An icon. A household name. One of our best-loved actors. Noni Hazlehurst is finally telling a story of her own.
A fourth-generation performer, Noni Hazlehurst has storytelling in her blood. She has graced our screens, stages and airwaves for fifty years – and won our hearts and respect in the process.
This is no ordinary memoir. Noni Hazlehurst is funny, fierce, thoughtful and clear-eyed about the world. Her story is full, rich, lively, opinionated – and a testament to her grit, willpower and talent.
She has always been committed to telling Australian stories – and this memoir is an impressive addition to her remarkable opus.
The following is an extract from Dropping the Mask.
Paying my dues
I returned home to Victoria to stay with my folks, who by now had inexplicably moved out to Ringwood, about 30 kilometres from Melbourne’s CBD, a million miles from where I wanted and needed to be. I didn’t drive yet, and it wasn’t advisable for a young woman to be coming home on the train after a theatre gig, nor practical to commute to the city for auditions or other opportunities.
Plus, I’d been off the leash too long. Luckily, I soon found a ?at in St Kilda, close to the city, which I shared with actress Tracey Mann, whom I’d met in Adelaide, and who’d just scored a regular role in The Box, a TV series made by Crawford Productions.
I managed an audition with the Melbourne Theatre Company in front of John Sumner, the artistic director. In spite of Wal Cherry’s sweet letter of recommendation, I failed the audition, and was told that I couldn’t try again. All that was left was television. If I was going to pay the rent, I needed an agent fast.
Somehow I ended up in the office of Woods’ Theatrical Management, run by Rita Tanno, a fast-talking New Yorker, whose enthusiasm and energy were infectious. She liked my speaking voice and thought voice-overs might be a quick way to make some money till I got established. She rang one of her contacts there and then, and the conversation went something like this:
‘I’ve just signed this noo girl and you’re gonna love her. Her name is Neeny Noodlenuts, no, Nozi Nasalburst, no, Needly Hoselwurst … I’ll call you back!’ She hung up and shrugged. ‘That name of yours needs practice.’
That slightly inauspicious beginning was soon forgotten. I got a gig playing Snow White in a panto at Chadstone Shopping Centre, performing in the general milling-about forecourt area – not ideal, but good experience. I was an extra in an episode of the ABC drama Bellbird, and earned some reasonable money doing two TV ads.
One was for Cadbury’s Nudge bars, with Eric Idle from Monty Python’s Flying Circus, which was at the height of its popularity. He’d been ?own to Australia for the campaign, which used the Python phrase, ‘Nudge, nudge, wink, wink’. He was very sweet to me, which helped a lot, as I was a tad awestruck!
The second ad was for some sort of hair dye, in which I played a secretary who won the heart of the boss by colouring her hair. As you do. They tried the product out on a sample of my hair before the shoot, and the results were not good – probably because it was so bleached by now – so a professional dye job was done for the after shots. I’m ashamed to say I didn’t question the dishonesty involved. It was such a relief to be earning money that I gladly went along with it.
My ?rst commercial voice-over was an experience I will never forget. It was a radio ad for Chrysler outboard machines, and I was working with two very experienced and well-known voice- over chaps, famous for their comedic delivery. The client had a pronounced stutter, and after we had done a couple of takes, he chose to intervene.
‘I w-w-want you t-t-to d-do it exactly l-l-like th-th-this,’ he said, and proceeded to demonstrate, stammering all the while. With a sly wink, the two men read the copy, perfectly imitating the poor man’s stutter. Luckily, everyone laughed, which stopped the take before I had to join in. I was pretty embarrassed, but these two were such stars of the airwaves that they got away with it.
Before long, I scored a lead role as a biker’s girlfriend in The Judging Ring, an ABC telemovie. Just before ?lming began, my mother had convinced me to let her dye my hair from its tawny blonde to a bright blonde. ‘Nobody likes a blonde who isn’t a real blonde,’ she said cryptically as she plunged my head into the sink to wash off the peroxide.
At work in the studio, my now white- blonde hair was apparently ?aring in the camera lens, so the props department sprayed my head with toxic dulling spray. It was my ?rst decent job, and all I wanted was to get through it without forgetting my lines or falling over.
If that was suggested to me now, with a sweet smile I’d tell them to bugger off, adjust their lighting and leave my head alone. But back then, the idea that I might have a right of refusal didn’t enter my mind. I meekly bowed my head and said, ‘Thanks. Sorry.’
Now that I had a couple of reasonable credentials on my CV, Rita got me through the door at Crawford Productions, which produced the majority of commercial television drama programs throughout the seventies and beyond. I won various guest roles in police dramas like Division 4 and Matlock Police, always as a victim of sexual crime or a bad girl who drove a man to do dastardly deeds. Most, if not all, of the regular police roles were played by men.
