I Was Actually There

Television ABC
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I Was Actually There

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2024 Upfronts

What if our history was told by the people who were actually there? What if this retelling came with all its unvarnished, irreverent and occasionally contradictory humanity still intact?

I Was Actually There, from the makers of You Can’t Ask That, will interview Australians who were there when our most defining and memorable events happened. What was it like to witness the

miraculous rescue at the Beaconsfield Mine? Or flee the raging waters of the Boxing Day tsunami? Or wag school to meet the Beatles in their prime?

Through powerful contemporary interviews with diverse and colourful characters, the show will ask these Australians what they saw, how they reacted and how it changed them. While looking to the past, the series will reflect who we are now and examine why these moments still resonate.

PRODUCTION CREDITS

A Docker Media production for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Finance by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and Screen NSW. Executive producer Kirk Docker. Producers Loni Cooper, Josh Schmidt and Jess Skinner. Created by Kirk Docker, Aaron Smith and Jon Casimir. ABC Commissioning Editor Julie Hanna. ABC Head of Factual Susie Jones. International sales: ABC Commercial.

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Compelling new factual series I Was Actually There starts in July

From the makers of the award-winning You Can’t Ask That, the new factual series I Was Actually There starts on Tuesday 9 July, at 8pm on ABC TV, with all episodes available to stream on ABC iview.

I Was Actually There is a bold, new six-part documentary series that explores defining moments of our recent history through the eyes, ears and voices of those who witnessed them firsthand.

What was it like to lie quietly on the floor of the Broad Arrow Cafe in Port Arthur while a mass murderer shot everyone around you? How did it feel to be a first responder on the scene of the massacre? To be the journalist who accidentally found herself on the phone with the gunman? Or the sniper tasked with taking him out?

How emotional was it to be part of the high-stakes rescue mission of two miners trapped a kilometre underground in Beaconsfield? Or to be one of those miners, caught under the rockfall, writing messages on your clothes in case you never saw your family again?

What were you thinking as you lost your grip on your teenage son in the raging waters of the Boxing Day tsunami? Or sped away from a desert detention centre in Woomera with an escaped asylum seeker hiding in your car? Or bantered with The Beatles in their Adelaide hotel room? Or captured the moment on a suburban footy field where a proud Noongar man called out racism?

Employing the unfiltered and up-close interviewing style that made You Can’t Ask That an international sensation, I Was Actually There uncovers hidden perspectives and never-before-seen footage to create a multi-dimensional, experience-driven picture of the events that shaped Australia.

Series One episodes:

Episode 1: Port Arthur massacre: 28 April, 1996

Episode 2: Boxing Day tsunami: 26 December, 2004

Episode 3 AFL footballer Nicky Winmar’s stand against racism: 17 April, 1993

Episode 4: The Beatles’ world record-breaking Adelaide visit: 12 June, 1964

Episode 5: Woomera Detention Centre breakout: 29 March, 2002

Episode 6: Beaconsfield mine rescue: 9 May, 2006

For audiences who want to learn more from our exceptional eyewitnesses, I Was Actually There also presents a companion podcast, releasing Tuesday 9 July on the ABC listen app. Hosted by director Kirk Docker, each episode is a gripping, in-depth interview with an individual featured in the television series. The podcast allows audiences to delve deeper into the personal accounts of these pivotal moments, as our interviewees share their memories and reflections in vivid, intimate detail.

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Episode 1 Port Arthur massacre: 28 April, 1996

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Tuesday 9 July 8.00pm

On a crisp autumn morning at Port Arthur’s historic convict settlement, a gunman walked into the Broad Arrow Cafe wielding an assault rifle and opened fire, killing 20 people in the first 90 seconds and 35 by the end of the ordeal. But these details are not what we learn from this show. Instead, we go deep inside the experience and hear from the tourists who ran for their lives, the local GP first on the scene, the journalist that spoke to the gunman on the phone, the sniper that had him in his sights, to understand what it was like to live it.

Brigid Cook was working as a chef at Broad Arrow that day and was shot by the gunman. “It felt like someone had driven a star picket into my leg. It was really immediate and really wrong,” she says. Somehow, she managed to escape and warn others of what was happening, saving countless lives in the process. “I was so full of adrenaline I could still run,” she says.

Victorian police sniper Craig Harwood was watching the situation unfold on TV. He was flown to the scene and sworn into the Tasmanian force, tasked with taking out the perpetrator. He spent hours lying alone in the darkness, waiting for an opportunity to bring the siege to an end. But the moment never came. “My own mum asked me why I didn’t pull the trigger on him. Once you arbitrarily decide to throw the rule book out, you’re as bad as them,” he reflects.

