Sweet Surrender (8 page)

No matter how crazy things got at Channel 9, or the suspended reality we lived in at the studio, outside events could be relied upon to bring me crashing back to earth with a thud.

Our children and their partners had supported both me and David through the difficult period of our marriage. They listened patiently to us both, to our rantings and ravings, our tears and irrational outpourings. Naturally, they became angry and frustrated with both of us at various times, yet they were understanding, long-suffering and forgiving. Given the stoutness of their support, how could we have foreseen that not long after David and I agreed to resolve our differences, to make up and move on, the relationships closest to our hearts would begin to crumble?

First it was Lorna and Aaron. I knew they had been experiencing difficulties but in my typical head-in-the-sand fashion I just assumed they would work it out. They always seemed happy when they brought the children to the farm, and even though I could sense tension between them at times I just assumed that they would hang in there. They had built a beautiful home together and established a lovely garden, and they were both working hard for their future and the future of their children.

From time to time Lorna had made comments to me about frustrations in her relationship with Aaron, but in reality she had protected me from her true feelings. Lorna is a brave young woman. She wasn't happy and she left. I was horrified. I didn't beg or plead but I desperately wanted her to go back to our son. To work it through. To resolve the problems. Aaron was a wreck. He fell apart and we did our best to pick up the pieces. He wasn't facing reality either, although he acknowledged a lot of the responsibility for what had gone wrong in their marriage. I kept reminding myself that they had been very young when they got together, and that the situation wasn't black and white. Like all relationships, the problems were complex and both partners had made mistakes along the way. During the period of their breakup, there was a lot of anger and some truly heart-breaking moments. I kept hoping for a happy resolution, thinking that perhaps in time things might settle down. I was deluding myself.

What about the children? They were unhappy and confused, and I believe to this day that they would love their parents to be together again. That's pretty normal, I suppose. We see a lot of them – they come to the farm with their father and they also visit us with Lorna. At first I tried to talk to them about what had happened, but it all seemed too sad to talk about and Ella, in particular, could not articulate her feelings very well. All I can say is that they are well-loved, happy children who see a lot of both their parents and seem to have come to terms with the situation. It wasn't always so, but over time, Lorna and Aaron have reached a comfortable place in their relationship and often socialise together, with the children. That's a very good thing. But it doesn't stop me from still feeling the pain of it all. I can't even begin to imagine how terrible it must be for grandparents when there is a marriage split and they are denied access to their grandchildren because of custody battles or financial disputes.

Aaron and Lorna's split came as a rude shock to me, and this has been a common thread through all my dealings with my children and
their partners. There is a tendency within the family to shelter me from anything that is negative or painful or unhappy. To protect me from the harsh realities of life. They know I love everyone to be happy. No conflict. No confrontation. The past few years when David and I almost separated – ‘the troubles', as I now jokingly refer to them – were an aberration. Until this rocky period I had always sought to keep things running smoothly. From the moment I first set up house with David, this is how I wanted things to be.

So when Miriam phoned us from Adelaide in early 2007 to say that she and Rick had separated, I could barely believe the words searing down the line. She was crying, of course, and was in profound shock herself. It had been sudden, turbulent and, she felt certain, quite final. At the time, Ethan and Lynne and their children were still living with us at the farm. Ethan was at work. I don't know where David was – maybe at the gym. I reeled from my office to the kitchen where Lynne was setting up a feed for Isabella. I blurted out the bare facts and she, too, howled in disbelief. We sat at the table, sobbing and drinking tea and trying to put the fragments of information we had together. Dismay and disbelief were the overriding emotions.

Initially Miriam wanted to ‘come home'. To pack up the house and the four boys and run back to an emotionally safe place. I readily agreed, feeling a need not only to see her but to help out in some way. That plan only lasted a few hours. By then the troops – Miriam's solid core of strong and supportive female friends – had rallied. They buoyed her spirits and provided plenty of practical as well as emotional support.

One of the first things I did was to send an SMS message to Rick, who was staying with a friend temporarily. Just to let him know that no matter what had happened between him and Miriam, we loved and supported him too. We did. We had always loved Rick, and I was well aware that he would be hurting just as much as our daughter. He decided to take some leave from work and visit his father in Sydney. It was only a few weeks after the initial bust-up, and he asked if he could
stay overnight with us at the farm on the way through. Of course he could; it would be good to see him and to talk.

In the meantime, I spoke with Miriam virtually every day. Her mood changed constantly. She swung from feeling happy and relieved that she was free from what she saw as an untenable situation, to feeling frightened and lonely and desperately sad at how it had all ended.

