The Sullivans

The Sullivans was also the title of a 1944 Oscar-nominated film set during World War II and written by Eddie Doherty (later renamed The Fighting Sullivans). You may have arrived here while looking for the Sullivan brothers.

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The Sullivans
The Sullivans main title caption.
Format	soap opera
Created by	Crawford Productions
Starring	Paul Cronin Lorraine Bayly Andrew McFarlane Steven Tandy Susan Hannaford Richard Morgan Norman Yemm Megan Williams Vivean Gray Reg Gorman Vikki Hammond
Country of origin	Australia
No. of episodes	1114
Production
Running time	30 minutes
Broadcast
Original channel	Nine Network
Original run	1976 – 1983

The Sullivans was an Australian made drama television series produced by Crawford Productions which ran from 1976 until 1983. The series told the story of an average middle-class Melbourne family and the effect World War II had on their lives. It was a consistent ratings success in Australia, and also became popular in the Netherlands, United Kingdom, Ireland and New Zealand. The soap was huge in Gibraltar where it played for many years every Sunday evening on GBC TV.

Main Story, Setting, and Characters

The story began in 1939, with the declaration of war against Germany. From the outset the series focused on the Sullivan family of Gordon Street, Camberwell, Victoria, along with their neighbourhood friends, relatives, and other close associates.

Grace and Dave Sullivan (Lorraine Bayly and Paul Cronin) were the parents of the intellectual John Sullivan (writer) (Andrew McFarlane) who was opposed to the war, while his more knockabout younger brother Tom (Steven Tandy) was keen to sign up and defend his country. Next son was Terry (Richard Morgan), a young rascal still in school. The youngest, the only girl, was the shy and conscientious Kitty (Susan Hannaford). Other key characters were Dave's brother, Uncle Harry (Michael Caton) and his syrupy wife Rose (Maggie Dence).

The family's close associates were Maggie Hayward (Vikki Hammond), the owner of the local pub The Great Southern, and Jack (Reg Gorman) the barman. Norm Baker (Norman Yemm) was a close family friend, as was the gossipy but sympathetic neighbour Ida Jessup (Vivean Gray) who initially appeared to be meddling and puritantical but actually held great strength and understanding. Mrs Jessup took in lodgers, the first of which were Bert and Lil Duggan (played by Peter Hehir and Noni Hazlehurst).

WWII Theme and Episode Locations

The majority of show's storylines relate to the war, focussing either on its impact on the Sullivan family in Australia, or through locally-filmed scenes of fighting in northern Africa, Greece - including the island of Crete, the Netherlands, England, New Guinea and Malaya. All male members of the Sullivan family enlisted in the armed forces at some point in the series; one son (John) was lost at sea but was later found fighting alongside Jewish partisans in the Middle East.

Critical and Popular Reception

The Sullivans attracted critical acclaim and was also one of Australia's most popular drama series, screening in half-hour episodes at 7.00 pm. Its popularity waned somewhat after 1979 following the departure of Lorraine Bayly. Bayly decided to leave the series, but unwilling to let such a popular actor who played a key central character leave the series, the producers of the series allowed her to take six months leave from the show. In the storyline her character Grace was sent to London, and a succession of pre-taped segments were interspersed through the period she was absent to maintain her presence in the series. These London-set segments featured actors specially imported from New Zealand, so that Australian viewers would not recognise familiar Australian actors in the scenes. After the break Bayly was still adamant she wanted to leave the series and so Grace was killed by a V1 bomb during a London air raid.

Despite her departure ratings remained high enough for the series to remain in production. In 1982 the war ended in the storyline and there were plans for the series to continue with examinations of elements of post-War Australian history such as the Snowy River hydro-electric scheme, however the decision of Paul Cronin to leave the series prompted the show's cancellation before any of this could come to fruition.

International success

The series subsequently enjoyed some success outside Australia after being purchased by networks in Britain and Europe as a daytime filler on the ITV Network. A midweek Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday 12.30pm slot was the most used slot when the programme was aired among most ITV contractors. When ATV became Central Television on 1 January 1982 the series was dropped in favour of contemporary Australian serials Sons and Daughters and The Young Doctors. Shortly after Central dropped the show, Yorkshire Television followed suit opting for local news programming instead.

The series was also screened on Sky Channel in the mid to late 80's before it became Sky One in 1989. It was shown at 11.30am every weekday morning. In the mid 90's, it enjoyed yet another repeat on UK Gold. Again, it was broadcast at 11.30am from 1994 to 1999.

In the early 1980s, the series was syndicated in North America. Stations included WLVI Boston, CKRD Red Deer, CKVR Barrie and TV Ontario.

Among the many short term cast members who worked on the series during its run, were several newcomers who later established successful careers, including Mel Gibson, Kerry Armstrong, Kylie Minogue and Dannii Minogue, Sam Neill, Gary Sweet and Sigrid Thornton.

The show was aired in the Republic of Ireland on RTÉ One.

The soap was a huge hit in Gibraltar in the 80s, screening every Sunday evening at 815pm. "The Sullivans" also became part of the local lingo, with people mentioning the popular family when referring to problems, complications or soap like elements to everyday life.

UK ITV regional scheduling

Cast

See also

• Crawford Productions
• Australian Irish

External links

• The Sullivans at the Internet Movie Database
• The Sullivans at TV.com
• Crawford Productions
• Audio discussion on Whatever Happened to The Sullivans cast
• A number of cast interviews
• Classic Aussie Soaps:The Sullivans
• The Sullivans - John Sullivan
• The Sullivans at the National Film and Sound Archive