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The Last Bastion
''The Last Bastion'' is a television mini-series which aired in Australia in November 1984. It is a docudrama telling the story of Australia's involvement in World War II, and its often strained relations with its two main allies, Great Britain and the United States. The running time of the series is reported as 360 minutes (6 hours) on the IMDb page, that is the screening time with ads. Each part runs for approx 90 minutes, both on VHS tape and DVD, is approximately 160 minutes implying they are heavily edited versions, as they've compressed 3 episodes into one 2 hour 40 minute film. The 3 episodes still remain in the Screensound Archive. Cast * Michael Blakemore ... John Curtin * John Wood ... Robert Menzies * Timothy West ... Winston Churchill * Robert Vaughn ... General Douglas MacArthur * Warren Mitchell ... Franklin D. Roosevelt * Ray Barrett ... General Thomas Blamey * Peter Whitford ... H. V. "Bert" Evatt * Max Cullen ... Eddie Ward *Jon Ewing ... Billy Hughes *Nancy ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
David Williamson
David Keith Williamson Officer of the Order of Australia, AO (born 24 February 1942) is an Australians, Australian dramatist and playwright. He has also written screenplays and teleplays. Early life David Williamson was born in Melbourne, Victoria (Australia), Victoria, on 24 February 1942, and was brought up in Bairnsdale. He initially studied mechanical engineering at the University of Melbourne from 1960, but left and graduated from Monash University with a Bachelor of Engineering degree in 1965. His early forays into the theatre were as an actor and writer of skits for the Engineers' Revue at Melbourne University's Union Theatre at lunchtime during the early 1960s, and as a satirical sketch writer for Monash University student reviews and the Emerald Hill Theatre Company. After a brief stint as design engineer for Holden, GM Holden, Williamson became a lecturer in mechanical engineering and thermodynamics at Swinburne University of Technology (then Swinburne Technical Col ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Douglas MacArthur
Douglas MacArthur (26 January 18805 April 1964) was an American military leader who served as General of the Army for the United States, as well as a field marshal to the Philippine Army. He had served with distinction in World War I, was Chief of Staff of the United States Army during the 1930s, and he played a prominent role in the Pacific theater during World War II. MacArthur was nominated for the Medal of Honor three times, and received it for his service in the Philippines campaign. This made him along with his father Arthur MacArthur Jr. the first father and son to be awarded the medal. He was one of only five men to rise to the rank of General of the Army in the U.S. Army, and the only one conferred the rank of field marshal in the Philippine Army. Raised in a military family in the American Old West, MacArthur was valedictorian at the West Texas Military Academy where he finished high school, and First Captain at the United States Military Academy at West Point ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bill Hunter (actor)
William John Hunter (27 February 194021 May 2011) was an Australian actor of film, stage and television, who was also prominent as a voice-over artist. He appeared in more than 60 films and won two AFI Awards. He was also a recipient of the Centenary Medal. Early life Hunter was born in Ballarat, Victoria, the son of William and Francie Hunter. He had a brother, John, and a sister, Marie Ann. During his teens, Hunter was a champion swimmer, and briefly held a world record for the 100 yards freestyle until his record was broken by John Devitt in the very next heat 10 minutes later.Atterton, Margot; Alan Veitch: ''The Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Australian Showbiz'' (1984). Hunter qualified for the Australian swimming team for the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne, Australia before a bout of meningitis ended his Olympic hopes. Career Hunter made his film debut as an extra in 1957 film '' The Shiralee''. An introduction to Ava Gardner saw him gain a job as an extra and swimming ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frederick Shedden
Sir Frederick Geoffrey Shedden (8 August 1893 – 8 July 1971) was an Australian public servant who served as Secretary of the Department of Defence from 1937 to 1956. Background and early life Frederick Shedden was born 8 August 1893 in Kyneton, Victoria. His father was George Shedden, a wheelwright born in Victoria. His mother was Sarah Elizabeth (née Grey) from England. He was the youngest of five children. His was schooled at Kyneton State and Kyneton Grammar schools. Career After placing very high in the Commonwealth Public Service examination, in March 1910 Shedden began his career in the Department of Defence at Victoria Barracks, Melbourne. He also studied law at Melbourne University, but the outbreak of World War One ended his studies. On 19 March 1917 he was appointed a lieutenant in the Australian Army Pay Corps. He served as the 4th Australian Divisions acting paymaster in August. On his return home he was discharged from the Australian Imperial Force on 24&nbs ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Elsie Curtin
Elsie Curtin (' Needham; 4 October 1890 – 24 June 1975) was the wife of John Curtin, the 14th Prime Minister of Australia. Biography Curtin was born in Ballarat, Victoria to parents Annie and Abraham Needham. From 1898 to 1910, she lived in Cape Town, Cape Colony (now Western Cape, South Africa). During the 1910s, she moved to Hobart, Tasmania, where she met John Curtin. They married in Perth, Western Australia Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth is ..., on 21 April 1917 and had two children. During her husband's wartime premiership, she supported him at two homes. She arranged functions and launched ships. Her husband died in office on 5 July 1945 and she attended the public funeral. In 1944, she became the Labour Women's Union's Western Australian President, a rol ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nancye Hayes
Nancye Lee Bertles AM ( Hayes; born January 1943), billed under her maiden name as Nancye Hayes, is an Australian actress, dancer, singer and choreographer/director and narrator. She has been a leading figure in Australian musical theatre since the 1960s. Although her roles have been almost exclusively in theatre, she has briefly worked in television in series and mini-series, as a character actress including filling in for an Judy Nunn in the series '' Home and Away''. Early life Hayes grew up in the New South Wales's Sydney suburb of Manly and was an only child. At the age of seven, she had an operation to remove a growth in her hip joint, and the recovery included strapping her leg with irons. After her father died in a car crash when Hayes was eleven, her mother became a barmaid at the old Pacific Hotel in Manly. She began dancing lessons at age nine at Hazel and Violet Meldrum's studio. Hazel had been a choreographer for the leading Australian theatrical firm J.&nb ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Billy Hughes