As usual I kept hoping that there might be a resolution. They could have marriage counselling perhaps. They could give it a second chance, as David and I had done. My continued denial of the truth of the situation and my blind optimism that that there could be a reconciliation were galling for Miriam. What she wanted and needed from me was unequivocal love and support for the very difficult decision she had made. She had my love, but she knew that at heart I wanted her to change her mind. To capitulate and compromise.

In the end she became angry with my attitude, and I can't really blame her. It was the first time in thirty-four years that she had been so critical of me, and I was shocked and hurt. As an outside observer of her marriage I had perceived various problems over the years, but had concluded that they were just the normal domestic ructions that all families experience. Miriam had always given me the impression that everything between her and Rick was good, and that their marriage was solid in spite of the flare-ups and clashes of personality. Because I wanted the marriage to be solid I chose to believe this implicitly. Because I wanted the marriage to survive I clung to the notion that maybe, just maybe, they could reconcile.

I flew to Adelaide to visit Miriam and the four boys. Miriam seemed very positive, very together, very upbeat. The boys were their usual boisterous selves. They are always delighted to see me and full of talk and noise and laughter. I took them out to lunch – I wanted to talk to them on their own to establish how they were coping with the situation. I broached the subject cautiously.

‘How do you feel about Mummy and Daddy? About them not being together any more?'

Eamonn looked vaguely into the distance. Theo glanced at the menu. Gus wriggled and fidgeted and looked uncomfortable. It was Sam who was the spokesman, as usual.

‘Well I was sad at first,' he said with a serious expression. ‘But now I've got used to the idea and it's okay.'

So that was it. I burst into tears and the four boys huddled around me, patting my back and giving me hugs. My attempt to comfort them was a complete fiasco.

I realise now that my reactions to the marriage breakdown were more about how I felt, about my pain, about my dismay that my ‘perfect' world had yet again taken a big knock. Of course I was desperately sad for both Miriam and Rick that it hadn't worked out the way they planned. They had been through so much together – they really were very young when they first met – and they had supported each other and worked hard together and it just seemed dismal for it all to end like that. So suddenly, like an axe falling.

In particular, I cherished the memories of the way they worked together at the births of their four boys. I was there for every birth. They took control and responsibility for everything – Eamonn, Sam and Theo were born at home with midwives and Miriam and Rick made a brilliant team. Rick swam with Miriam in the birthing pool and cradled her between his legs each time as she delivered their four large sons.

They cherished those memories too, and eventually I realised that nothing could ever negate those extraordinary moments of intimacy. They were the building blocks of their lives and, even though they were no longer together as a couple, they were united in their reverence for this chapter in their lives.

Positives sometimes emerge from negative situations. Both Miriam and Rick seem much happier now and, after the initial shock, grief and anger, they have settled into a really good relationship revolving around the boys. It seems to me that they have handled the fallout
for their kids particularly well. Miriam notified the school counsellor immediately after the break-up so that their teachers could keep an eye on the boys and watch out for any signs of trauma. But there were no such signs. Their schoolwork didn't suffer. They didn't act out any adverse behaviour in the classroom or playground. I'm not suggesting that they were untouched or unaffected by what happened, I'm just saying that they appear to have taken it in their stride, and because their parents have a fundamentally respectful relationship, the boys are happy.

The Catch-Up
went to air in February. The first week was terrifying. We had a studio audience, and had to march onto the set during the opening music and credits, sit up at the desk facing the cameras and start talking immediately. We had been wired up with microphones – always two, in case one malfunctioned – and we also had earpieces so that the producers in the control room could help direct the flow of the conversation. Libbi was against this idea, fearing it would interfere with the authenticity of our discussions, but in the end she relented.

My main problem with the show was always the content. I knew it was necessary to keep it broad and entertaining, but to me the topics we discussed were invariably too frivolous, too lightweight. I had plenty of opportunity to voice my opinion in the production meetings that preceded the show. Every morning we met with the creative crew to toss around ideas for that day's show. One of the problems was that the other girls, who all had quite long distances to drive, were sometimes late arriving to this meeting. We only had an hour to thrash around ideas and then we had to head to the dressing room for hair and make-up. Every day, it seemed, we had less and less
time to make intelligent decisions about what issues we would deal with on the show.

From my perspective, there was definitely a dumbing-down factor. At first I had been told that we were aiming for an audience of intelligent career-minded women who were at home with young children, but I quickly realised we were aiming for the sort of audience who watch Dr Phil or American soaps. It was disappointing.

We were given a variety of guests to interview, as well as guest panellists who would join us for most of the show and also be involved in interviewing the other guests. We had Julia Gillard (we talked mostly about her hair and her boyfriend), Amanda Vanstone (we talked about her dinner parties) and Kathy Lette (we gave her new book a big plug). Nine wanted men on the panel from time to time, so we had Sam Newman from
The Footy Show
(I found him a very strange character) and Andrew Bolt, a right-wing newspaper columnist from Melbourne who didn't really know how to handle four prattling women. If they were the best ‘blokes' in all Australia that we could entice onto the show, it raised some real questions.

