Keeping extra out of the ordinary

Press, 17 May 1989, Page 15

Keeping extra out of the ordinary

Subjects such as A.I.D.S. and breast cancer may be suitable topics for “The Flying Doctors” and “A Country Practice” to explore, but “Richmond Hill’s” producer, Phil East, was adamant that “Richmond Hill” (tonight, 7.30 on Two) would not be heading down that path. “We are entertaining first and teaching second,” he insisted last year, after the series had been on air for three months in Australia. With tonight’s episode marking three months of the series screening here (it began on February 19), we can expect later in the year to see a shift away from the sensational

crime-busting storylines of the early episodes to plots which are more char-acter-driven. “The characters may be ordinary but they’re deliberately so,” maintains East. “They do day-to-day things like the rest of us and the, only difference is that they’re a bit more concentrated than real life.” Keeping extra out of the ordinary also means sidestepping contentious subject matter, although East hinted that condoms, politics, and the vagaries of the stock market were all alluded to in later episodes. East is referring to episodes from the mid-twen-

ties onwards and tonight’s episode is number fifteen. It reflects the earlier attitude of “Richmond Hill’s” producers where storylines were more likely to include car chases and murders. The series screened twice a week in Australia last year, so New Zealand audiences have some catching up to do. Tonight, Andrew (Marc Gray) gets involved with a young car thief nicknamed Rocket (Kelan Angel) whose joyriding almost has tragic consequences, and Dan (Ross Higgins) has an unexpected reaction to the devastating news of his wife’s sudden death.