William Morris Hughes (25 September 1862 – 28 October 1952) was an Australian politician who served as the seventh prime minister of Australia, in office from 1915 to 1923. He is best known for leading the country during World War I, but his influence on national politics spanned several decades. Hughes was a member of federal parliament from Federation in 1901 until his death, the only person to have served for more than 50 years. He represented six political parties during his career, leading five, outlasting four, and being expelled from three. Hughes was born in London to Welsh parents. He emigrated to Australia at the age of 22, and became involved in the fledgling Australian labour movement. He was elected to the New South Wales Legislative Assembly in 1894, as a member of the New South Wales Labor Party, and then transferred to the new federal parliament in 1901. Hughes combined his early political career with part-time legal studies, and was called to the bar i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jon Ewing
Jon Douglas Ewing (6 October 1936 – 14 March 2014) was an Australian actor and director best known for his stage work. Life and career Ewing was born in Paddington, New South Wales and attended Sydney Boys High School. He studied under Hayes Gordon and in 1958 helped to establish the Ensemble Theatre. He played Albin in the 1985 original Australian cast of '' La Cage aux Folles'', for which he received a Green Room Award. Other stage roles include ''Camelot'', ''Cabaret'', ''Tarantara! Tarantara!'', ''The Threepenny Opera'', ''Candide'', '' The Venetian Twins'', ''Sweeney Todd'', ''Nicholas Nickleby'' and ''The Phantom of The Opera''. His screen roles include ''The Last Bastion'' and ''Bliss'' (for which he was nominated for an AFI Award for Best Actor in a Supporting Role). He appeared on TV in ''Waterloo Station'', ''Homicide'', ''A Country Practice'', ''The Mavis Bramston Show'' and ''Consider Your Verdict ''Consider Your Verdict'' is an Australian television series ma ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eddie Ward
Edward John Ward (7 March 189931 July 1963) was an Australian politician who represented the Australian Labor Party (ALP) in federal parliament for over 30 years. He was the member for East Sydney for all but six-and-a-half weeks from 1931 until his death in 1963. He served as a minister in the Curtin and Chifley Governments from 1941 to 1949, and was also known for his role in the ALP split of 1931. Ward was born in Sydney and left school at the age of 14; he became involved in the labour movement at a young age. He was elected to the Sydney Municipal Council in 1930, and the following year won Labor preselection for the 1931 East Sydney by-election. He was elected to the House of Representatives, but Prime Minister James Scullin refused him admission to the ALP caucus due to his support for Jack Lang. Ward and six other "Lang Labor" MPs formed a separate parliamentary party and eventually brought down Scullin's government. He lost his seat at the 1931 federal electio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Max Cullen
Max Cullen (born 29 April 1940) is an Australian stage and screen actor. He has appeared in many Australian films and television series but is best known for his role in the film ''Spider and Rose'' and the television series ''The Flying Doctors'', ''Secret Valley'' and ''Love My Way''. Early life Cullen was born in Wellington, New South Wales in 1940, but when he was one year old his family moved to Lawson in the Blue Mountains. His brother was the actor Cul Cullen (1934–1982). Career He began his career as a painter and sculptor after training at Sydney's National Art School in 1956 and later studied at the Julian Ashton Art School with Brett Whiteley in 1959. His works have been exhibited regularly in solo and in group exhibitions and he has worked as an illustrator, cartoonist and layout artist on several magazines and newspapers. Cullen was also a regular arts reporter on the ''Sunday'' current affairs television program. He has also worked as a professional and moti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Whitford
Peter Whitford (born 1939) is an Australian former radio, theatre, television and film character actor known for numerous roles particularly as wealthy businessmen and members of the aristocracy. Peter Whitford was born in Adelaide, South Australia. He graduated from NIDA in 1963. In his early career, he played Jack Parker in the long-running radio serial '' Blue Hills''. Whitford an actor, playwright, director and singer started his career firstly in radio roles and subsequently in the theatre genre in 1958, but has appeared in numerous TV and film roles, stating from the late 1960s until 2010. Film roles * ''The Tichborne Affair'' (1975) as Cubitt * ''Cass'' (1978) as Frank * ''My Brilliant Career'' (1979) as Uncle Julius * ''Phar Lap'' (1983) as Bert Wolfe * '' Careful, He Might Hear You'' (1983) as George * ''With Prejudice'' (1983) as Bodor * '' Who Killed Hannah Jane?'' (1984) as James Gannon * ''Dead End Drive-In'' (1986) as Thompson * '' Running from the Guns'' (198 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thomas Blamey
Field marshal (Australia), Field Marshal Sir Thomas Albert Blamey, (24 January 1884 – 27 May 1951) was an Australian general of the First World War, First and Second World Wars, and the only Australian to attain the rank of field marshal. Blamey joined the Australian Army as a regular soldier in 1906, and attended the Pakistan Command and Staff College, Staff College at Quetta. During the First World War he participated in the landing at Anzac Cove on 25 April 1915, and served as a staff officer in the Gallipoli Campaign, where he was mentioned in despatches for a daring raid behind enemy lines. He later served on the Western Front (World War I), Western Front, where he distinguished himself in the planning for the Battle of Pozières. He rose to the rank of brigadier general, and served as chief of staff of the Australian Corps under Lieutenant general (Australia), Lieutenant General Sir John Monash, who credited him as a factor in the Corps' success in the Battle of Hamel, t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
