As a result, she was unable to cover the debate, and instead sent to immediately isolate herself in a hotel room for further testing. Meanwhile, Seven reporter Paul Kadak was hurriedly dispatched from Los Angeles to cover the event from outside the Cleveland debate centre in her place.
Strangely, Mullany had already recovered from COVID-19 just a couple of months ago, so the reading came out of the blue. After further tests came up negative, US health authorities decided her pre-debate diagnosis was a false positive — apparently a remnant of her positive test from months ago.
With Mullany now cleared to resume normal transmission, she was free once more to correspond for Seven: just in time to cover — you guessed it — Donald Trump’s positive COVID-19 test from Cleveland on Friday.
Is Karl Stefanovic Netflix’s next Tiger King?
Karl Stefanovic is in the midst of talks with Netflix about making documentaries for the streaming giant that follow in the footsteps of international hit show Tiger King, Diary can reveal.
Stefanovic has told some of his close associates that he has held highly productive meetings with Netflix in recent weeks, with a pitch about making documentaries on “quirky” character-based Australian stories.
News of the Netflix talks mysteriously comes days after another big name Australian talent, Chris “Thor” Hemsworth, reached terms with the streaming giant for a four-movie deal, in which he is said to be lobbying to bring the films down under.
What is the connection between the Netflix talks with both Hemsworth and Stefanovic? Their shared uber-agent, Mark Morrissey.
Apart from negotiating Hemsworth’s Netflix deal, Morrissey also inked Stefanovic’s latest TV deal, which could see him with Nine until the end of 2023.
“But surely Karl is locked down to Nine?,” Diary asked when we first heard the news.
Surprisingly, the answer to that is no. We’ve learnt that Morrissey managed to build some wriggle room into Stefanovic’s latest TV contract, in compensation for a pay cut he is about to take.
Under the terms of his new COVID-affected deal with Nine, starting next year, Stefanovic took a $1m a year haircut on his previous record $2.5m a year contract from TV’s golden days.
So Morrissey smartly negotiated a clause in Karl’s new Nine contract to allow him to make side deals elsewhere while hosting Today.
An early pitch was for Stefanovic to take over 2GB drive from breakfast-bound Ben Fordham. But that proposal was rejected by Nine, who gave that gig to Jim Wilson.
However, as a sweetener to get Karl’s new contract across the line, we’re told Nine generously agreed to a clause that lets him pursue “streaming” projects, on one big condition: that he is not the on-camera “face” of any of those productions.
Diary also understands that Nine has “first and last refusal” on any project Karl pitches to Netflix or anyone else — which gives Nine or Stan first dibs if they think it’ll be a ratings winner.
Never a dull moment in the world of Karl, who didn’t return calls Sunday.
Singo on 2GB’s big gamble: ‘Full marks for balls, Malone!’
He only just sold out of 2GB last year. Now, in a rare interview, legendary radio and ad mogul John Singleton tells Diary he has five words for 2GB’s latest custodian, Nine’s Tom Malone: “Full marks for balls, Malone!”
The ex-2GB owner is talking about the Nine Radio chief’s crazy/brave decision to replace breakfast king Alan Jones with Ben Fordham in May. But 2GB’s shock succession plan paid off beyond even Malone’s wildest dreams last Tuesday, when Fordham recorded a dominant 17.3 per cent share of the audience in his first survey. That result came with even 2GB insiders tipping 12 per cent.
Singo admits he was shocked by the result. “I wouldn’t have taken the risk to not have Alan Jones,” he tells Diary. “But the Alan Jones factor? There wasn’t one! They can be very, very happy with that.”
He has also cited Jones’s own words to help explain this year’s changes at 2GB. “As Alan often says, an employee can’t get rich with an employer who’s broke.” Singleton noted that 2GB’s hand was forced by a revenue versus costs equation which changed dramatically in recent years, because of “social media activists, the defamation case and the cost of insuring Alan”.
Singo says he doesn’t yearn to make the decisions anymore. “You can’t sell a station and have any say in it. The personalities involved are so large. And so is the risk, when things don’t work well.”