Mia wanted controversy and Lisa did her best to create it. Pauline Hanson released a book in which she claimed she'd had an affair with David Oldfield. The minute the story hit the papers he was invited onto the show to give an emphatic denial – it was squirmingly embarrassing to see him being interviewed by a panel of women which included his wife, and Libbi's body language made it patently obvious she did not endorse the decision to bring him onto the show.

The desire to make ‘news' led our inexperienced team down treacherous paths. We were given the gangland queen Judy Moran as a guest, but were not advised to avoid certain subjects because of a big court case running in Melbourne. She was a spine-chillingly scary woman – cold and intimidating – and I really would have been happy to sit out that particular interview. Not surprisingly, she made actionable statements – we were foolishly unaware. When it became apparent the
next morning that the Nine Network was now in serious trouble with the Victorian judicial system, we were given an in-depth briefing by the station's lawyers. It was like closing the stable door after the horse had bolted.

A few weeks after we first went to air, it was decided that having all of us interviewing one guest at a time wasn't working very well. Our interviewing styles were vastly different, and I often felt I was struggling to get a question in. I think we all felt the same way at various times.

It was agreed we would put our hands up for those interviews that most interested us and that we would be split into pairs according to these preferences. Generally Libbi and I teamed up, as did Zoe and Lisa. This was a much better system from my perspective. Some of the guests we were given were absurd. There was a ‘baby whisperer' who charged anxious parents a small fortune to stay overnight and teach their babies to sleep (it used to be called mothercraft). There were the identical twin sisters who talked in unison, answering each question in perfect synchronisation. There were various clairvoyants and psychics who were going to ‘pick up on' various aspects of our personalities and do spontaneous ‘readings' with the live audience. I have absolutely no patience with such nonsense. During the week of rehearsals we had interviewed a psychic and, while the cameras were rolling, she turned to me and started to pick up ‘deep vibrations from my aura'. Those were her words. She said a few obvious things that she could easily have found out about in advance by reading my website or by googling me.

‘I think what you're really picking up on is my deep cynicism,' I quipped, smiling sweetly.

It wasn't our job to make the talent look foolish, but I just couldn't help myself. It became a running joke in the production office that whenever there was a wacky guest Mary was ‘out' of the interview. I was happy.

Libbi was considered to be difficult by some of the production team. She wasn't always easygoing, she often questioned decisions
and argued with the producers if she didn't feel comfortable with what they were proposing – like taking a swing at Sam Newman as part of a judo segment, or participating in advertorials with scripted questions and answers for sponsors. During the mornings, while we prepared ourselves for the show, all the other girls would chain-smoke, dashing out the back door with their hair in rollers, half made-up, puffing like mad and making themselves, in my opinion, even more wound up and tense. Libbi hadn't smoked for years and took it up again, I guess because of the pressure we were under, and because Zoe and Lisa were smoking. She usually forgot to buy her own cigarettes and instead helped herself to the others' packets, which caused tension in the dressing room. Zoe started to hide her cigarettes and Libbi could be heard swearing while she searched for them. Next day Libbi would turn up with several packets of Zoe's favourite brand and everything would be fine until the cigarettes ran out again.

I tried to remain calm in the mornings and to set aside time for clear thinking and to gather my thoughts on the topics we had chosen (or that had been chosen for us) to discuss. As the anchor, Libbi endeavoured to create some structure within the program. She wanted the conversations between us to flow more naturally, and tried setting up ‘links' that would enable us to jump from one topic to the next without it appearing clunky. It was a bit of an uphill battle – she was the only one who had any experience at making live television work, and her exasperation with the rest of us was often received as bad humour. I could see what she was trying to do, trying to pull it all together, but I don't think Lisa and Zoe or some of the production team had the same level of appreciation. When she fought for what she considered to be the best for the show, like insisting that the hairdryers be switched off while the cast had their final pre-show content briefing, she was not popular.

But apart from a few spats, I believe we all got along pretty well despite the craziness of our situation. We laughed a lot, and our
mornings together having our hair and make-up done were often hilarious – undoubtedly more entertaining than the show itself. In spite of everything I genuinely liked my co-panellists, and felt quite protective, even motherly, towards them.

Lisa Oldfield continued to bemuse and confuse me. During the rehearsals and the first week of the show she would arrive looking distraught and complain bitterly about her father and husband. She claimed they previewed the tapes and told her she was dreadful, that she was hopeless, that she had no talent. I found it upsetting – the last thing any of us needed was to be undermined, especially by members of our own family. I felt desperately sorry for her. She was intelligent and yet vulnerable.

