Mike Willesee
Encyclopedia
Michael Willesee is an Australia
n television presenter.
Mike Willesee came to prominence in 1967 as a reporter for the ABC
's new nightly current affairs program This Day Tonight
(TDT), where his aggressive style quickly earned him a reputation as a fearless political interviewer.
government, led by Prime Minister
Harold Holt
, not to reappoint the ABC Chairman Dr James Darling
. This decision was rumoured to have been the result of the government's anger over critical coverage of its policies on the ABC. Willesee's own critical comments about the decision on TDT on 2 April further angered Holt, who questioned the ABC's impartiality and implied that Willesee (whose father Don Willesee
was a Labor
Senator; in 1972 he would become Foreign Minister
in Gough Whitlam
's Labor government) was politically biased. Holt's remarks backfired, as they provoked strong protests from both Willesee and the Australian Journalist's Association.
After TDT, Willesee hosted the ABC's flagship current affairs program Four Corners from 1969 to 1971. He then moved to the Nine Network
, where he hosted A Current Affair, another popular Australian current affairs program. He was known for a long-running friendship with a disabled boy named Quentin Kenihan, who has osteogenesis imperfecta
. He was also known for sparring with the Orange People, who recruited in Australia during the 1980s.
One of the most significant interviews conducted by Willesee was the famous Birthday Cake Interview
in 1993, with then leader of the Liberal Party, John Hewson
. With the 1993 Federal Election to take place in only ten days, Willesee asked Hewson numerous questions about the proposed Goods and Services Tax
(GST) that the Coalition
wished to introduce. Hewson struggled to answer the simple question of whether a birthday cake
would cost more or less under his government as a result of the GST. Willesee's unrelenting questioning along with Hewson's indecisive answers and his frequent stuttering made it appear that Hewson had little understanding of one of his own major policies. Hewson would go on to lose the election against Paul Keating
and the Coalition would remain out of government for a further three years. Many political analysts believed that the interview cost Hewson's chance of winning what his supporters dubbed the 'unloseable election'. However, others counter that opinion polls held up until election day still predicted a Coalition victory.
In 1993, Willesee received public outrage for his controversial action of interviewing, via phone, two young children, a brother 11 and his sister 9 who were being held in a hostage situation. Many held the opinion that his actions were reckless and endangered the children's lives. This event was subsequently parodied by ABC TV
's Frontline
where main character Mike Moore interviewed a gunman and his hostage daughter. In the final scene of this episode, Mike interviews, live on air, another gunman in another siege who, much to Mike's horror, subsequently shoots each of his hostages, the sounds of which are played live across Australia.
Willesee is remembered by many Australians for the night when, filling in for Jana Wendt
on "A Current Affair", he fronted the show drunk. In a 2006 interview, Andrew Denton asked Willesee about the incident, including the fact that the following evening, rival journalist Derryn Hinch went on air and introduced his show with, "I'm Derryn Hinch and I'm sober."
ANDREW DENTON: When you look back on that now, do you see a man lost?
MIKE WILLESEE: Yes, I think that's pretty fair. The problem with being lost is not just being lost, but not knowing that you're lost. If you know you're lost you can do something about it. I didn't know I was lost because everything had worked for me. I guess I had a golden touch - whatever I did seemed to work. As you rightfully pointed out, that night I was filling in. I'd been doing nothing. Life wasn't a lot of fun. This was the time I should have had fun because I could fly anywhere I wanted, I could have a holiday anywhere I wanted, I could afford whatever I wanted, but it was much more fun when I was working. But I got bored with that so it wasn't really - I mean, maybe that plane crash, maybe that was a jolt. It wasn't a conversion, but maybe that really kicked me into saying, "Well wait a minute, are coincidences, coincidences?" The more I thought about God, the more, at the very least, I had something to think about.
In his fifties Willesee rediscovered the Roman Catholic faith of his upbringing. He has reported on religious topics and in 1998 he made a report entitled Signs From God on the appearance of stigmata
displayed by a woman, Katya Revas, in Bolivia
. This documentary was watched by an audience of 28 million in the United States
. In 1999, Willesee won the Bent Spoon Award
from the Australian Skeptics
for Signs From God. The rationale for Willesee receiving the award was that the show was "seeking to capitalise on the irrational millennial fears of many people".
In 2002, Mike Willesee became the 19th inductee into the TV Week Logies
Hall of Fame.
On 21 August 2006 Willesee appeared on Andrew Denton
's TV show Enough Rope
and spoke about his dedication to discovering what science can ascertain about the Shroud of Turin
; specifically, whether it contains the blood of Jesus Christ.
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n television presenter.
Mike Willesee came to prominence in 1967 as a reporter for the ABC
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly referred to as "the ABC" , is Australia's national public broadcaster...
's new nightly current affairs program This Day Tonight
This Day Tonight
This Day Tonight was an Australian Broadcasting Corporation current affairs program of the late 1960s and early 1970s.- Overview :...
(TDT), where his aggressive style quickly earned him a reputation as a fearless political interviewer.
