“...Some hick country town”: Watching ‘A Country Practice’

[Mel O'Drama]

​

Boxed sets making up the entire series have been sitting in my DVD cupboard for over three years now. The thought of diving in has been simultaneously exciting and hugely daunting, with thirteen years’ worth of story adding up to 1088 hour long episodes: that’s significantly more than double Sons and Daughters’ screen hours!

As far as my background with the series goes, I feel I’m in the sweet spot. Back in the day I watched just enough of the series for there to be an element of nostalgia to this deep dive. At the same time, my memory tells me I only watched regularly for a relatively short period for a run of would what have probably been mid-Eighties-ish episodes. This means many faces will be instantly familiar, and some names will come back to me but - almost certainly for the first seasons - the stories will be all new.

ACP is very character-driven and far less heavily serialised than a traditional continuing drama. Each week’s key story takes place over two hour-long episodes, usually being introduced in the first and resolved by the end of the second (in that regard, it resembles 1966 Batman more than it does something like Sons and Daughters). There are some serialised elements to the relationships and arcs, but these generally bubble away to form this small town’s backdrop, occasionally being brought to the foreground in their own two-part story for any significant moments. I believe this is this format remains the template for the entire run.

This comes with a benefit. Almost all of whatever I did watch, I have forgotten. It’s possibly doing the series a disservice to say that it’s forgettable, but I’d say there’s a different psychology to watching a series of stories set almost in isolation compared to investing in a serial with multiple overlapping arcs and stories demanding attention in each episode. With ACP, a new viewer can come in, watch one two-parter and be told everything they need to know, which perhaps demands less retention of details.

There’s one important exception for me in terms of memory - one particular story I remember very clearly because it hit so hard… and I realise now it’s possibly THE best-remembered ACP story for many other viewers for the same reasons. Without giving away details of the plot, I’ll just say the story was called Molly. And if you know, you know.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

Season One

​

In General Practice (a.k.a. Wandin Valley)


Firstly, it’s unlikely I’ll be writing a new post about every story as I watch. With a series of this length, it’ll probably be more like a check-in every now and then. Whatever it ends up being, though, I wanted to get down some initial impressions after the first two episodes.

For each title given, by the way, we can assume there are two parts. It would get very cumbersome to write “Part I” and “Part II” for each story, so I’m just planning to do this in cases where I have only watched one part at the time of writing.

The DVD menu calls this opening two-parter “Wandin Valley”, whereas all sources I’ve found online suggest that this was only used internationally, with "In General Practice" being the original title going back even to when it was first conceived and pitched by James Davern back in 1979 (Ten passed and it was snapped up by The Seven Network. That old rivalry runs deep and it’s not the last example of this relating to this particular series). Either works. The story is about two GPs with different struggles, but the first thing we see in the opening scene is a gold Mercedes pulling up to a sign that reads “Wandin Valley 9km”.

The woman in the car was instantly familiar but it took me a few seconds to place her as Dasha Bláhová: Maria Ramsay from early Neighbours. My exclamation of “Oh, it’s her” actually made me miss the first few lines and I had to re-watch it afterwards. Of course, this is early Eighties Seven Network so I’m hoping for lots more familiar faces dropping in for an episode or two as we go along.

Indeed, I also got to exclaim “Oh, it’s him” when none other than David Palmer appeared on screen as a gruff widower who runs a farm while his fifteen-year-old daughter wants to go on the pill so she can have sex with her older boyfriend. The series is refreshingly frank about this, as is the daughter who refuses to hide behind things like painful periods. Naturally, as we watch, we realise the boyfriend is a wrong ‘un who is more concerned about getting his end away, which he does with someone else when he refuses to wait a month. The teen angst is real and Seven loves this kind of stuff (one of the earliest Neighbours episodes had a very similar “I wanna go on the pill” storyline with Scott’s girlfriend Kim, while early Home and Away had fifteen year old Roo skipping the pill altogether and getting pregnant, requiring her to snare another character to take the blame). Still, it’s a nice little arc that does its thing well and gives Tom Richards the chance to to get beneath the bluster to show someone who genuinely cares for his daughter (not that we see the character again. After all, Tom Richards has to depart in order to attend to his son’s incestuous affair over on that other series).

