Peter Allen: Not The Boy Next Door TV Miniseries

When will this be on TV in the USA?

This from The Guardian:

More than 2 million people across Australia watched Seven’s miniseries about the songwriter Peter Allen, which trended number one on social media and handed the station a huge share of the audience on Sunday night. The colourful story – combined with the debut of The X Factor – gave Seven an impressive 37.5% share of the audience, eclipsing both The Block on Nine and The Biggest Loser on Ten. Peter Allen: Not The Boy Next Door, with triple threat performer Joel Jackson in the lead role, is based on the book Peter Allen: The Boy From Oz by Stephen MacLean. Australian audiences appear to love biopics. In 2014 Seven also had a hit with another musical biopic INXS: Never Tear Us Apart. Both Not The Boy Next Door and INXS were made by the same production company Endemol Shine Australia.

Not The Boy Next Door featured some extraordinary performances as it told the story of young Peter Woolnough growing up in country NSW amid family tragedy and going on to perform on Broadway and marry Liza Minnelli. Allen died in the US from an Aids-related illness in 1992 aged 48. A young Minnelli was played by Sara West from the ABC’s Anzac Girls and Allen’s mother Marion Woolnough was played by Rebecca Gibney. But the performances which got the most attention on social media were Sigrid Thornton as eccentric, pill-popping screen legend Judy Garland (Minnelli’s mother) and 14-year-old actor Ky Baldwin as the young Peter. The story was carried along by the Grammy and Oscar-winning songwriter’s catalogue of hits such as I Go To Rio, Australia’s unofficial anthem I Still Call Australia Home and Tenterfield Saddler. Allen also co-wrote I Honestly Love You, Don’t Cry Out Loud and Arthur’s Theme (Best That You Can Do).

The second part of Peter Allen: Not The Boy Next Door airs on Sunday 21 September.

Huffington Post Australia:

"Time is a traveller, Tenterfield Saddler. Turn your head. Right again Jackaroo. Think I see Kangaroo up ahead.

Peter Allen's beautiful tune must surely be ringing sweetly between the ears of many Australians, following the 7 Network's fabulous tribute to Peter Allen, Not the Boy Next Door. There are few showbiz stories quite as remarkable as Peter Allen's rise to fame. I'm old enough to say with my hand on my heart that I still miss him. The same way I still miss John Denver, Michael Landon, Princess Diana and Elvis. I was a kid when Elvis died but I still remember my dad telling me why the radio stations were playing his music all day long, like the river flows, surely to the sea. He was a flamboyant, incredibly talented performer, pianist, singer, songwriter, dancer. He was the quintessential triple threat that other artists wish they could mirror. He was a fine storyteller. His lyrics were soaked with the love of his family and the Great Southern Land. He was once married to the offspring of Hollywood royalty, Liza Minnelli, he was fun loving (those loud shirts, those maracas!) and he was incredibly close to his mother Marion and sister Lynne, after tragically losing his father when he was only 13. Thank you, Peter Allen, for your deep love of Australia that gave us the song most of us cannot listen to without feeling emotional; our unofficial national anthem I Still Call Australia Home. Thank you for your laughter, your songs, your loud shirts, your maracas, your humble nature, your ability to get yourself through tragedy as a young boy and rise above heartbreak."

Of his kissing scenes with actor Andrew Lees, who played Peter Allen’s lover Greg Connell, Joel Jackson said: “He had this big fake moustache on and I was like: ‘That’s going to hurt’. He is straight and I am straight and we just gave it as much as we could to find the real moments in it and the real love to do the best for the story.” Jackson wasn’t worried what his real-life girlfriend would think seeing him kiss someone else. “We talked about it and she knows it is work,” he said. “She is the only one that gets the real ones.”

What's up next-- "She Is Woman-The Helen Reddy Story?"

[quote]ackson wasn’t worried what his real-life girlfriend would think seeing him kiss someone else. “We talked about it and she knows it is work,” he said.

