Tony Morphett

Rain Shadow

Rain Shadow is an Australian television drama series which premiered on 7 October 2007 on ABC TV. It aired on Sundays at 8.30 pm. The six-part series was produced by Southern Star. Music from The Audreys features in the soundtrack for the show, including the main theme. Rain Shadow was shot in the Adelaide Hills in South Australia and is set in the fictional district of Paringa, a dry land farming area in a rain shadow. It tells the story of two characters who become the means of each other's future. It stars Rachel Ward as district vet Kate McDonald and Victoria Thaine as new veterinary assistant Jill Blake.

Release Date:2007-10-07

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:3

Vote Count:1

Sea Patrol

Sea Patrol is an Australian television drama set on board HMAS Hammersley, a fictional patrol boat of the Royal Australian Navy. The series focuses on the ship and the lives of its crew members.

Release Date:2007-07-05

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:6

Vote Count:20

headLand

Headland is an Australian drama television series produced by the Seven Network which ran from 15 November 2005 to 21 January 2006. The Seven Network filmed 52 episodes in the first series. Production on the second series had begun before any episodes were aired. Set in a university, Headland premiered in Australia on Tuesday, 15 November 2005 at 7.30pm. On 23 January 2006, the Seven Network officially announced that the series has been cancelled. The show aired on weekdays at 7.30pm in the United Kingdom on E4, re-formatted as half-hour episodes. E4 eventually dropped the show but episodes continued to be broadcast on Channel 4 at 12:30pm, this time in the original hour-long format.

Release Date:2005-11-15

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:1

Vote Count:7

Balmain Boys

Former national Aussie Football player Ledge had to quit the sport due to injury and started a fine career as police detective. He gets injured in a case. However IA, which always considered him the commissioner's pet, investigates against him. His old mate and competent lawyer Andy Grace gets him off, after which he retires honorably. However the criminals decide to set them up, using crafty underage homeless pickpocket The Kid. The gang has hidden ramifications.

Release Date:2003-07-02

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Vote Count:2

MDA

MDA is an Australian television series that aired between 2002 and 2005 on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. It concerned the day-to-day operation of legal firm MDA, which specialised in medical defence.

Release Date:2002-07-23

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:1

Don't Look Behind You

Jeff Corrigan has to enter the witness protection program with his family when he gives up his former boss to the FBI after discovering that he is a drug lord. Relocating his wife and kids causes trouble for them, as they are very dissatisfied with their new lives. Unfortunately, the protection program also fails, as the gang tracks down the family and Jeff is forced to protect them from attack.

Release Date:1999-07-25

Department:Writing

Job:Teleplay

Vote Count:3

Stingers

Stingers brings to light the life and work of an undercover police unit located in Melbourne. This dangerous work requires complete dedication, one slip can cost an operative their life.

Release Date:1998-09-29

Department:Creator

Job:Creator

Vote Count:5

Kings in Grass Castles

The life of an Irish immigrant family in Australia in the second half of the 19th century. Based on a 1959 book of history by Dame Mary Durack.

Release Date:1998-03-28

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:2

Vote Count:1

13 Gantry Row

When newlyweds Peter and Julie purchase an old house with plans to renovate it, they begin to discover the strangest things. First, they find one of the living room walls covered with iron plates that reveal an expanding sepia stain. Afterwards, they realize that the stain is beginning to take the shape of a man climbing from the darkness under the house. Whenever they paint over the stain, it reappears. The evil events that took place in the house 100 years prior, are becoming the cause of strange occurrences. Soon, the couple is directly threatened by the evil history of their home.

Release Date:1998-01-09

Department:Writing

Job:Screenplay

Vote Count:11

Water Rats

Water Rats is an Australian TV police procedural broadcast on the Nine Network from 1996 to 2001.

Release Date:1996-02-12

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:23

Vote Count:8

Sky Trackers

Sky Trackers was a television series created by Jeff Peck and Tony Morphett, and produced by Patricia Edgar and Margot McDonald for the Australian Children's Television Foundation. The series was a winner of various Television Awards. The pilot was produced by Anthony Buckley.