Dasha plays a heavily pregnant woman who has gone into labour a month early after learning of her husband's affair with an old lover. This gives her Sue Ellen Syndrome where she doesn’t want anything to do with her baby until the staff bring the baby in and leave her alone in a room with the baby as she cries. Fortunately, it pays off (given the mother’s strength of feeling it seems to me it could have gone disastrously wrong).

The real familiarity, though, comes from meeting our regulars. I’m pleasantly surprised by how many I remember as having been present in my viewing era. There’s the big softie of a policeman, whose name I correctly remember as Frank. He’s wooing clinical receptionist Lorrae Desmond whose real name is stuck in my mind, even though I couldn’t remember her character is Shirley (and I had to look it up even as I wrote this). She’s much quirkier than I remember, with a penchant for sitting under a pyramid frame in her living room which she believes restores her health and ages her wine. She also may or may not smoke grass (depending how you read her line to Frank about this in a bid to put him off pursuing her).

Shirley’s daughter is vet Vicky and she is being wooed by adorable blonde GP Simon Bowen, new in town and unable to get patients due to the closed ranks (it’s Simon who utters the line featured in the thread title, when he tells her about the curse of having a silver spoon in his mouth, and how, despite his father and grandfather being GPs in the city, he couldn’t get a role there so had to buy into a practice in this small town). Both of these I remember well.

There’s also a sister with attitude, Judy. I recognised her, but couldn’t place where from. Then I realised it’s from this series but later on. The characterisation and look seems different, so I’m guessing she may have softened as the series evolved. Here she’s delightfully outspoken… sometimes inappropriately so, which adds to the fun.

Series lead is Shane Porteous - a name and face I also remember well (that iconic credits image of him pulling up with his elbow out of his Land Rover is taken from the end of the second episode). Much is made of how dishy he is - and he does get a scene emerging from a swimming hole in barely-there trunks showing a very toned body - while Grant Dodwell is getting rejected left, right and centre and stays overdressed at all times. Let’s hope for some more balance in this department. Something I don’t remember at all is the character’s alcohol dependence. I’m guessing he may have cracked it by the time I watched, but it’s certainly an interesting element, and darker than I’d expected. We haven’t explicitly been told about what went wrong for him that caused a gifted surgeon to take up practice here, so that’s some intrigue.

One character I don’t remember is the Scandinavian matron who, when she can’t be out riding, talks to the framed photo of her beloved horse at work. I think she’d left by the time I watched, replaced by the more matronly matron. Anyway, I’m enjoying Marta so far, but I did find it amusing that the opening scene of this “slice of Australian life” series was between two women with thick Northern European accents.

In the first episode, there’s a dotty older lady waiting in reception at one point who is played by the actress who would go on to be a mainstay as the series’ dotty old lady. I’m fairly sure the character is different, though. Absent so far are the eccentric older characters who I remember hanging out at the pub. From what I’ve seen in skimming information, a few of these arrive early in Season Two, but it also appears a couple more regular characters will arrive in the coming episodes.

Watching this series slowly unfold looks set to be a nice, gentle ride.

 

[Willie Oleson]

Boxed sets making up the entire series have been sitting in my DVD cupboard for over three years now.

I remember you mentioned buying the set, something like "a sweet deal".
For what it's worth, it's also happened to me (that big Big Valley box set).

Each week’s key story takes place over two hour-long episodes, usually being introduced in the first and resolved by the end of the second (in that regard, it resembles 1966 Batman more than it does something like Sons and Daughters).

Flying Doctors (on the ground)?

 

[Mel O'Drama]

I remember you mentioned buying the set, something like "a sweet deal".

Indeed it was. I paid $AU500 for the entire series as a bundle in a ViaVision sale. It does sound a lot until you consider it's the best part of 1000 hours' worth of television.

For what it's worth, it's also happened to me (that big Big Valley box set).

That's the trouble when there are so many soaps and just not enough time.

Flying Doctors (on the ground)?

You're not far off the mark at all there. ACP may feel less "outback" and have a smaller budget, but both have that rural Aussie feel with quirky or rugged characters everywhere you look and lots of medical drama.

Both have Brett Climo at various points as well, so that's another common selling point.

 

[Carrie Fairchild]

Watching this series slowly unfold looks set to be a nice, gentle ride.

I look forward to reading your thoughts on the show. I’ve vague memories of it, mainly who the different characters were, as opposed to specific storylines.