Why are actors always saying this? "Oh I talked with my partner and they were okay with it." And what if they weren't okay with it? Are you going to refuse the paycheck?

Judy popping dolls!

Can't wait.

One would assume you would know this was going to happen when you read the script so if it was a problem you would say no to the offer. Unless the director decided to spring it on you in a burst of improvisation. However given that Peter Allen was gay, the prospect of him kissing another man would seem pretty likely.

The Region 4 DVD is out next month.

Haven't we all cruised a man the same as in the museum scene?

sorry, wrong thread.

Peter Allen was one of my favourite singers, and I still play his songs.

Truly a talented Aussie who wrote some of the best songs.

Up next - Kylie Minogue will star in her own story I Should Be So Lucky.

I hate actors who have to make a big deal out of playing a gay role and then constantly remind us of their virile heterosexuality.

Why do these Peter Allen biopics always try to assign a very significant other to him? Peter never had a very LTR. He was very fluid and open (ok a slut) when it came to sex and romance.

Maybe it is a dramatic device so that he has someone to confide plot points to.

Yes he needs to someone to tell him that if he keeps doing that thing he does 'I may not be here when you get back'.

He had a boyfriend/husband/lover named Greg. I met them.

I knew him only for the last five years of his life; there was no boyfriend then.

Because his partner died of AIDS in 1984, R20.

I met them in 1976. Drove them around DC while he was there for a concert. Interviewed him on my college radio station.

Who played Olivia Newton-John? Her ugly daughter?

[quote] He had a boyfriend/husband/lover named Greg.

He loved him. He honestly loved him.

I remember when "I Go To Rio" exploded across the world and it seemed everyone had turned gay.

Christie Whelan-Browne plays ONJ. They had to cast a hyphernate.

Sydney Morning Herald writes: Keep the tissues handy as this terrific biopic concludes tonight. We cover a huge amount of ground, but not only does it never feel rushed, the writer, director and performers all hit the big emotional notes beautifully. Allen's life-changing meetings with collaborator Carol Bayer Sager and lover Greg Connell; his transition from club crooner to headliner; the loss of Connell to AIDS-related illness and, eventually, his own death are all handled with style and power. It really is an extraordinary story, and this intelligent production absolutely does it justice.

The Guardian: Thank you, Peter Allen, for giving Australia the permission to be camp. As Channel Seven’s biopic illustrated, the singer-songwriter paved the way for a different kind of Australian man – flamboyant, flirtatious and unafraid of emotion.

Growing up in regional Australia can be difficult when you’re gay. Especially if you’re the kind of gay male without a predilection for trucks and rugby union. Other boys in town might describe you as a “poof” or “pansy”, and while their parents may opt for gentler but still loaded terms such as “artistic” or “sensitive”, it hardly stems the tide of small town gossip. You are wary of being “too much” yourself and social isolation or violence are your constant friends. That wide, brown land of middle Australia feels claustrophobic. I was one of the luckier ones, being surrounded by family and teachers who championed difference. Raised in St George in western Queensland, I still experienced moments of self-consciousness, such as those times I avoided buying phallus-shaped vegetables from the local supermarket, for fear of inviting suggestion. Even when my closet door was firmly shut, deep down I always thought it was more embarrassing being from the country than it was being gay. Inevitably, many of us leave for the cities. But few go on to become Academy Award-winning singer-songwriters and inimitable pop maestros as Peter Allen did, and whose story was captured in a Channel Seven telemovie, captivating nearly two million Australians over the course of two Sunday evenings.