Career
Willesee figured prominently in the controversy that erupted over the decision in early 1967 by the LiberalLiberal Party of Australia
The Liberal Party of Australia is an Australian political party.Founded a year after the 1943 federal election to replace the United Australia Party, the centre-right Liberal Party typically competes with the centre-left Australian Labor Party for political office...
government, led by Prime Minister
Prime Minister of Australia
The Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of Australia is the highest minister of the Crown, leader of the Cabinet and Head of Her Majesty's Australian Government, holding office on commission from the Governor-General of Australia. The office of Prime Minister is, in practice, the most powerful...
Harold Holt
Harold Holt
Harold Edward Holt, CH was an Australian politician and the 17th Prime Minister of Australia.His term as Prime Minister was brought to an early and dramatic end in December 1967 when he disappeared while swimming at Cheviot Beach near Portsea, Victoria, and was presumed drowned.Holt spent 32 years...
, not to reappoint the ABC Chairman Dr James Darling
James Ralph Darling
Sir James Ralph Darling OBE was the Headmaster of Geelong Grammar School , and Chairman of the Australian Broadcasting Commission .-Early life:...
. This decision was rumoured to have been the result of the government's anger over critical coverage of its policies on the ABC. Willesee's own critical comments about the decision on TDT on 2 April further angered Holt, who questioned the ABC's impartiality and implied that Willesee (whose father Don Willesee
Don Willesee
Donald Robert "Don" Willesee was an Australian politician, a member of the Australian Senate for 25 years representing Western Australia, and a Cabinet minister in the Whitlam government....
was a Labor
Australian Labor Party
The Australian Labor Party is an Australian political party. It has been the governing party of the Commonwealth of Australia since the 2007 federal election. Julia Gillard is the party's federal parliamentary leader and Prime Minister of Australia...
Senator; in 1972 he would become Foreign Minister
Minister for Foreign Affairs (Australia)
In the Government of Australia, the Minister for Foreign Affairs is responsible for overseeing the international diplomacy section of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. In common with international practice, the office is often informally referred to as Foreign Minister...
in Gough Whitlam
Gough Whitlam
Edward Gough Whitlam, AC, QC , known as Gough Whitlam , served as the 21st Prime Minister of Australia. Whitlam led the Australian Labor Party to power at the 1972 election and retained government at the 1974 election, before being dismissed by Governor-General Sir John Kerr at the climax of the...
's Labor government) was politically biased. Holt's remarks backfired, as they provoked strong protests from both Willesee and the Australian Journalist's Association.
After TDT, Willesee hosted the ABC's flagship current affairs program Four Corners from 1969 to 1971. He then moved to the Nine Network
Nine Network
The Nine Network , is an Australian television network with headquarters based in Willoughby, a suburb located on the North Shore of Sydney. For 50 years since television's inception in Australia, between 1956 and 2006, it was the most watched television network in Australia...
, where he hosted A Current Affair, another popular Australian current affairs program. He was known for a long-running friendship with a disabled boy named Quentin Kenihan, who has osteogenesis imperfecta
Osteogenesis imperfecta
Osteogenesis imperfecta is a genetic bone disorder. People with OI are born with defective connective tissue, or without the ability to make it, usually because of a deficiency of Type-I collagen...
. He was also known for sparring with the Orange People, who recruited in Australia during the 1980s.
One of the most significant interviews conducted by Willesee was the famous Birthday Cake Interview
Birthday Cake Interview
The "birthday cake interview" was a famous political interview in Australia that was carried out between interviewer Mike Willesee and Liberal Party Opposition Leader Dr. John Hewson shortly before the 1993 federal election...
in 1993, with then leader of the Liberal Party, John Hewson
John Hewson
John Robert Hewson AM is an Australian economist, company director and a former politician. He was federal leader of the Liberal Party of Australia from 1990 to 1994 and led the party to defeat at the 1993 federal election.-Early life:...
. With the 1993 Federal Election to take place in only ten days, Willesee asked Hewson numerous questions about the proposed Goods and Services Tax
Goods and Services Tax (Australia)
The GST is a broad sales tax of 10% on most goods and services transactions in Australia. It is a value added tax, not a sales tax, in that it is refunded to all parties in the chain of production other than the final consumer....
(GST) that the Coalition
Coalition (Australia)
The Coalition in Australian politics refers to a group of centre-right parties that has existed in the form of a coalition agreement since 1922...
wished to introduce. Hewson struggled to answer the simple question of whether a birthday cake
Birthday cake
The birthday cake has been an integral part of the birthday celebrations in Western cultures since the middle of the 19th century. Certain rituals and traditions, such as singing of birthday songs, associated with birthday cakes are common to many Western cultures. The Western tradition of adding...
would cost more or less under his government as a result of the GST. Willesee's unrelenting questioning along with Hewson's indecisive answers and his frequent stuttering made it appear that Hewson had little understanding of one of his own major policies. Hewson would go on to lose the election against Paul Keating
Paul Keating
Paul John Keating was the 24th Prime Minister of Australia, serving from 1991 to 1996. Keating was elected as the federal Labor member for Blaxland in 1969 and came to prominence as the reformist treasurer of the Hawke Labor government, which came to power at the 1983 election...
and the Coalition would remain out of government for a further three years. Many political analysts believed that the interview cost Hewson's chance of winning what his supporters dubbed the 'unloseable election'. However, others counter that opinion polls held up until election day still predicted a Coalition victory.
