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The Thredbo tragedy and the death of Princess Diana stand out.
"It's been a horrific year and you can't try to make things that are inherently tragic all of a sudden funny," the portly funnyman says.
"Fortunately, the Good News Week writers have managed to construct comments on those events, particularly in the opening monologues, that capture the absurdity of the moment without slipping into material that degrades the tragedy."
Robins shares the spotlight on the Friday night cult show with host Paul McDermott. The former Doug Anthony Allstar returned the favor this year by teaming up with Robins for radio station Triple J's breakfast shift. Robins will return to the shift next year. McDermott will not.
"Paul's probably one of the quickest thinkers on his feet that I've ever met," Robins says. "He's also one of the few people who can make me laugh out loud."
Before Good News Week, Robins was a regular on McFeast. He says the irrepressible Elle is a totally different creature from McDermott.
"Elle works best when she has a victim - a bit like Norman Gunston used to work," he says. "When she bales up a politician who is terrified of her she's hysterically funny."
The political satire of McFeast proved to be a godsend when Robins was picked for Good News Week.
"It really made me hone my current affairs knowledge," he says. "I always used to read the papers and watch the new, but now I read at least three newspapers a day and watch three hours of news and current affairs a night, from the start of the 5pm news on Channel Ten to the end of the 7.30 Report on the ABC."
Robins says his role on Good News Week is to help the guest panelists, who have included entertainers Magda Szubanski, Gary and Johanna Sweet and ACTU boss Jenny George, feel comfortable.
"I tell them not to worry about having to be funny, which helps them relax," Robins says. "Sometimes, though, they go on air and they're hysterical.
The greatest surprise, according to Robins, has been poet Margaret Scott.
"When they first mentioned she would be on the show I thought 'A poet from Tasmania? Are you sure you know what you're doing?' She turned out to be fantastic. Every time she's on it's an absolute joy."
Though Robins says he feels embarrassed every time he sees himself described as a comedian, he has the pedigree. His father, Bill, was a part-time stand-up comedian in Newcastle clubs before he died when Robins was ten.
"I never got a chance to see him do his act," Robins sighs. "I remember my father as a funny man and that you got attention in my house by making people laugh."
Now, as the final Good News Week of 1997 draws near, Robins is looking forward to a well-earned break.
"I'm pretty tired," he says. "I will have done 42 weeks of Good News Week, plus my radio show, which means getting up at 4.30 each morning. I've had a ball, but I need a good holiday."
Sadly, while this lighthearted look at a heavyweight subject is generally quite amusing, the belly laughs are few and far between.
That's not to say there aren't funny bits: chortles, sniggers, guffaws, even the odd titter, such as can often be seen running through a crowd, it is said.
But stop-'em-in-their-tracks knock-'em-dead material? It's as rare as a vegetarian at one of the all-the-dead-meat-you-can-eat barbecues that figure prominently in the lives of these three funsters.
Tony, Mikey and Steve (should that be Stevey?) come with impressive pedigrees. These are seriously funny men - and larger than life at that.
Squires is a Sydney television columnist, Radio Triple J contributor and regular judge on ABC television's Race Around the World. Robins is the unstoppable, over-the-top panel captain on the ABC's Good News Week and Weekend, and a co-host of Triple J's morning radio show. Abbott, better known as The Sandman, has also been a regular on Good News Weekend and Triple J.
All come from the Castanet Club comedy kindergarten. Robins and Abbott have earlier books to their name, so all three have writing pedigrees.
And I like the boys' work. I've always been impressed by the wit of Squires and Robins, different though it is, and while I wasn't always blown away by The Sandman's radio work, his television efforts have been a revelation.
Why didn't I find this book funnier?
Surely I can identify with the subject matter. I'm overweight and over 30 (over 40, for that matter). Whether I'm overdone is someone else's call, but probably not all that important anyway.
Am I too close to the subject matter? I doubt it. I'm not particularly sensitive about my weight or age.
No, the book is just not consistently funny enough. And that's another thing - consistency. As you would expect in a book written by three big blokes with three big egos, or at least three big personalities, the tone chops about a fair bit (and I'm not referring to the lamb chops which gets a frequent mention, along with steaks, tomato sauce and, of course, beer).