Peter Allen: Not The Boy Next Door introduced our young protagonist as he was noodling away at the piano in his hometown of Armidale. Allen’s prodigious musical ability earned him the nickname “Peter Poofter” but also became a lifeline for his family following the tragic suicide of his alcoholic father, eventually taking him from rural New South Wales to the national spotlight. On a cruise ship gig in Hong Kong he met Judy Garland, a woman who became both mentor and, following his marriage to Liza Minnelli, his mother-in-law. Allen once said it was his songs that serve as his true biography and we were given a peek at the stories behind the hits, most notably 1972’s Tenterfield Saddler, a song inspired by his grandfather, a saddle maker, and his troubled father who found it “easier to drink than go crazy”.

The Guardian Part 2: This was by no means ground-breaking television, constrained by the tired TV biopic formula that reduces one man’s life to a string of, supposedly, revelatory moments sandwiched between ads for cruise ship holidays and pasta sauce. But it is in the spirit of true equality that gay men get average telemovies, too. And to its credit, Channel Seven seems committed to more: a Molly Meldrum biopic will air later this year. Surely the story of Belvedere from Good Morning Australia isn’t far away. One of the more surprising insights offered by the movie was Allen’s dismay at being savaged in the gay press for not taking a public stand on LGBT issues. In his 40s and having finally come to terms with his sexuality, Allen struggled to reconcile the role of gay rights spokesperson with his desire to appeal to the broadest audience possible. That tension was still unresolved when Allen was tested for HIV and died from an Aids-related illness in 1992. Nontheless, there was something courageous in the way Allen gave Australia the permission to be camp. He dragged us out of a dim, buttoned-up Englishness and took us on a permanent summer holiday, with maracas, leopard print and Bob Fosse by way of Rio. His influence is found in the entertainment exports that have defined us for the past three decades. From Strictly Ballroom and Priscilla to Kylie Minogue and Kath & Kim, all exude an Allenesque daggy tropicana, the ring of pineapple in our works burger. It’d be enough to cause cultural cringe if it weren’t so delicious. Masculinity or “straight-acting” is still prized in sections of the gay community. If you are to “pass” as heterosexual you are congratulated by gay and straight allies alike. You are taken more seriously, which suggests that a natural lisp or a less than rigid gait can never be strong or powerful, for the qualities are “too feminine”. It’s at this juncture where homophobia and sexism furiously collide. And yet what is clear from Not The Boy Next Door is there can be no doubting Allen’s strength. It was all there: in his art, his loyalty and generosity to his family and affection for those he loved and fought to save. A few months before I left my own small town, my mother took me to see Hugh Jackman in The Boy From Oz, a “treat” for finishing my senior exams (to her great credit, she still acted surprised when I came out a few years later). It opened with Jackman as Allen, lowered onto the Brisbane Entertainment Centre stage atop a glittering piano. Then, decked out in a bedazzled NRL jersey, he proceeded to flirt in character with a group of Brisbane Broncos players seated in the front row. In a state where defendants charged with assault can still claim temporary insanity if it followed “homosexual advances”, commonly known as the gay panic defence, it seemed an act of great bravado. I remember watching on with awe. In that moment I understood Allen represented a different kind of Australian man: flamboyant, flirtatious and unafraid of emotion. In Not The Boy Next Door, when told his performance was “too fruity” for Radio City Music Hall, Allen responded by demanding a camel to ride onstage – proof that when his time came Allen was never anything less than completely himself. And just as he crooned when he took us to Rio in 76, “free at last – what a blast”.

Part 1 is up on Primewire for those of us in the US. I just finished watching, and it was fantastic.

Peter Allen's 1st girlfriend Jenny: When Jenny grew up with a young boy named Peter Allen in Armidale in country New South Wales she had no idea that he was on the path to becoming a global super star. With the Channel 7 mini-series Peter Allen: Not The Boy Next Door, Jenny was again drawn back into Peter's world as researchers approached her knowing she had a book of newspaper articles collected throughout Allen's career. I am just so pleased that they portrayed him as it was Jenny told Kim Mothershaw on 4BC Afternoons. Jenny first met Peter when they were both 5 years old. They studied tap dancing together until the age of 13 as Peter took piano lessons at the same time. According to the show they even shared the odd kiss or two as youngsters but was that part of the story really true?