Release Date:1995-03-25

Department:Creator

Job:Creator

Vote Count:1

The Seventh Floor

Kate Fletcher has the perfect apartment. Everything is computer controlled. It is the home of her dreams until a psychotic man begins to execute the violent orders he hears from his long dead sister.

Release Date:1994-09-30

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Vote Count:2

The Man from Snowy River

The Man from Snowy River is an Australian television series based on Banjo Paterson's poem "The Man from Snowy River". Released in Australia as Banjo Paterson's The Man from Snowy River, the series was subsequently released in both the United States and the United Kingdom as Snowy River: The McGregor Saga. The television series has no relationship to the 1982 film The Man from Snowy River or the 1988 sequel The Man from Snowy River II. Instead, the series follows the adventures of Matt McGregor, a successful squatter, and his family. Matt is the hero immortalized in Banjo Paterson's poem "The Man from Snowy River", and the series is set 25 years after his famous ride.

Release Date:1994-09-23

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:2

Vote Count:9

Heartbreak High

The ins and outs of the classroom lives of a group of students who attend the fictional Hartley High School in Sydney.

Release Date:1994-04-01

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:1

Vote Count:39

Blue Heelers

Blue Heelers was one of Australia's longest running weekly television drama series. Blue Heelers is a police drama series set in the fictional country town of Mount Thomas. Under the watchful eye of Tom Croydon (John Wood), the men and women of Mount Thomas Police Station fight crime, resolve disputes and tackle the social issues of the day. We watch their successes and their failures and learn to grow with them and their loved ones as the heart of the series develops.

Release Date:1993-09-10

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:40

Vote Count:13

CrimeBroker

High court judge Holly McPhee devises blueprints for criminal operations and offers them for sale to the crime world. Her scrupulous operation falls apart when she takes part in a multi-million dollar bank robbery and becomes an accessory to murder.

Release Date:1993-07-01

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Vote Count:1

The Distant Home

Government authorities incarcerate a girl whose extraterrestrial origin is discovered after an accident with a car.

Release Date:1992-06-06

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Vote Count:2

Sweet Talker

When scam artist Harry Reynolds gets out of jail, he makes his way to the depressed coastal village of Beachport, where according to local myth, an old Portuguese treasure ship lies buried in the sand. Harry is an old pro at manipulating this situation to his best advantage, but never anticipates how deeply he will be affected by the relationship he develops with a young boy and his mother. A delightful tale of greed, gullibility and grandiose schemes, "Sweet Talker" is a romantic comedy for everyone in the family.

Release Date:1991-05-10

Department:Writing

Job:Story

Vote Count:7

Sky Trackers

NASA's Tidbinbilla Tracking station in Australia prepares for the re-entry of a decaying satellite containing a dangerous biological experiment. It is decided to bring it down near the station, for which job Dr Tony Masters has been brought in to assist Dr Spencer. At the same time, and unknown to her, Dr Spencer's daughter Ali has been using her computer to hack in to the station and reprogram the dish to communicate with a decommissioned satellite. Meanwhile, an unscrupulous industrial espionage agent, has penetrated the station and is preparing to take charge of the re-entry process, causing havoc and a chase through the Australian countryside to find the potentially deadly satellite.

Release Date:1990-01-01

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Vote Count:1

Bangkok Hilton

This classic Australian mini series was originally broadcast in 1989 as three 90 minute episodes and tells the story of a young woman who goes in search of the father she has never known. Her search takes her from Australia to England and then on to Bangkok. There she meets up with a charming young man, Arkie Regan, who plants drugs in her luggage and leaves her to her fate when the authorities find them during a routine search at the airport. Following her imprisonment in the notorious Bangkok Hilton prison she awaits the decision of the authorities on whether she should face the death penalty.

Release Date:1989-11-05

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:3

Vote Count:46

Boys in the Island

A teenage boy from Tasmania is drawn into a petty crime gang in Melbourne.