In my ?rst Division 4 episode, in which I played a rape victim, I had a serious police interview scene, playing opposite Gerard Kennedy, one of the regular detectives. He was a double Gold Logie winner, so it was a big deal to be working with him. The scene started with the camera on me, seated at a table opposite Gerard.
The ?oor manager called ‘Action’ and I looked at Gerard, who appeared to be crossing his eyes at me. I giggled – I thought he was trying to make me laugh. I apologised, and we started again. Once again, Gerard was looking at me weirdly, which threw me off.
The ?oor manager asked what was wrong, and I quietly said, ‘Sorry, but Gerard keeps crossing his eyes at me.’ What I didn’t know was that Gerard had a glass eye. When they pulled me aside to tell me, I could have fainted from embarrassment. Fortunately, he was very gracious.
Two regulars in Division 4 were John Hannan and Andrew McFarlane, recent NIDA graduates who had won parts as junior uniformed cops. In another episode, I played one of their girlfriends, and much hilarity ensued. To my great delight, I would work with both of them several times in the future.
In an episode of Matlock Police, I had to ride a bike. Actors all subscribe to Showcast, a casting resource, which includes a description of each individual, with a long list of attributes/skills to tick that might enhance our chances. Most people tick boxes that they shouldn’t. Scuba diving? Sure. Accents? Archery? Bike riding? No problem … Except, I’d never had a bike.
On the shooting day I was given my prop bike, which I surreptitiously took out to practise on the footpath. Thankfully I didn’t have to go on the road! I was told to ride through the gate, down the driveway and past the camera towards the house.
I managed to do what was required – just – but once I got past the camera, I couldn’t stop, and smacked into the house. The crew was happy – they’d got the shot, so they headed for the next set-up. Not wanting to make a fuss, I carried on. Apart from a few bruises the next day, it was my pride that was hurt more than anything.
I don’t remember ever seeing a nurse on set in those days, which is now required. Actors and crews regularly took ridiculous physical risks with no safety officers or protocols in place.
There were no make-up or wardrobe vans, and certainly no individual trailers for the actors. Make-up and hair were done at the Crawford’s studios or in the passenger seat of the station wagon when we arrived at location. It had to be a station wagon, because the back of it housed the wardrobe, and we often got dressed on the side of the road. When make-up and wardrobe buses arrived a few years later, they seemed like such a luxury!
Guest roles in Division 4 and Matlock Police were good stepping stones, but the real prize was Channel 7’s Homicide, which was shot on ?lm, as opposed to video. Everything was in black and white – we didn’t get colour television in Australia till 1975 – but the format of all-?lm was signi?cant. It looked much more believable and professional.
My only guest lead in Homicide was playing a bad girl with a petty-crim boyfriend. The director of the episode was a young Englishman who had risen through the ranks at Crawford’s and was now being given the chance to direct. Of course, we fell in love.
Noni Hazlehurst AM
Actor, presenter, director, writer and broadcaster, Noni Hazlehurst AM studied Drama at Flinders University in South Australia. After graduating, she worked her way through numerous television roles, before joining the original cast of The Sullivans in 1976. From 1978 to 2002 she was a regular presenter on Play School.
She has won four Australian Film Institute (AFI) Awards, including two for Best Actress, for Monkey Grip (1982) and Fran (1985), and two Logies for Ride On Stranger (1979) and Waterfront (1984). In 2016, she became only the second woman to be inducted into the Logie Hall of Fame.
Hazlehurst was the anchor of the Seven Network’s Better Homes and Gardens from 1995 to 2004, and has presented three seasons of SBS’s Every Family Has a Secret (2019-2024). Other notable works include Nancy Wake (1987), The Shiralee (1987) and Curtin (2007), as well as a lead role as matriarch Elizabeth Bligh in all six seasons of A Place to Call Home (2013-2018). Her theatrical appearances have earned multiple awards and she has received several ARIA nominations for her recordings for children.
Offscreen, she has been an ambassador for several children’s welfare organisations, including Barnardos, and she is currently the patron of the Australian Children’s Laureate Foundation. She has served on the boards of the AFI/Australian Academy of Cinema and Television Arts, Film Australia and Belvoir St Theatre, and was awarded an honorary doctorate from Flinders University in 2007. In 1995, she was named a Member of the Order of Australia.
Dropping the Mask is published by HarperCollins Publishers and is available from all leading book sellers including QBD Books.
Images: Dropping the Mask – courtesy of HarperCollins Publishers | Noni Hazlehurst (supplied)
Words: Extract republished with kind permission of HarperCollins Publishers