I knew Peter Allen and it makes my head ache to read all this gushing bullshit about him.Allen was the very definition of a predatory letch and evil drunk creep. I was a young dancer and was working professionally around the same time as Allen became popular. No young guy was safe from this creepy perv...He was very abusive and enjoyed humiliating young guys. Dancers learned very early to avoid him at all cost. God help you if he targeted you. He was mean...a mean son of a bitch of a user. When he died no one i knew mourned his passing. All this nostalgic worship is ridiculous.

You should write that book.

r32, now THIS is what we come to DL for. Thank you.

What is that quote about wearing a moustache? The actor playing Greg Connell is clean shaven throughout. Maybe he means the actor had facial hair during rehearsals or something.

I enjoyed it a lot. There were some glaring weaknesses - mainly the tendency to present conflict but then wrap it up quickly and neatly. The moment that jumps to mind is Liza walking in on Peter and Greg in bed. Almost as soon as she's found the pair, she's shown on the roof of the apartment reassuringly touching Peter's wrist as he speaks about his sexuality. It felt utterly false. There were several other moments like that - when Peter tells Liza that he wants a divorce.

The strength was how beautifully and energetically shot it was. And the cast was very nearly uniformly excellent The one weak link was the actress as Allen's sister. She was practically an extra, with good reason - she blew her "big moment" - when Peter lies to his mother abput having throat cancer instead of HIV/AIDS. Sigrid Thornton almost stole the show as Judy Garland and I liked the device of having her as Peter's confidant beyond the grave. But at the centre, Joel Jackson was damn nigh impossibly winning as Allen - most of his best moments were wordless reacting to what was going on around him. He was only somewhat let down by the fact that he didn't look near 50 in the last scenes, nor especially sick. It took me a while to warm to the actress playing Liza. She suffered a little in comparison to Thornton's spot-on Judy but she did a good job overall. The actress playing Carole Bayer Sager also stood out, though she didn't have a lot to do.

Liza knew he was gay from the very beginning. That is why she married him.

It was a marriage of convenience for both, but they really were best friends, She took care of him at the end.

Is Liza a fan of the lez-lez? Was the techie she married who worked on THE ACT also gay?

R37

She is long rumored to be a dyke, but no declaration, even amongst close friends. She ONLY marries gay men.

I'm a young aussie who didn't know Peter Allen's story. I liked the mini-series but even watching it I felt like it was a very romanised version and not reality. Even so, it was moving and affected me. Things like this and A Normal Heart help give the younger generations an insight into the horrors of AIDS in the 80s :(

I wonder if Liza Minelli has seen this movie, or will ever see this. I'd love to know her thoughts. She would be the only credible source who knew if this story was truly bullshit or not.

Having read Burt Bacharach's autobiography, I thought it was funny when the actress playing Carole Bayer Sager reminded Jacksons' Allen about his "moon and New York City line" and suggested collaborating with her and Bacharach. In the book, Bacharach's take is that they had no intention for Allen to come onboard their ARTHUR songriting team but he wouldn't give them permission to use his line - his only contribution to the song - without being cut in as one of the song's writers. I don't fault Allen for that - that one line is perhaps the key image. But it's interesting how Bacharach kind of "tells on himself", and by implication Bayer Sager, in his recollection of that song.

Allen was totally in the right to want a songwriting credit. Even though it was only one line, it was still his line that he wrote. And "when you get caught between the moon and New York City" is the one lyric that everybody remembers from that song.

Peter Allen was bisexual. He was married to Liza Minnelli.

Well, there is a scene where he gets a boner with Olivia Newton John in his lap - I wondered if that was a story she told - but apart from that no lady lovin' for Peter in the movie.

Did they recreate the Peter-Liza wedding night?

He was not bisexual. Liza knew he was homo before the wedding. THAT is the reason she wanted to marry him.