Boxed sets making up the entire series have been sitting in my DVD cupboard for over three years now.

For what it's worth, it's also happened to me (that big Big Valley box set).

The boxsets of Dynasty and Howards’ Way are staring down at me from a shelf, waiting for me to finish them despite having bought them years ago.

The thought of diving in has been simultaneously exciting and hugely daunting, with thirteen years’ worth of story adding up to 1088 hour long episodes

They split the hour long episodes into two here, but it aired 4-5 days a week, so the entire run was completed within 12 years (1985-1997) on Irish TV.

ACP is very character-driven and far less heavily serialised than a traditional continuing drama. Each week’s key story takes place over two hour-long episodes, usually being introduced in the first and resolved by the end of the second (in that regard, it resembles 1966 Batman more than it does something like Sons and Daughters).

Flying Doctors (on the ground)?

A Country Practice is a funny one, as it’s essentially as you describe it above, yet it is referred to as a “soapie” in Australia. Whereas similarly themed shows like Flying Doctors, All Saints and G.P (which was basically ACP in the city) aren’t. I think ACP’s twice a week broadcast pattern may be the reason but you rarely see it referred to as a medical drama, like the others are.

There’s one important exception for me in terms of memory - one particular story I remember very clearly because it hit so hard… and I realise now it’s possibly THE best-remembered ACP story for many other viewers for the same reasons. Without giving away details of the plot, I’ll just say the story was called Molly. And if you know, you know.

For a long time, and possibly still today, this was regarded as a landmark moment in Australian TV drama. I remember it getting a special mention on a show celebrating 50 years of Australian TV.

Indeed, I also got to exclaim “Oh, it’s him” when none other than David Palmer appeared on screen as a gruff widower who runs a farm while his fifteen-year-old daughter wants to go on the pill so she can have sex with her older boyfriend. The series is refreshingly frank about this, as is the daughter who refuses to hide behind things like painful periods.

I was surprised to read about some of the harder hitting storylines that the show covered, as my vague memory of it was a gentle drama that my granny used to watch in the afternoons.

 

[Willie Oleson]

but you rarely see it referred to as a medical drama, like the others are.

Maybe it's more like Inverness "General Hospital"

 

[Mel O'Drama]

A Town Tragedy


Already I’m intrigued about the background to these early episodes.

As mentioned, I’m aware that James Davern had written In General Practice as a pilot a couple of years before it came to fruition. Since this second story introduces a few new characters not seen in that first story, I find myself asking whether it’s because the pilot was (a) shot earlier or (b) was filmed alongside the series, with Davern thinking of additional characters in the intervening years. Was it always the plan to introduce more regular characters gently as the episodes unfolded, or is the second story ensemble the “series” version compared with the first episode’s “pilot” cast?

Not that the changes are major. There are no recasts, no changes to sets or settings, everyone looks the same and the title sequences remain the same (other than two additional characters in the second story’s opening credits). This suggests the two stories were produced very close together.

My feeling - and this is just conjecture - is that the additional characters weren’t in the original pilot script but were written into the series in the pre-planning stage, with the decision taken to leave the pilot script more or less intact and add the others in the second story. My view on this may change if more regulars are introduced in the coming episodes, but for now that’s enough to help me sleep at night.

The key new faces in this story are Brendan and Molly Jones. Brendan and Molly are a cute pair - together or individually - and they’ve very quickly been integrated into things.

As I watched Brendan splitting his time between nursing and getting things straight on the farm, the familiarity came back to me. As a male nurse, he’s something of a pioneer - something that’s acknowledged in dialogue. There’s no real controversy over it, just mild surprise from a couple of characters, but I can’t think of a male nurse who appeared on-screen earlier. The Young Doctors’ focus seemed to be on photogenic young women, so if they had any male nurses I missed it. Certainly, Brendan was on screen over half a decade before Casualty’s Charlie Fairhead who came to symbolise - and arguably popularise - the role on British television.

Just as with Simon in the first story, Brendan’s medical background allows him to quickly spot that Terence is a gifted surgeon leaving him with the same question of why this surgeon has ended up in a small rural hospital, only to receive the same answer from other characters: that it is nobody’s business but Terence’s. This serves a double purpose. Not only does it keep the intrigue bubbling away, Brendan’s curiosity integrates him fully into the character dynamics. And, they endear him to the audience who have similar questions. It’s a winning function for a character.