At times it's fairly clear who has written each piece. At other times I had no idea. And the book switches from apparently fictional (make that mythical, given the proportions) figures like Big Kev, he of the Big Man's Food Emporium, where meals are all fried and heaped on the plate, to real-life big men like Steve "Blocker" Roach, big man of rugby league, and David Williamson, big man of the theatre.
There's a bit of a quibble about Williamson, by the way. Sure he's tall (passing the old six-foot mark at the age of 12), but as the book says: "You may be tall, you may be a legend ... (but) you're not a Big Man unless your pants are size 40 or more."
The only SNAGS in this book are smothered in tomato sauce, and the men's movement is a bunch of playing backyard cricket.
All good fun, all totally politically incorrect, all enough to have dietitian Gloria Marshall and feminist Gloria Steinham cringing at the same time.
BIG MAN'S WORLD by Tony Squires, Mikey Robins and Steve Abbott, Random House, $24.95. Review: GEOFF TURNER.
Robins may abandon the shift, which he co-hosts with Jen Aldershaw and Sandman, because he's starting to feel drained.
"I'm still making up my mind," Robins says. "The pros are that I love working with Jen and Sandy and on Triple J. I've never had as much fun as I've had this year.
"The cons are I've been getting up at 5am for seven years."
Robins was the eighth most popular radio host in Melbourne, according to a survey by AC Nielsen McNair released in May this year.
While Robins hasn't lost his enthusiasm, new challenges are inviting, particularly in TV.
His appearances this year have most notably been each week on ABC-TV's Good News Week.
"I'm in the enviable position of having quite a few offers on the table. I can't say who from."
He's had some ''sniffs" from other radio stations. "It's like ordering a meal at a restaurant ... when the waiter turns up I'm going to make up my mind."
Robins' contract expires on January 6, but management wants a decision in about four weeks.
"He's been very honest about it and I don't have any ill feelings about him delaying his decision for another month or so," network general manager Ed Breslin says.
"After the service he's given the station I think that's the least we can do."
Robins' indecision is holding up my potential changes elsewhere in Triple J's schedule, because a station's line-up is usually built around the breakfast show.
If Robins does go, an obvious replacement would be afternoon host Adam Spencer, who has excelled this year.
That would leave the drive spot vacant, possibly to be filled by young comedy duo Merrick and Rosso, who have been doing some weekend spots on Triple J.
There will be some work, though Network Ten's new series of Good News Week will record four shows as part of the festival at 7pm and 9.30pm on April 7 and 21 at Melbourne's Town Hall. Mikey will also partake in one of the festival's popular annual debates and is involved in a possible TV series starring Triple J icons The Sandman and Flacco.
So, what difference has moving the show to a commercial network made? "None, sadly," he says. "I wish I could say 'money' but it's Channel Ten. Oh, there is running hot water in the dressing room."
Not that he makes it sound like hard work. "You get to goof off, have the comedians on your show and do the funny stuff with them without having to go through the terrifying ordeal of doing stand-up, which takes years off your life."
Mikey stopped doing stand-up 10 years ago because he says, "I wasn't very good". But now he's threatening to give it another try. "I might getup and do some stuff - but I'd need to be really pissed," he says, narrowing the odds. If he does, he's sure to be a success, if his spontaneity on GNW is anything to go by. "I do have a list of quips, but they never work. Every time I go out with a couple of things in my head, they just get a titter."
So what's his favourite gag? "The Liberal party's election platform in NSW," he quips - Mikey says that another advantage of the shift from the ABC is that he can now make much more fun of the government without receiving a slap on the wrist.
The fact that his best mates, Steve Abbott (The Sandman) and Paul McDermott, will be in Melbourne with him should heighten the chaos that Mikey can cause. "They are my best mates and can reduce me to tears of laughter. We live a few blocks away from each other, although my fiancee and Steve's wife might object to you likening our close friendship to a marriage.
Mikey rates both Paul and Steve, along with his old class clown - who's now working for a gas company in Queensland - as the funniest people he's ever met. At the festival, he'll be searching out appearances by "Morgs" (Anthony Morgan) and "Fleety" (Greg Fleet) and following his four comedy festival golden rules.