He also tells Diary his big satisfaction was transforming 2GB from cellar dweller to market leader. “It was second last when we bought it. I really enjoyed it mate. I always said: ‘We’re only custodians of the station.’ And I think we did a pretty good job.”
‘Save Bob Rogers’
It’s a world record that may never be broken. Bob Rogers, 93 years young, once known as the “Fifth Beatle”, retired on Saturday night after a remarkable 78 years in radio.
Craig Hutchison’s Melbourne-based sports radio group SEN is turning Rogers’ home of 25 years, Sydney’s 2CH, into an all-sports station. Hutchison offered Rogers the opportunity to move to a digital station off the main Sydney AM dial, but he declined. “I was offered a reduced salary to move to a DAB+ station,” he said. “But I didn’t think it was worthwhile working for a small audience on a small salary.”
However, Rogers did get a glittering send-off on Saturday night, featuring Singo, Cliff Richard and Ray Hadley. Singo in 2014 ambitiously secured Rogers, then 88, for 2CH for 10 more years on a “handshake agreement”.
But clearly, handshake agreements don’t work when radio stations are sold. So Singo today launches a “Save Bob Rogers” campaign through Diary. He wants reclusive radio mogul Bill Caralis — owner of John Laws’ latest home, radio’s Super Network, based out of Sydney’s 2SM — to keep him on air.
“Bob is the Bill Collins of music,” Singo tells us. “2SM could do much, much worse than have Bob Rogers and John Laws back together.”
Insta fame beats love in ‘reality’ shows
So-called “reality romance shows” like The Bachelor and Married At First Sight have long claimed their casts are filled with men and women who want love, not Instagram fame.
But every year, the talent on these shows sure make it hard for the networks to make that argument with a straight face.
Take Bella Varelis, runner-up on this year’s just-completed series of The Bachelor. Throughout its screening, she was forced to repeatedly deny her real mission was to become an actor, rather than her alleged dream of winning the heart of Locky Gilbert.
At one point, she indignantly took to Instagram (where else?) to make her point. “I’ve never wanted or tried to be an actress in Australia, never wanted or tried to get work as an actress in LA and certainly am not acting on the Bachelor,” she wrote.
But we’re extremely relieved to report that days after her tearful rejection on the finale, Varelis’s broken heart had a miracle recovery. Maxconnectors, which on its website modestly describes itself as “Australia’s No. 1 Influencer Agency”, last week announced Varelis as its newest star, “with her broad cheeky smile and sparkling eyes”.
Who needs love?
Trump knocks off ratings smash Dan TV
The king of daytime TV has been dethroned. After more than 90 consecutive appearances at the helm of his million-viewer-a-day daytime ratings smash Dan TV, Daniel Andrews was finally knocked off the main channel of Melbourne’s major TV networks by — wait for it — Donald Trump.
Instead of Andrews’s daily press conference, Melbourne’s major TV stations, Nine and Seven included, chose to screen an even bigger ratings winner last Wednesday: the first pugilistic presidential debate between a pre-COVID-19 Trump and Joe Biden.
For one day only, Dan TV was left languishing on a combination of streaming platforms and digital channels as the fireworks from America played out.
But network news directors were over the weekend left sweating about as much as Trump would have been with his coronavirus-positive diagnosis.
With Trump now forced to quarantine for at least the next two weeks (and possibly longer), will there be any more ratings-topping debates available to be screened? They’d rate through the roof now.
The news bosses are praying Trump makes a speedy recovery. And if all else fails, they’ve always got Dan.
Eddie’s ratings get an Andrews caffeine shot
There’s more than one reason Eddie McGuire was cock-a-hoop last week.
Not only did his beloved Collingwood shock Perth’s West Coast by one point in their own backyard on Saturday night, but the ratings of his Melbourne FM radio show with Luke Darcy boomed, at a time of near-universal carnage among all other FM shows in the locked-down city. The audience for the Triple M show of McGuire and Darcy jumped 20 per cent during the period. And a big part of that ratings caffeine shot seems to have come from the show’s access to Premier Dan Andrews.
Andrews popped up on the McGuire/Darcy show during the survey period more than on any other radio station.
Relations between Andrews and the show seemed tight, until an emotional Darcy vigorously took on Andrews last month over the damage wrought by the state’s extreme lockdown, even citing it as contributing to the death of his own father.