28 years on, we learn about the ongoing impact of the day on first responders and survivors. For Pam Fenerty, a local GP who was among the first on the scene to treat victims, dealing with patients in the aftermath became the hardest to cope with. “There’s a thing called compassion fatigue from listening to the same story repeatedly, which is what happened. You can only take so much.”

Interviewees:
Peter Crosswell - a tourist who was inside the Broad Arrow Cafe at the time of the attack. He was shot by the gunman
Amy Roganovic - a 10-year-old girl who was visiting Port Arthur with her family
Mick Beekman - a tourist who was sitting on the balcony of the cafe when he encountered the gunman
Brigid Cook - a chef at the Broad Arrow cafe. She was shot by the gunman, but managed to flee and warn others to escape
Robyn Dell - a volunteer ambulance officer who was one of the first on the scene at Port Arthur
Pam Fenerty - a GP at nearby town Nubeena. One of the first to arrive at the scene and knew many locals involved
Alison Smith - ABC Hobart journalist who had a phone conversation with the gunman Ricardo Piacenza - helicopter pilot who transported the injured to hospital
Craig Harwood - a Victoria Police sniper who was sworn in the Tasmanian force and tasked with taking out the gunman
Andrew Fisher - ABC political journalist called in to report at the scene overnight until the siege ended

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Episode 2 - Boxing Day Tsunami

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Tuesday 16 July 8.00pm

A massive earthquake below the Indian Ocean unleashed the deadliest tsunami in recorded history, killing 230,000 people across 14 countries. But those who were swept up in the wave had no idea of its scale, only of the devastation that unfolded before their eyes.

At the beachside districts of Phi Phi Islands and Phuket in Thailand, a handful of Australians found themselves facing a ten-metre-high wall of water travelling 800 kilometres an hour. Joe Giardina, his wife, and their teenage son, Paul, had just sat down for breakfast when the tsunami hit, and were initially worried about getting wet feet.

“When it hit us, I put Paul up against a concrete pillar to hold him in there, and it picked us both up and threw us over a wall,” he says. “Everything happened in a millisecond. Something hit me on the back of the head and that’s when I went under and that’s when I lost Paul. I wasn’t able to hold onto him”.

Heart wrenching accounts of loss, miraculous tales of survival, and the reactions of ordinary people to extraordinary circumstances dominate this second episode. “I’m not brave. I have great respect for paramedics, police, fire fighters. These are people who run towards danger. I don’t know how they do it. I know that I’m not one of them,” says survivor Alexa Moses.

Despite losing his girlfriend to the tsunami, Gold Coast surfer Damian Kloot put aside his suffering to link up with other Australians in the search for survivors. “It gave me purpose, not only to save myself or save my partner, but to try to help others as well,” he says.

For many, surviving the tsunami was far from the end of the ordeal and each needed to work out how to live with it. Some have never been back in the ocean. Others believe they have a spiritual connection to Thailand. For Thai restaurateur Pym Boonyarattana, the emotional scars of the disaster are as present as ever. “I still think the wave will come any day, any time, any minute in my life. I’m living with fear.”

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Episode 3

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Tuesday 23 July 8.00pm

It’s a day etched into Australian sporting folklore for all the wrong reasons. Thanks to stellar performances from Indigenous AFL stars, Nicky Winmar and Gilbert McAdam, St Kilda downed Collingwood at their home ground, Victoria Park, for the first time since 1976. Winmar sealed the match with a stunning 60 metre strike and McAdam kicked five goals – while being hurled with relentless racist abuse.

“Swearing at you, spitting at you, calling you everything under the sun, which I won’t repeat,” McAdam recalls, adding that abuse was far from an exception in those days. “Every club tried it, don’t worry,” he says. As the siren sounded, Winmar faced Collingwood fans, lifted his shirt, pointed his middle finger at his stomach, and uttered the now immortal phrase, “I’m black and I’m proud to be black.”

“I just got sick of it. I just wanted to show them the colour of my skin and who I was,” Winmar says.
Yet the gesture was nearly missed. Had it not been for the quick thinking of two young sports photographers, Wayne Ludbey and John Feder, Nicky Winmar’s stand would never have been captured.

“There’s no footage of it, the commentators didn’t address it. It was left to John and I to record, as it turns out, a very significant moment in history,” recalls Ludbey.

This episode confronts the complexity of that moment and the trauma Winmar, McAdam and their peers have endured. “It gets me a bit emotional talking to people about that day, and what happened, the bad and the good side,” Winmar says. It asks audiences to reflect on the treatment of Indigenous sports stars – then and now.

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Episode 4 - The Beatles

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Tuesday 30 July 8.00pm

When The Beatles flew into Adelaide, they had no idea that the biggest crowd they would ever witness was waiting for them. Fans describe the life-changing experience of seeing the biggest band in the world arrive and perform in Adelaide.