Yet with Lisa just when you were feeling your most sympathetic, the ground would suddenly shift. Early on in the show she made some on-air remarks about her childhood and came into the production office the next day, agitated. She needed, urgently, to change the biography she had written. She wanted to change the details of her life story because it was causing upset in the family. Yet another morning she came in with her mouth bruised and swollen and told us all she'd been kicked by a horse at the weekend. We believed it. By the time we were ready to go on camera she had totally changed her story (after being challenged by the canny hairdresser) – her lips had in fact reacted to ‘injectables' given to make them appear fuller and more voluptuous. The contradictions went on and on.

Lisa also cried and vomited on camera. During a DIY segment she was asked to demonstrate a home fire extinguisher – the moment the fumes hit the air she started to throw up and had to dash from the studio. The same thing happened when we showed footage on camera of an eccentric English animal-rights campaigner eating corgi meatballs in Trafalgar Square to protest the royal family's fondness for fox-hunting.

On another occasion she started to cry and talked emotionally on camera about her miscarriages, totally taking the focus from the
group discussion. And when we debated the issue of decriminalisation of certain illegal drugs she suddenly became hysterical, sobbing and saying that drugs had nearly ruined her life, that she had been drug addicted in her early twenties. Good grist for the gossip columns – the newspapers were full of it the next day.

Libbi and I were also concerned about how many of Lisa's political views were in fact her husband's. When our topics for the day had been decided she would sometimes phone him and take copious notes. Several times she hijacked a topic by going off on a completely different political tangent that none of us could really debate with her because she would suddenly be spouting facts and figures it would be impossible for us to refute on camera without time for some of our own research. I believe she was quietly taken aside and told to ‘stick to the agreed topic'.

Working with Lisa was nerve-wracking. She had to be handled with great care. Yet in spite of all this there was something very engaging about her. She was quick-witted and funny, and appeared desperate to get on with us all. She just had an unpredictable side to her nature that was very hard to keep up with.

Zoe was a sunny, sweet-natured young woman who was impossible not to like. She had a dizzy blonde quality which could be infuriating at times, especially during on-camera discussions or interviews when she would make some offhand remark that could make her seem daffy. One question she asked, ‘Will John Howard still be Prime Minister if Maxine McKew wins his seat?', became legendary in the media. Her lack of knowledge about current affairs was a tremendous disadvantage. It is impossible to debate issues with a person who is totally uninformed.

During our first week on air, the US vice-president, Dick Cheney, was in Sydney, staying with John Howard at Kirribilli House. In our morning production meeting I suggested we should discuss him and his Australian visit on the show.

‘Who is Dick Cheney?' Zoe asked wide-eyed.

‘Only the second most powerful person in the world,' I think I responded.

A few weeks later she asked a similar question when we mentioned the possibility of talking about Queensland's premier, Peter Beattie. She'd never heard of him. Often when we debated difficult or intense topics she'd break into an angelic smile and suggest we should all meditate more, or do yoga, or spend more time thinking lovely thoughts. She was not in the real world. She sometimes didn't appear to be listening to our conversations – it was as though she was sitting at the desk, waiting to slip in a funny line or a quip without really participating in what was supposed to be a reasonably intelligent debate. I liked her tremendously – she was, generous, funny and sweet – but she was on cloud-cuckoo-land.

Over the run of the show some hilarious incidents occurred. During the first few week, I didn't realise that the microphones attached to our clothes could be heard by absolutely everybody – even the executives on the third floor could tune in and listen to us if they chose to. It was not a good idea to make flippant asides, as I discovered the hard way. We were waiting to do the celebrity gossip segment where we crossed live to the
Woman's Day
office and chatted to poor Pete Timms.

I turned to Libbi and said, ‘I hate this bloody segment.'

Immediately I heard Pete in my earpiece. ‘Thanks, Mary,' he said.

Whoops.

There was also the Shelley Horton affair. Shelley had been one of the four women chosen for the earlier show that didn't get the go-ahead. She had been passed over for
The Catch-Up
. However Mia, Tara and Henrie really liked her and had decided to use her as a fill-in host if any of us wanted time off. Six weeks into the show Lisa wanted to take a few days' break, so Mia contacted Shelley and asked her to stand in. Shelley apparently sent an email to all her friends encouraging them to watch the show while she was on, ‘even though I know you hate it'. One of her so-called friends leaked the email to the media and
Mia was furious. Shelley called us that weekend, crying and apologising profusely. She bought a huge bunch of flowers for all the hard workers in the production office. I felt sorry for her, but thought the whole incident was highly amusing, because it demonstrated to me so clearly that in the competitive world of show business, nobody has a true friend!