When we caught up with McGuire, he was adamant interviews with Dan “rate” with Melbourne listeners.
“We’ve had Dan Andrews on extensively,” McGuire tells Diary. “We won’t give him a free ride, but sometimes people want to hear what he wants to say.”
But McGuire claims the improvement isn’t only about Dan interviews. “We also broke stories of what was going on in the quarantine hotels throughout the period,” he says.
No ‘big head’ for Howcroft
The breakfast show helmed by 3AW’s Ross Stevenson and John Burns has long been arguably Melbourne’s dominant radio program.
So surely changing a winning formula, and having Russel Howcroft (star of the ABC’s Gruen), subbed in for Burns as the incomparable Stevenson’s new partner was a huge risk?
Not on your nelly. The show’s ratings actually recorded a huge spike, from a dominant 17.3 in the last survey with Burns to a whopping 26.1 in Howcroft’s first survey. That means the show attracted more than a quarter of the entire Melbourne breakfast radio audience for the period: an all-time high even for Stevenson.
All of which has left colleagues doing their best to make sure there’s no chance of him getting a big head. Howcroft tells Diary: “A very well-known radio broadcaster called me and said: ‘You’d better quit now, because it ain’t going to get better than this.’ I replied: ‘I hope you’re wrong.’”
Minister’s SBS plea: ‘Be better than ABC’
The minister in charge of the public service, Ben Morton, has issued a stark plea to SBS staff. It can best be summed up as: “Please don’t do an ABC and pocket a 2 per cent pay rise, when your other public sector mates are on a pay freeze.”
Why is Morton making the plea? Because Diary has learnt that, just like the ABC, SBS is now holding its own vote this month on whether to take the 2 per cent rise, or defer it for six months.
Speaking through Diary, Morton has pleaded with SBS staff to ignore both the ABC and the temptation of more money. “I encourage SBS staff to vote yes for a six month deferral of their pay increase,” he told us over the weekend. “In doing so, SBS staff will show their solidarity with other public servants who have had the deferral applied to them.”
Morton said it was important for SBS staff not to seem out of touch with an Australian public smashed by COVID-19. “By voting to defer their pay increase for six months, SBS staff can demonstrate their deep understanding and connection with the Australian community during these difficult times,” the minister told Diary.
But a similar pitch to ABC staff last month fell on deaf ears, after they overwhelmingly voted against any delays to their own 2 per cent pay rise — despite some serious virtue signalling brownie points they would have won.
ABC chair Ita Buttrose assured staff the $5m in savings from delaying the pay rise would be put towards the worthy causes of “emergency broadcasting services and public interest journalism”.
But that noble pitch didn’t work: eight-in-10 ABC staff chose to pocket the money anyway.
Hot Seat narrowly avoids $1m mistake
It’s not just the AFL Grand Final moving from Victoria to Queensland. With Nine running out of Hot Seat Millionaire episodes filmed in locked-down Melbourne, it has moved the show holus bolus to the Gold Coast to fit around Eddie McGuire’s AFL obligations in his temporary home.
McGuire last week told Diary he was in the middle of a marathon Hot Seat filming spree on the Gold Coast, with 30 episodes filmed over five days. “We were running out — we filmed them in the nick of time,” he said.
But there was a snag. On the first day of filming, one of the episodes didn’t record at all — so it had to be entirely re-shot.
With Nine having to honour any money won in both the recorded and blank versions, the same contestants in that episode had a lucky two bites at winning big money. But they didn’t make their good fortune into a fortune. In total, Hot Seat’s rare double chance didn’t cost Nine a million, or anything like it.
In both the taped and blank versions, the last contestants standing fell at the last hurdle, leaving them with only the default $1000 prize both times.
The total damage to Nine from two episodes? A paltry $3000. As McGuire notes: “It could have been a whole lot worse.”
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Spare a thought for Seven’s US correspondent Ashlee Mullany. After going to all the trouble to get accredited and travel from Los Angeles to Cleveland to cover the Trump vs Biden brawl last week, she took a COVID-19 test. And senior Seven insiders have confirmed that, regrettably for the unlucky Mullany, it came up positive.