Release Date:1989-01-01

Department:Writing

Job:Screenplay

The Riddle of the Stinson

A true story. In 1937, a routine passenger and mail flight crashes during bad weather on a flight between Brisbane and Sydney. A local bushman begins his own search, and finds the wreckage and two survivors ten days after the crash.

Release Date:1988-07-25

Department:Writing

Job:Screenplay

Vote Count:5

The Shiralee

Macauley is a swagman on the road in the 1940s looking for work. He's a laid back, laconic sort of bloke but when he gets landed with his daughter after his drunken play-girl wife in Adelaide makes him face up to what she believes are his responsibilities, neither he nor his daughter are ready for each other. But in the beginning he's all she's got, and at the end, she's all he's got.

Release Date:1988-06-26

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:2

Vote Count:6

My Brother Tom

Set against the backdrop of World War II, this epic miniseries centers on the religiously divided town of St. Helens and the innocent romance between a pair of star-crossed teenagers (Tom Jennings and Catherine McClements) that threatens to tear it apart. Gordon Jackson, Christopher Cummins and Christopher Mayer also star in director Pino Amenta's adaptation of James Aldridge's novel of the same name.

Release Date:1986-09-22

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:2

Vote Count:1

The Flying Doctors

The Flying Doctors is an Australian drama series produced by Crawford Productions that revolved around the everyday lifesaving efforts of the real Royal Flying Doctor Service of Australia. It was initially a 1985 mini-series based in the fictional outback town of Cooper's Crossing starring Andrew McFarlane as the newly arrived Dr. Tom Callaghan. The success of the mini series led to its return the following year as an on-going series with McFarlane being joined by a new doctor, Chris Randall, played by Liz Burch. McFarlane left during the first season and actor Robert Grubb came in as new doctor Geoff Standish. The series' episodes were mostly self-contained but also featured ongoing storylines, such as Dr. Standish's romance with Sister Kate Wellings. Other major characters included pilot Sam Patterson, mechanic Emma Plimpton, local policeman Sgt. Jack Carruthers and Vic and Nancy Buckley, who ran the local pub/hotel, The Majestic. Andrew McFarlane also later returned to the series, resuming his role as Dr. Callaghan. The popular series ran for nine seasons and was successfully screened internationally.

Release Date:1986-05-15

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:10

Vote Count:14

Robbery Under Arms

Fourth adaptation and first made for television of the classic Australian bushranger novel "Robbery Under Arms" by Rolf Boldrewood. Made by the South Australian Film Corporation during the mini-series boom of the 1980s and lensed in the Flinders Ranges, it stars Sam Neill as the infamous Captain Starlight.

Release Date:1985-03-28

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Vote Count:5

Under Capricorn

Helen Simpson's scorching novel of passion and unspoken loyalty is brought to life in a major mini series unfolding in the epic Australian tradition of Against The Wind and Sara Dane.

Release Date:1983-01-01

Department:Writing

Job:Screenplay

Episode Count:2

Vote Count:2

A Country Practice

A Country Practice was an Australian television drama series. At its inception, one of the longest-running of its kind, produced by James Davern of JNP Productions, who had wrote the pilot episode and entered a script contest for the network in 1979, coming third and winning a merit award. It ran on the Seven Network for 1,058 episodes from 18 November 1981 to 22 November 1993. It was produced in ATN-7's production facility at Epping, Sydney. After its lengthy run on the seven network it was picked up by network ten with a mainly new cast from April to November 1994 for 30 episodes, although the ten series was not as successful as its predecessor . The Channel Seven series was also filmed on location in Pitt Town, while, the Channel Ten series was filmed on location in Emerald, Victoria.

Release Date:1981-11-18

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:1

Vote Count:13

The John Sullivan Story

After his troopship is sunk in 1942, John Sullivan is saved by members of the Yugoslav group, the Chetniks. He is later sold to the opposing group, The Partisans. This is his life as a medic in civil war-torn Yugoslavia. A TV movie spin off from The Sullivans (1976).