Sydney Morning Herald: Channel Seven's recent, audacious and moving two-parter, Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door, is a triumph. The poignant and perceptive screenplay by Justin Monjo (part 1) and Michael Miller (part 2) is ambitious in structure. It jumps around in time, employing fantasy sequences and weaving together events from across the entertainer's life, spanning his country childhood to his 1992 death but remaining cohesive, compelling and appropriately colourful throughout. The direction by Shawn Seet (The Code) makes his background as an editor evident: he knows just how much he needs from each scene to drive the drama and often chooses to shoot from unusual angles, confident of his ability to cut shots together. The sequence in the second part detailing the composition of Allen's classic, Tenterfield Saddler, a song that runs like a pulse through the drama, is masterful. Beyond that, though, there's the excellent cast, built around the dazzling central performance from Joel Jackson as the adult Allen. The actor creates an uncanny physical likeness to his character and he's unrecognisable as the man who earlier this year played the dogged and dedicated journalist Charles Bean in Deadline Gallipoli. It's not necessarily a prerequisite for an actor to look exactly like their subject, as Cate Blanchett and a host of others demonstrate definitively in their portrayals of Bob Dylan in I'm Not There. But they do need to convey something authentic and essential about their spirit. And the whole enterprise can come a cropper if a telling detail doesn't ring true: if, for example, Asher Keddie hadn't nailed Ita's trademark lisp in Magazine Wars: The Birth of Cleo. With the Hawke telemovie, the producers understood the importance of the wigs in depicting the politician's distinctive silver mane, irrespective of how potent Richard Roxburgh's performance might be. Jackson manages to embody Allen's distinctive, lanky angularity and kinetic energy on stage. He captures the musician's exuberance and public flamboyance as well as his private fragility. He does justice to Allen's gifts as a performer but also reveals the pain and conflict that shaped his private life. Beyond Jackson, the cast offers a veritable parade of standout performances. Ky Baldwin is extraordinary as the young Peter Woolnough and Sigrid Thornton pulls out all stops, succeeding wildly as Judy Garland. If Thornton grabs a scenery-rattling role with gusto, Rebecca Gibney takes an understated approach as Allen's stoic and supportive mother. She invests Marion Woolnough with dignity and compassion, while firmly grounding her as a down-to-earth country wife and mother. In a role that holds significant challenges, Sara West brings sweetness and vulnerability to Liza Minnelli and helps to make the love story between the performers believable. There was a danger that Garland and Minnelli could be reduced to caricatures; instead, both become much more. The depth of talent in the cast also extends through to the smaller roles, with Henry Szeps as manager Dee Anthony, Rob Mills as Chris Bell, the other half of the Allen Brothers singing duo, and Nick Farnell as Peter's troubled father also noteworthy. It's rare for a dramatisation to tick the boxes in so many departments. The telling of Peter Allen's story has set the bar high.

Sydney Morning Herald:

Channel Seven's recent, audacious and moving two-parter, Peter Allen: Not the Boy Next Door, is a triumph. The poignant and perceptive screenplay by Justin Monjo (part 1) and Michael Miller (part 2) is ambitious in structure. It jumps around in time, employing fantasy sequences and weaving together events from across the entertainer's life, spanning his country childhood to his 1992 death but remaining cohesive, compelling and appropriately colourful throughout.

The direction by Shawn Seet (The Code) makes his background as an editor evident: he knows just how much he needs from each scene to drive the drama and often chooses to shoot from unusual angles, confident of his ability to cut shots together. The sequence in the second part detailing the composition of Allen's classic, Tenterfield Saddler, a song that runs like a pulse through the drama, is masterful.

