Rebecca Gibney goes into the Logie Awards 2024 Hall of Fame
An emotional Rebecca Gibney is celebrating after joining the Logies Hall of Fame as her son pays tribute.
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Beloved TV star Rebecca Gibney has spoken of her joy after she inducted into the TV Week Logie Hall of Fame by her 19-year-old son Zac Bell, saying she is “utterly overwhelmed” and “incredibly humbled”.
The actress took to Instagram on Monday after her emotional win on TV’s big night, thanking those who had helped her during her career.
Gibney posted: “So last night has to be up there with one of the best! To be inducted into the Hall of Fame has never been something I had even considered and to then witness not only so many dear friends saying so many incredible things followed by my son — for those that watched you would have seen my reaction.
“I am still utterly overwhelmed, still incredibly humbled and very proud of this honour. Thank you to those people who reached out — there were so many and I have shed many tears reading the messages.”
The New Zealand-born Gibney said as a teenager she had struggled with “enormous self-doubt” as she joked about needing some pain-killers after her huge night.
“For a girl born in a tiny town in NZ with enormous self doubt to be honoured in this way by a country I have lived in and loved since I was a teenager ... has meant the world to me . “Thank you to the Australian public, to TV Week and to everyone who has helped achieve this dream.
“I am such a proud Aussie/Kiwi girl right now and probably won’t come down from the clouds for a while….although definitely will need a few Panadol this morning.”’
Actor Zac Bell said he was “beyond proud” of his mother.
“I feel so lucky that I was able to be a part in presenting my Mum her TV Week Logie Awards Hall Of Fame placement,” he posted.
“Mum, I am beyond proud of you. You have worked so hard to bring so much to everything you do to entertain us all. You inspire me, you inspire so many others, and I am so happy that you are receiving this recognition for your incredible contribution to the arts; as well as being the amazing human that you are.”
GIBNEY’S INCREDIBLE ACCEPTANCE SPEECH
During her acceptance speech, Gibney told how she was struggling with crippling anxiety and body dysmorphia on the set of her breakthrough show when co-star Maurie Fields gave her advice that has stayed with her nearly four decades.
Just the fourth woman ever inducted into the TV Week Logie Hall of Fame, Gibney said: “It was on the set of ‘The Flying Doctors’ where I learnt one of my biggest lessons from the legendary late great actor Maurie Fields.
She continued: “I asked him one day, ‘what’s the secret of success in this business?’ He said and I quote, ‘It’s pretty simple love – just show up on time, know your lines, and
don’t be a d**k’. It’s a motto that I’ve taken on to every job ever since.”
Noni Hazlehurst, Kerri-Anne Kennerley and the late Ruth Cracknell are the three other women to have made the Logies Hall of Fame in the events 64 years.
Gibney, 59, has been a fixture on Australian and New Zealand small and big screens for more than four decades, having scored her first role here in children’s series, Zoo Family, before becoming a household name as mechanic Emma Plimpton in The Flying Doctors.
Acropolis Now, All Together Now, Halifax f.p., Packed to the Rafters, Peter Allen: Not The Boy Next Door and Wanted are just a few of her other prominent roles.
On the big screen, she has appeared in an eclectic mix of projects from Lucky Break with Anthony LaPaglia to the P.J Hogan directed Mental and The Dressmaker with Kate Winslet.
“If someone had told 16-year-old me, who suffered crippling anxiety and severe body dysmorphia, that one day I would be standing on the stage with this award, she wouldn’t have believed it,” she said.
“Thank you firstly to the Australian public. Many have grown up with me and have supported me since the early days, and, like me, think 1984 was only 20 years ago. Thank you to the writers who have created the most wonderful characters for me to inhabit.”
It isn’t Gibney’s first Logies honour. She has been nominated several times and scored the coveted Gold in 2009, as well as Most Popular Actress that year for Packed To The Rafters.
Among her other Logie nominations were Gold nods in 2010 and 2011.
Gibney won an AFI (Australian Film Institute) Award for Best Actress in 1990 for her role as Guinea Malone in post WWII drama Come In Spinner.
Son Zac walked the red carpet with his mum and took to the stage to help present the actor with the Hall of Fame honour.
“I feel so lucky to have been raised by someone with so much love to give and be guided through life watching her show so much kindness to everyone that she meets,” he said.
“Throughout her incredible career, she has brought so many amazing different characters to life. I have seen her take on so many challenges and give her all to every role that she plays, whether she is playing a loving mother, a forensic psychiatrist, an outlaw on the run from the police, solving crimes as a detective, running a wine vineyard in Otago or cutting into body parts as a hardened crime boss. She never takes the easy route and works so hard to entertain us all. I am so proud of my mum for receiving this incredible recognition for years of hard work.”
Hugh Jackman, Claudia Karvan, Erik Thomson, Richard Roxburgh, Sigrid Thornton, Deborra-Lee Furness, Georgie Parker, Peter O’Brien and Julia Zemiro were among those paying tribute to the industry icon.
Gibney splits her time between her home country of New Zealand and Australia with production designer husband of 23 years, Richard Bell.
“My beautiful mum Shirley, Mama Shirl, who will be so proud that I’m standing on the stage, my mother came from the most traumatic childhood and raised six children pretty much single-handedly and often under terrible circumstances,” Gibney said.
“She taught us the most important thing in life is forgiveness, kindness and respect, that you can be anything you want in this world, make sure you treat people the way you wish to be treated. I have been so fortunate to have been guided and supported by some incredible visionary women on this journey. From my mother, to my first agent, to the many female producers, directors, fellow actors and crew who have encouraged me behind the scenes, and I am very proud to be one of four women to have ever been inducted into the Hall of Fame.”
Originally published as Rebecca Gibney goes into the Logie Awards 2024 Hall of Fame
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