Release Date:1979-08-05

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Against the Wind

Against the Wind was a 1978 Australian television mini-series. It is a historical drama portraying both the British rule of Ireland, and the development of New South Wales and Australia. The producers were Bronwyn Binns, Ian Jones and Henry Crawford. The directors were George T. Miller and Simon Wincer. The scriptwriters were Bronwyn Binns, Ian Jones, Peter Kinlock, Tony Morphett, Paul Davies and Cliff Green. Jon English won the Logie Award in 1979 for "Best new talent" for his role in the miniseries as "Jonathan Garrett". The complete series is now available on DVD in Australia, Norway, Sweden and the Netherlands in PAL format. It is also available in North American format.

Release Date:1978-09-12

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:13

Vote Count:9

The Last Wave

Australian lawyer David Burton agrees with reluctance to defend a group of Aboriginal people charged with murdering one of their own. He suspects the victim was targeted for violating a tribal taboo, but the defendants deny any tribal association. Burton, plagued by apocalyptic visions of water, slowly realizes danger may come from his own involvement with the Aboriginal people and their prophecies.

Release Date:1977-12-15

Department:Writing

Job:Screenplay

Vote Count:193

Winners: Quest Beyond Time

A young hang glider crash lands into the year 2457 where he finds himself embarking on a dangerous mission to help an ailing colony.

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

The Alternative

Unmarried, beautiful and talented, Melanie Hilton discovers she is pregnant. The editor of a woman's magazine, she decides to have her baby and take leave from her job. Caught between her ex-lover and a colleague who wants to marry her, Melanie must find a solution or an alternative to her problem. When she falls in love with a woman, she questions the value of the traditional value unit.

Release Date:1977-04-20

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Vote Count:1

The Sullivans

The Sullivans is an Australian drama television series produced by Crawford Productions which ran on the Nine Network 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 United Kingdom, Ireland, Netherlands, Gibraltar and New Zealand.

Release Date:1976-11-15

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:6

Vote Count:7

The Evil Touch

The Evil Touch is an Australian-produced television series, originally broadcast in Australia in 1973. It was an anthology series where each episode had a self-contained story and a new set of characters. Each episode feature a new cast of guest actors, although several guest stars appeared in more than one episode, playing different characters. Each story is a thriller or horror story of some variety, ranging from tales of the occult and the supernatural, science fiction horror stories, to more standard murder schemes and whodunits. Most stories feature a twist ending.

Release Date:1973-06-19

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:1

Vote Count:2

Boney

Boney is an Australian television series produced by Fauna Productions during 1971 and 1972, featuring James Laurenson in the title role of Detective Inspector Napoleon Bonaparte. Two series, each of thirteen episodes were filmed. The series is centred on Bonaparte, a half-Australian Aboriginal character, created by Arthur Upfield, who wrote twenty nine novels about him from 1929 until his death in 1964.

Release Date:1972-07-27

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:5

Vote Count:2

Dynasty

Dynasty is a 1970 Australian TV series based on a novel by Tony Morphett.

Release Date:1970-10-09

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:23

The Naked Bunyip

A shy young man is hired by an ad agency to conduct a survey on sex in Australia. The somewhat clueless young man investigates homosexuality, transvestites, prostitution, and strip clubs along with every other variant on the "norm". While doing his interviews he meets celebrities, self proclaimed sex experts, prostitutes, female impersonators, pop stars, actors, and legislators as well as self appointed morals guardians.

Release Date:1970-02-02

Character:Himself

Vote Count:7

The Link Men

The Link Men was an Australian television series shown in 1970. The series was the first drama series made in-house by the Nine Network as part of an attempt to rival the cop shows produced by Crawford Productions such as Homicide and Division 4. The Link Men starred Kevin Miles, Bruce Montague and Tristan Rogers as three detectives working in the city of Sydney. The series was devised and produced by Glyn Davies who had created The Rat Catchers for BBC TV. The director was Australian film director Jonathan Dawson. The show lasted for thirteen episodes. Other actors included Elke Neidhardt.

Release Date:1970-01-14

Department:Writing

Job:Writer

Episode Count:1