In 1993, Willesee received public outrage for his controversial action of interviewing, via phone, two young children, a brother 11 and his sister 9 who were being held in a hostage situation. Many held the opinion that his actions were reckless and endangered the children's lives. This event was subsequently parodied by ABC TV
ABC Television
ABC Television is a service of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation launched in 1956. As a public broadcasting broadcaster, the ABC provides four non-commercial channels within Australia, and a partially advertising-funded satellite channel overseas....
's Frontline
Frontline (Australian TV series)
Frontline is an Australian comedy television series which satirised Australian television current affairs programmes and reporting. It ran for three series of 13 half-hour episodes and was broadcast on ABC TV in 1994, 1995 and 1997.-Production:...
where main character Mike Moore interviewed a gunman and his hostage daughter. In the final scene of this episode, Mike interviews, live on air, another gunman in another siege who, much to Mike's horror, subsequently shoots each of his hostages, the sounds of which are played live across Australia.
Willesee is remembered by many Australians for the night when, filling in for Jana Wendt
Jana Wendt
-Early life:Wendt was born to Czech parents who emigrated to Australia in 1949, and was educated at the University of Melbourne.-Career:Wendt's television career began as a news presenter for ATV-10 evening news...
on "A Current Affair", he fronted the show drunk. In a 2006 interview, Andrew Denton asked Willesee about the incident, including the fact that the following evening, rival journalist Derryn Hinch went on air and introduced his show with, "I'm Derryn Hinch and I'm sober."
ANDREW DENTON: When you look back on that now, do you see a man lost?
MIKE WILLESEE: Yes, I think that's pretty fair. The problem with being lost is not just being lost, but not knowing that you're lost. If you know you're lost you can do something about it. I didn't know I was lost because everything had worked for me. I guess I had a golden touch - whatever I did seemed to work. As you rightfully pointed out, that night I was filling in. I'd been doing nothing. Life wasn't a lot of fun. This was the time I should have had fun because I could fly anywhere I wanted, I could have a holiday anywhere I wanted, I could afford whatever I wanted, but it was much more fun when I was working. But I got bored with that so it wasn't really - I mean, maybe that plane crash, maybe that was a jolt. It wasn't a conversion, but maybe that really kicked me into saying, "Well wait a minute, are coincidences, coincidences?" The more I thought about God, the more, at the very least, I had something to think about.
In his fifties Willesee rediscovered the Roman Catholic faith of his upbringing. He has reported on religious topics and in 1998 he made a report entitled Signs From God on the appearance of stigmata
Stigmata
Stigmata are bodily marks, sores, or sensations of pain in locations corresponding to the crucifixion wounds of Jesus, such as the hands and feet...
displayed by a woman, Katya Revas, in Bolivia
Bolivia
Bolivia officially known as Plurinational State of Bolivia , is a landlocked country in central South America. It is the poorest country in South America...
. This documentary was watched by an audience of 28 million in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. In 1999, Willesee won the Bent Spoon Award
Bent Spoon Award
The Bent Spoon Award is an award given by Australian Skeptics, "presented to the perpetrator of the most preposterous piece of paranormal or pseudoscientific piffle". The name of the award is a reference to the spoon bending of Uri Geller...
from the Australian Skeptics
Australian Skeptics
The Australian Skeptics is a non-profit organisation based in Australia which investigates paranormal and pseudoscientific claims using scientific methodologies.-History:...
for Signs From God. The rationale for Willesee receiving the award was that the show was "seeking to capitalise on the irrational millennial fears of many people".
In 2002, Mike Willesee became the 19th inductee into the TV Week Logies
Logie Award
The TV Week Logie Awards are the Australian television industry awards, which have been presented annually since 1959. Renamed by Graham Kennedy in 1960 after he won the first 'Star Of The Year' award, the name 'Logie' awards honours John Logie Baird, a Scotsman who invented the television as a...
Hall of Fame.
On 21 August 2006 Willesee appeared on Andrew Denton
Andrew Denton
Andrew Christopher Denton is an Australian television producer, comedian, Gold Logie-nominated television presenter and former radio host, and was the host of the ABC's weekly television interview program Enough Rope. He is known for his comedy and interviewing technique...
's TV show Enough Rope
Enough Rope
Enough Rope with Andrew Denton is a television interview show originally broadcast on ABC Television in Australia...
and spoke about his dedication to discovering what science can ascertain about the Shroud of Turin
Shroud of Turin
The Shroud of Turin or Turin Shroud is a linen cloth bearing the image of a man who appears to have suffered physical trauma in a manner consistent with crucifixion. It is kept in the royal chapel of the Cathedral of Saint John the Baptist in Turin, northern Italy. The image on the shroud is...
; specifically, whether it contains the blood of Jesus Christ.