When the most famous musicians on the planet flew into Adelaide on 12 June 1964 on an Ansett-ANA jet, they had no idea that the biggest crowd they would ever witness was waiting for them. The Beatles made their way through the streets surrounded by 350,000 screaming fans – more than half the population of the city.

Explaining the hysteria, then 14-year old Beatles fan, now actress, Kate Fitzpatrick says, “You just got sucked along with it. You can understand those cult things where they all drink Kool-Aid.”

It wasn’t just the teenagers who were swept up. After a hard-fought campaign and 80,000 residents signing a petition to get the group to come to the sleepy city, almost everyone surrendered to Beatlemania. “The wives of the mayor and the councillors were like school kids, desperately trying to get to The Beatles,” says assistant tour manager, Malcolm Cooke. “It was strange that grown people would behave in this way”.

Stranger still are some of the rituals the Beatles were subjected to, including an introduction to a 17-year-old female Ringo Starr look-alike. Adele Minns reflects back on her unusual encounter with the band. “John [Lennon] stood up and gave me his seat. He said to me, you’re prettier than Ringo,” she recalls. “Paul McCartney offered me a cigarette. I was just sitting there. I was just in too much awe being with them.”

These interviewees reflect on a very different Australia of 60 years ago – one that was isolated and at the dawn of a revolution. This joyous moment affected them as profoundly as a disaster or tragedy might.

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Episode 5

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Tuesday 6 August 8.00pm

A demonstration against indefinite mandatory detention at Woomera detention centre attracted more than a thousand concerned citizens from all over the country. But the protest took an unexpected turn.

A demonstration against indefinite mandatory detention at Woomera detention centre, in the middle of the South Australian desert, attracted more than a thousand concerned citizens from all over the country. “There were church groups, there were greenies, there were queer groups,” recalls one of the organisers, Alex Kelly.

But the protest took an unexpected turn. Enraged activists tore down perimeter fencing in an impromptu action and charged up to the main facility to hold hands with asylum seekers through razor wire. In never-before-seen footage and raw accounts from those at the fence, we witness the emotion felt by those on either side. “It was hard to believe all these people coming there, but when it happened it was more like a miracle,” then asylum seeker Ali Malekizad recalls.

Suddenly, inner fences were also broken, and asylum seekers scattered into the desert. Activists and detainees were forced to ask how far they were willing to go. “It wasn’t something that we planned to do,” says protester Kav, who made a snap decision to help an escapee, but adds “I don’t regret driving him away from there. I think that’s one of the best things I’ve ever done.”

Once the dust settled, many were left asking what side of history they would fall on. Kav and the man he tried to help escape were soon caught. “I always felt like I let him down and possibly made his situation worse,” he reflects.

“How does your behaviour impact other individuals? You always have to question yourself about that,” says protester Izzy Brown. “I always wonder, did we do the right thing?”

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Watched this episode on iview.

Interesting to see Candice Wyatt as an interviewee. I wasn’t aware that she was a local reporter at Southern Cross (7 Tasmania) at the time. Apparently she’d only been there a month before Beaconsfield happened.

From her former ABC bio: Candice Wyatt

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Episode 6 - Beaconsfield Mine Disaster - final

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Tuesday 13 August 8.00pm

The small Tasmanian mining village of Beaconsfield became the centre of a global media storm, when a mine collapse a kilometre underground killed Larry Knight and trapped two others, Todd Russell and Brant Webb, alive.

It took six days to discover Russell and Webb hadn’t been killed in the rockfall. As the town celebrated Todd and Brant’s miraculous survival, rescue teams were frantically figuring out how to get the men to the surface.
“Now they were alive – shit, what do we do now? There’s two hundred tonnes of rock sitting above them. To try and get them out, if it went bad, we kill them,” recalls Beaconsfield Mine General Manager, Matthew Gill.

A range of new perspectives are unearthed, from those working to free the miners, locals and loved
ones keeping vigil outside, and others tasked with covering the biggest news story in the world at the time. “We got the feeling the town didn’t want us there,” then rookie news reporter Candice Wyatt recalls, “but we had to make a story”.

Freed after an unimaginable 321 hours, celebrations for the mens’ survival were tempered by commiserations for their deceased co-worker Larry Knight. And nearly two decades later, the trauma of their ordeal lives on inside both men. “I’ve been down some very dark roads and the latest one eight or nine months ago, where I didn’t wanna be here,” admits Todd Russell.

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Tonight’s episode will also feature the last interview with Rob Rogers

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Updated synopsis and list of interviewees for tonight’s final episode

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ABC Commercial is thrilled to announce that I WAS ACTUALLY THERE, has been nominated at the prestigious C21 International Format Awards.

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