"Try and have a decent-sized lunch; pace yourself, don't see more than one show a night; and make sure McDermott's got his bloody wallet with him."
GD: It's all new for 2000, with one Saturday night show rather than GNW on Mondays and GNW Night Lite on Thursday.
MR: We've now got ninety minutes because we compressed both shows into one. It's a pretty sensible idea. Once we told people we were doing it, they tended to go, 'Yeah, I think you should.' Two and a half hours over two different nights was spreading ourselves and our audience a bit thin - everyone was knackered by the end of it. So now there's one show, and it contains everything we loved about the two shows - the politics and current affairs of the Monday show, and Flaco, the Sandman and the live music and comedy from the Thursday show. We're adding some new games too.
GD: New games, eh? Can you let us know what they're all about?
MR: Let's just say Who Wants To Be A Millionaire will be shitting their pants.
GD: Do you think the move to Saturday night will be a good one for the show?
MR: To be honest, things like timeslots are beyond my understanding. That's for the guys at the network to worry about.
GD: The reason I asked is that I was wondering if GNW could maybe take up where Hey Hey It's Saturday left off?
MR: Don't say that, please... althoug one thing that we're doing that Hey Hey did as well is show Australian bands playing live. I think we're the only prime time show on a commercial network that is doing that. I mean, our first show for the year had Midnight Oil, and I don't think they've ever appeared on commercial TV before.
GD: There's a lot of talk that shows like The Panel and GNW are slowly taking over from traditional news sources in providing information on current events...
MR: I think that's drawing a long bow. We're providing comment, but I don't think you're going to know a lot more about the news at the end of the show than you did at the start. You might have had a few more laughs out of it than you normally would have, but I really think that's a couple of academics drawing a long bow. If this is the new kind of news show, why am I reading three newspapers and watching four hours worth of news and current affairs shows a day just so I can do the show?
GD: Is the show truly off the cuff, or is it the kind of spontaneity you can only acheive with plenty of rehearsal time?
MR: You think you're ever going to get Amanda Vanstone and Tim Fischer to rehearse? The only things that are written are Paul's monologue at the start, and the questions and maybe Paul's responses to some of our answers. Everything else is spontaneous. It looks a little slicker than you may expect because editing tightens it all up, but almost everything is ad libbed.
GD: The move from the ABC to Channel Ten was a while ago, but do you think Ten have gained a good grasp of the show? Do they get it?
MR: I think Ten may have got the show better than the ABC did. I'm not sure if the ABC ever quite understood what we were doing. They liked it, but I know a few people at the ABC who never got it. The people at Ten actually seem to be fans - I'll run into people from management and they'll actually mention something that happened during an episode. Ten also gave us the opportunity to develop new stuff - there was GNW Night Lite last year, and this year we're doing some specials. I'm putting the finishing touches on a documentary on pub culture.
GD: Looking over the list of artists on the CD, I was saddened to see that you don't make any vocal contributions, or even that drum solo for "Wipeout" that you did on your belly.
MR: I was a bit pissed off about that. When I sing, however, it sounds like someone's anally torturing a small bird. It's not particularly nice. My involvement with the music on the show is really me sitting there enjoying it. Talking about the artists appearing on the CD, I liked Jimmy Little and Karma County.
GD: So who would you like to see on the show?
MR: I'm the guy who keeps asking, 'Can we have TISM on?' The response is always, 'They wreck sets.'
Me with Tracy, the fitness Nazi, who makes me walk.
Mid-morning, pretending to return emails The plastic thing is a cigarette substitute.
A rare, wild Flacco, caught in the headlights.
With DJs, 'The Vegies' and AC/DC's Angus Youg at Sydney's Triple M. Angus seems frightened that we're going to fall on him.
At Good News Week, guest John Maloney rehearses while Paul McDermott pretends to play the mandolin.
Pre-show: a quick bit in my 'luxurious' dressing room.
Pam (producer Pam Swain) working hard, while Julie McCrossin looks calm and poised.
11.30pm - Home time. Sandy has just realised he's left his pants in his dressing room.