago on Dancing With The Stars.

“I’d do that again in a heartbeat,” she says. “Although these days it might be a case of mind willing and body possibly not being as able.”

Her ABC job doesn’t preclude her from accepting other work, so any dance reality show developers should feel free to call.

SPOUSE-TATOR

Since stepping away from TV, Bath, whose husband Jim Wilson is a sports presenter for Seven News, says she’s now a ‘spouse-tator’.

She won’t be drawn on the sex scandal currently engulfing her old boss, Seven CEO Tim Worner: ”You’d have to ask Seven about that”.

“I’m a spouse-tator now”: Bath with husband Jim Wilson. Picture: Richard Dobson

FULL CIRCLE

Bath’s broadcast career started in 1988 as an intern at Sydney’s 2UE.

“On day one, I got a list of jobs: the first was a press conference about Mick Jagger’s solo tour and I walk in and there’s (music journalists) Richard Wilkins and Maurice Parker who I thought were just so famous, and they handed me a glass of champagne and a Reebok shirt (which I still have, I can’t throw it out) and I went ‘wow’,” she says.

By the time she’d filed from a the middle of a demonstration protesting then-education minister Terry Metherill, education reforms, then popped in watch Al Grasby launch Gough Whitlam’s biography, she was hooked.

At the end of the week, 2UE offered her a job.

Fast-forward more than a quarter of a century, and with two years of radio the rest in TV, and the buzz is still there.

Despite her wariness of the technology, her broadcast brain was being stretched.

“It’s not often you get to do a new thing. When I started standing in for Richard Glover, I was so tired. And then I’d come home and Jim would say ‘I haven’t seen you this exhilarated by work in a long time’,” she says.

The format of Evenings will be loose — talkback, long-form interviews, and a few things that will make the show her own.

“There will definitely be a bird nerding segment in there,” she says.

Yes, Bath is a bird watcher, dragged into it by her now-teenage son, Darcy, who “inexplicably developed a fascination with it as a youngster and “has infected the whole family”.

She’ll also unapologetically share her love of 80s music.

Regular listeners will be happy she’s keeping the quiz — which affectionately became known as ‘Norman” under presenter James O’Loghlin.

“It won’t be called Norman, just the quiz, but I will not be responsible for the murder of Norman,” she laughs.

“Imagine that headline: ‘Satan from commercial TV comes to ABC and bones the quiz’.

“I don’t think so.”