Howzat! There are more paper giants.

Did anyone watch (and love) the ABC's Paper Giants: the Birth of Cleo?
 

Asher Keddie as Ita Buttrose

I watched this series whilst on a plane to Germany last year. When flying, my absolute favourite thing is getting to watch all these movies and not having to feel like you have to be outside because you can't go outside on a plane. I normally have to calculate how much time I have and see how many movies I will be able to fit in. Then I have to decide what I feel like watching and which movies are the most important to watch. So my time is precious in a plane. At first I was a little skeptical about this show and I wondered if this gamble with my time would pay off but after the first few minutes I was sold. Ita Buttrose is a great lady and this is a great portrayal of part of her life and her struggle to get Cleo up and running. It's also a great feminist tale. Asher Keddie as Ita does a brilliant job and even captures her famous lisp.

And now we have some sequels being made. Not only is there another ABC series but there is also a Channel Nine series as well. The Channel Nine porduction, Howzat! Kerry Packer's War, that will focus on the events surrounding the creation of World Series Cricket whereas the ABC production, Paper Giants: Magazine Wars, will portray the circulation war of New Idea and Woman's Day in the 1980s and 1990s.

New Idea Vs Women's Day

 Both series' are littered with Australian stars with the Kerry Packer show starring most of the cast from Channel Ten's Offspring (not that this is a bad thing, just we really like to recycle our actors), Lachy Hulme, Matthew Le Nevez and Richard Davies whilst ABC is pulling stars like Rachel Griffiths and sees Rob Calton reprising his role as Packer. Both shows come from the production company Southern Star and are being produced by John Edwards (Offspring, Love My Way).

Rob Calton Vs Lachy Hulme

Well it seems that there is a boy's show and a girl's show. Magazines vs cricket. Not that men can only watch one and women the other, just that they are obviously targeted at different audiences but then they are both important Australian stories. But what we really need to take out of this is that if you are considering watching one of these shows and you haven't seen Paper giants: The Birth of Cleo then that is the one you need to watch. That is said with quite a bit of bias on my part as I haven't seen the other shows, I am a girl and I think Asher Keddie is brilliant but even so, it is a good show and a great production (and it's the 70s so there are some pretty awesome outfits).

...And just if anyone was interested, I know that Ita's ex-husband, Alasdair Macdonald, is/was (don't really know what happened with the case) suing the ABC for defamation. He said that the portrayal of him was wrong as he did not abandon his family and did not leave Ita because he felt threatened by her success. The ABC did issue a full apology recognising and admitting that they were wrong. This is good to know. Him abandoning Ita whilst she was pregnant did make for a great story but it also really made me hate the guy, so it's nice to know that he wasn't that much of an asshole...