Shot Putting. Javelin Tossing. Pole Vaulting. Discus Throwing. They’re among the many competitive activities in the Olympic Games. Today I carry the torch for Name Dropping. It has a central place in our culture – presumably it derives from collecting autographs, as popular a pursuit in the playground at East Kew Primary as playing marbles or yo-yoing. Now let’s see fellow Name Droppers competing at Paris 2024, where I’m confident of winning gold.
After 60 years spent interviewing tens of thousands of the great, the good and the ugly, I should, at very least, rank in Guinness World Records, however an Olympic podium will suffice. Accept into evidence the following – just a random sampling of the famous or infamous, the meritorious or notorious, I’ve encountered. (I’ll exclude run-of-the mine billionaires such as Lang and Twiggy, and common-or-garden PMs and presidents.)
My collection includes war criminals, hit men, comics and cardinals. A random sampling? The Great Franquin, Henry Kissinger (we had lunch), The Amazing Randi, Salman Rushdie, Christine Keeler, Lech Walesa, Mikhail Gorbachev (a memorable weekend), standover man Billy “The Texan” Longley, Julian Assange and Colonel David Hackworth (the inspiration for Marlon Brando’s Kurtz in Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now). Also Coppola.
Did I mention Minchin? I speak of Tim, not the Libs’ Nick. Plus fellow comics Norman Gunston, Eric Idle, Aunty Jack, Johns Clarke and Cleese, Paul Hogan, Barrys Crocker and Humphries, Spike Milligan and Peter Cook.
Zsa Zsa Gabor, David Frost, Timothy Leary (I gave him a tour of Sydney), Oliver Sacks, two Hercule Poirots (Suchet and Ustinov), Colonel Sanders, fellow atheists Christopher Hitchens and Richard Dawkins. George Pell.
Kurt Vonnegut, Robert McNamara, Arthurs Miller, C. Clarke and Schlesinger. Nixon’s John Dean. J.K. Galbraith, Nugget Coombs. Madeleine Albright, Margaret Atwood, Nelson Mandela (a pleasant few hours). William F. Buckley Jr (he interviewed me). Prince Charles and Princess Diana (a Yarralumla dinner plus I took them to the movies in Melbourne). Olivia Newton-John. The Seekers. Jack O’Hagan sang me Along The Road to Gundagai. Most of the First Nations aristocracy – Lowitja O’Donoghue, Marcia Langton, Noel Pearson, David Gulpilil, Mandawuy and Galarrwuy Yunupingu.
Sid Nolan. Arthur Boyd. Writers? Joan Lindsay, Alan Marshall, Germaine Greer, Helen Garner, Tim Winton, Tom Kenneally, Frank Moorhouse, Judith Wright, Patrick White, Les Murray, Xavier Herbert, Frank Hardy, Colleen McCulloch, Clive James, Bob Hughes, Morris West, Richard Flanagan and Peter Carey. Ditto thespians: Jack Thompson, David Wenham, Richard Roxburgh, Russell, Cate, Nicole, Judy, Jacki, Bryan, Sigrid, Greta, Hugo and Hugh. Vale to my friends from Don’s Party – John Hargreaves, Ray Barrett and Graham Kennedy. A wider net? Jimmy Stewart (we watched Rear Window together), Kirk Douglas (he came home for dinner) and Sophia Loren. Grace Kelly and Meryl Streep and Werner Herzog, who I met at Cannes. And Harvey Weinstein. (We had a meeting on his double bed at the Carlton in Cannes).
While I vividly remember all the above, few remember me. I’m the merest footnote, a marginal jotting. Even my four daughters seem vague about my identity and ask me to wear a nametag.
PS. I began by declining to ID the PMs I’ve known but it’s the lot from Menzies on. Minus one. But as Scott and I both know, you can’t win ’em all.
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