And then there’s Molly. How interesting to have an eccentric, borderline comedic character played by - to repeat a phrase used earlier - a photogenic young woman. And without the usual props of her being “other” in some physical way. There are no goggle glasses. She’s not overweight. She’s not a bookworm. The “other” element mainly comes from her being too “city”. She hasn’t adapted her dress to her surroundings but there’s also a sense that she’s very out there by any standard. We see her glam up her wellingtons, which is perhaps more acceptable in 2026 than it would have been in 1981. In one scene with Brendan, she wears a large necklace on which are hung - front and back - about a dozen plastic spoons of different colours, set about two inches apart at regular intervals. It’s not even acknowledged in dialogue. It’s simply there, and because Brendan simply accepts it, we, too, accept that this is simply Molly.

The little comedic touches work well for me. In one of Brendan and Molly’s first scenes, we deduce the apple didn’t fall far from the tree when their housewarming present from Molly’s mother is a chandelier. Later in the episode there’s a scene with Molly talking to someone at the pen of Doris the pig. The camera pans up to show Doris’s pen is now adorned with the chandelier (talk about keeping up with the literal Joneses). It’s just enough.

Debuting is part two is Bob Hatfield, apparently a one-off fairly minor character who will come to be a more permanent part of the Wandin Valley scenery.

Along the same lines, there’s ornery Miss Bird, who gives Brendan a baptism of fire as his first patient. It’s the first of three roles for Colleen Clifford, an actress born in the Nineteenth Century). Again, the character will appear on a more recurring basis come Season Two and - incredibly - the actress will still be seen on the series in other roles more than a decade after this.

The meatier story this time out is of a respected married townswoman who is killed by a drunk driver, with much talk about the fact that she is in the car of a local businessman evidently heading out of town with a packed suitcase, a note addressed to her husband and no ring on her finger (even her friend Shirley has to admit “rings don’t fall off”).

As well as tapping nicely into the Peyton Place element of the way information travels quickly round a small town, fuelling (sometimes cruel) gossip and speculation, it also presents a moral dilemma for various regulars uncovering pieces of information - the ring; the letter; the cases. Given the circumstances, the question is how much of this information they give the woman’s grieving husband. Do they have the right, with the best of intentions, to conceal something that would cause nothing but hurt. The path taken is relatively satisfying. It’s not so much about whether their choices end up being the “right” or “wrong” ones, but about the fact that, one way or the other, any choice made is going to have a consequence to someone, even if it’s the person who says nothing.

 

[Mel O'Drama]

I’ve vague memories of it, mainly who the different characters were, as opposed to specific storylines.

Same here.

The boxsets of Dynasty and Howards’ Way are staring down at me from a shelf, waiting for me to finish them

Oh, I hope you get round to the rest of HW at some point. I'm quite rusty on the later episodes, and I think it's now over a decade since I last watched the entire series, but it's always good to see it get some love.

They split the hour long episodes into two here, but it aired 4-5 days a week

Sounds like Irish TV was at least a little more consistent than the ITV network. I think the later years were stripped this way on most ITV franchises, though. According to Wikipedia, my region showed it 5 nights a week from 17:10-17:40, which surprised me as I think of the Home and Away slot. H&A certainly started there in 1989 and I'd thought it had stayed there for most of the Nineties.

For a long time, and possibly still today, this was regarded as a landmark moment in Australian TV drama. I remember it getting a special mention on a show celebrating 50 years of Australian TV.

I can believe it.

It will be interesting for me to see this story from a long-term viewer perspective. When I first dipped into ACP in the late Eighties, it was one of the first episodes I ended up watching*, so I didn't have much connection to the characters. It's a testament to the series that it hit hard even to a new viewer.



* Even weirder, I only began watching the series partly because I'd read about this story in a book about soaps and realised there may be more to the series than I'd thought. It's quite bizarre that I should tune in only to immediately see that very episode.

I was surprised to read about some of the harder hitting storylines that the show covered, as my vague memory of it was a gentle drama that my granny used to watch in the afternoons.

It promises to be interesting. I have much the same image of the series as this very gentle and innocuous programme that was on around 2:15pm in between bland gameshows and things like Farmhouse Kitchen. Already my eyebrow raised when Molly called her temperamental generator a "son of a bitch" at least once.