Beyond that, though, there's the excellent cast, built around the dazzling central performance from Joel Jackson as the adult Allen. The actor creates an uncanny physical likeness to his character and he's unrecognisable as the man who earlier this year played the dogged and dedicated journalist Charles Bean in Deadline Gallipoli. It's not necessarily a prerequisite for an actor to look exactly like their subject, as Cate Blanchett and a host of others demonstrate definitively in their portrayals of Bob Dylan in I'm Not There. But they do need to convey something authentic and essential about their spirit.

And the whole enterprise can come a cropper if a telling detail doesn't ring true: if, for example, Asher Keddie hadn't nailed Ita's trademark lisp in Magazine Wars: The Birth of Cleo. With the Hawke telemovie, the producers understood the importance of the wigs in depicting the politician's distinctive silver mane, irrespective of how potent Richard Roxburgh's performance might be. Jackson manages to embody Allen's distinctive, lanky angularity and kinetic energy on stage. He captures the musician's exuberance and public flamboyance as well as his private fragility. He does justice to Allen's gifts as a performer but also reveals the pain and conflict that shaped his private life.

Beyond Jackson, the cast offers a veritable parade of standout performances. Ky Baldwin is extraordinary as the young Peter Woolnough and Sigrid Thornton pulls out all stops, succeeding wildly as Judy Garland. If Thornton grabs a scenery-rattling role with gusto, Rebecca Gibney takes an understated approach as Allen's stoic and supportive mother. She invests Marion Woolnough with dignity and compassion, while firmly grounding her as a down-to-earth country wife and mother.

In a role that holds significant challenges, Sara West brings sweetness and vulnerability to Liza Minnelli and helps to make the love story between the performers believable. There was a danger that Garland and Minnelli could be reduced to caricatures; instead, both become much more.

The depth of talent in the cast also extends through to the smaller roles, with Henry Szeps as manager Dee Anthony, Rob Mills as Chris Bell, the other half of the Allen Brothers singing duo, and Nick Farnell as Peter's troubled father also noteworthy. It's rare for a dramatisation to tick the boxes in so many departments. The telling of Peter Allen's story has set the bar high.

In answer to a question about whether the series has any sex scenes, someone commented that In the first part, they show Peter Allen in 3 sex scenes, although no nudity is shown. 2 of those scenes are with a male partner, and it only hints at what is happening. The other scene is with Liza Minnelli, and goes into a bit more detail.

[quote]I wonder if Liza Minelli has seen this movie, or will ever see this. I'd love to know her thoughts. She would be the only credible source who knew if this story was truly bullshit or not.

Wouldn't it be great if Datalounge had 'events'? Live interviews with DL faves. Best questions answered etc...it would be phenomenal, in fact.

How could Liza NOT have known that Peter Allen was gay before she married him? Or the minute she met him, actually? He pinged all the way to outer space.

[quote]How could Liza NOT have known that Peter Allen was gay before she married him? Or the minute she met him, actually? He pinged all the way to outer space.

Because she's attracted to gay men...& her father was gay.

I get that the writers needed to cram a lot into 3 hours but the "show don't tell" concept was clearly lost.

The scene with Carole Bayer Sager - "Peter, Burt Bacharach and Christopher Cross want to use our song The Best That You Can Do for the new movie Arthur starring your ex-wife Liza Minnelli" reminded me of the "Aaron who? Aaron Spelling? You want me to appear in your new tv soap Dynasty?" line from Lucky Bitches. A shame they didn't use the ageing make up from Lucky Bitches either - a dying Peter didn't look any older than the one who had Livvy NJ sit on his lap.

[quote] 2 of those scenes are with a male partner, and it only hints at what is happening

Pushing Peter up against a wall, kissing him and then showing Not-Peter's head descending out of frame... is NOT hinting at what is happening.

[quote]The other scene is with Liza Minnelli, and goes into a bit more detail.

Probably more than what happened in real life.

Next to this @ imdb there's, Holding the Man (2015)....another gay Australian drama that sound interesting.

