‘Mr. Gormsby’ wows Australian critics!
A politically incorrect teacher with appalling views, bushy moustache and an Officer’s swagger stick joins an Indian
Motorbike, a computer generated lion and a computer generated giant ape in delighting overseas audiences.
The local comedy series Seven Periods with Mr Gormsby starring David McPhail has been receiving rave reviews in the
Australian media since premiering on the nationwide ABC channel two weeks ago.
Seven Periods with Mr Gormsby, the first New Zealand comedy to ever play on free-to-air television in Australia, was
described by Mike O’Connor of Brisbane’s Courier-Mail as ‘hopelessly and delightfully irreverent, brilliant and
hilarious.’ O’Connor saw Gormsby as a ‘devastatingly witty spoof of the New Zealand education system in which the
central character of Gormsby exposes the political correctness that has paralysed it. As we enter the television desert
which is the holiday season,’ said O’Connor, ‘Gormsby stands as a comedy oasis.’
Lenny Ann Low of the Sydney Morning Herald described the show as ‘darkly funny’ and a ‘quick-witted poke at modern
education and society.’
Ray Cassin of the Melbourne Age was similarly impressed, describing Gormsby as ‘resolutely politically incorrect as it
is possible for a television series to be … not since Father Ted has there been a television satire so willing to
trample on every kind of sensibility, and which so triumphantly gets away with it… It is an attack on hypocrisy on all
forms. I don’t think there is a vicious right-wing agenda in Gormsby the series, or even Gormsby the character, but
there is a relentless and gleeful insistence on the part of the series writers, Danny Mulheron, Dave Armstrong and Tom
Scott, that they will do whatever they can to shock, to make us see the deceits and pretensions they are trying to
unmask.’
Plaudits from Australia cap off a great year for the Gormsby creative team. Dave Armstrong’s play The Tutor, directed by
Danny Mulheron won The Outstanding New NZ Play at the recent Chapman Tripp Theatre Awards in the Capital. Tom Scott’s
play The Daylight Atheist has just finished seasons in Brisbane and Adelaide. The Melbourne Theatre Company won a
prestigious Green Room Award for best ser for it’s production, and Richard Piper won a Green Room Award for best male
performance as Danny Moffat in that production.
The DVD of series one goes on sale today. A second series of Seven Periods with Mr Gorsmby, funded by TVNZ and New
Zealand on Air, is currently being shot in the Hutt Valley, and will screen next year.
ENDS