'Tim and John fell in love while teenagers at their all-boys high school. John was captain of the football team (hawt!), Tim an aspiring actor'

It seems some of 'Holding The Man' is set in the '70s, so lots of silly looking wigs on the guys.

Peter's image didn't become more flamboyant until after he had divorced Minnelli.

The Peter liza married was a lot more straight laced and preppy in his appearance

R29: Belvedere! Man, I had forgotten all about him.

I wonder if a Bert biopic would be made. Too many skeletons, methinks.

Just watched part of this interview with Allen. He comes off a bit distant, nothing like the charmer he's portrayed as in the movie. Perhaps he was jetlagged or something.

[quote]straight laced

Oh, dear.

Your Oh dear is out of order, r61.

Straight-laced is an allowed variant.

I enjoyed this miniseries but it did feel a little glossy (the whole thing could have benefited from even a small dose of grimy realism... especially in the younger scenes and the very later ones). Being an Australian production I was wishing Judy Davis could reprise her tour de force performance as Garland but I get if she wants to put that to rest. Thornton was very entertaining. His songs really were wonderful and carried the miniseries to be honest, but it's definitely worth a look.

I wouldn't say the songs carried it. The visuals and the cast were the best thing about it.

The weirdest thing about Peter Allen was that he got away with just shaking maracas on stage, as if it were a difficult thing to do.

The best thing about Peter Allen was he let me get away with flouncing around a stage while shaking my ass in tight white pants, and still the audience thought I was heterosexual.

The best thing about Peter Allen was the TAUGHT BY EXPERTS album.

Since I heard it on a Broadway compilation (Jackman's version), I assumed "I Go to Rio" was a hit but it wasn't - in the States anyway. Allen only had one US hit, which isn't even featured in the mini-series. Were his signature songs hits anywhere? In Australia at least? I don't mean his songs that were hits for others, btw.

One of the best things on the TAUGHT BY EXPERTS album.

R68, many of his "signature" songs are on TAUGHT BY EXPERTS. Here's the title song. You'll find more on youtube.

"Back Doors Crying"

In 1976, every gay man I knew (in NYC) had a copy of TAUGHT BY EXPERTS. It was bracing, really, to have a heartbreak album made by a gay man, as I was going through my first broken heart.

"I Go to Rio" was also on TAUGHT BY EXPERTS.

Though TAUGHT BY EXPERTS has never been released on CD, you can now buy in MP3 format.

Showtime airs the INXS mini series so maybe they'll get around to airing this.

More "signature" Peter Allen.

More Peter Allen.

"I'd Rather Leave While I'm in Love"

I presume all the TAUGHT BY EXPERTS have been released on CD - just not on the same CD? There are a few multi disc Allen collections on the market. Or is it not possible to reconstruct the album on CD?

R78, you will find all the songs on TAUGHT BY EXPERTS on the 3-CD Peter Allen box set. It's out-of-print, but I see that a copy is available in Australia on eBay. Reasonable price, too. Not mine, btw.

I thought Joel Jackson sang very well. I guess there are no plans to released his versions - perhaps he only recorded partial vocals.

He did a nice version of Chris Montez's version of The More I See You.

Peter Allen was before my time, but I caught this on streaming (I'm in the US) and it was quite an interesting story, of course I'm sure there was a bit of whtiewashing. The actress who played Judy Garland was wonderful. I only knew Peter Allen from "I Go To Rio," and had no idea he wrote so many songs that became hits for other artists. He was basically as "out" as a person could be in that era, and he made no apologies.

I wondered how he was able to have that Radio City Music Hall success (9 shows) when he never was a big hit recording artist. His TV appearances were enough to make him famous enough to succeed in that venue?

People like me went, R83. And it was fabulous.

I'm not at all surprised to hear r32's dish that Peter Allen was a mean and creepy lecher. So many of his songs are so incredibly sentimental and self-pitying ("Don't Cry Out Loud," "Tenterfield Saddler," "I Could Have Been a Sailor"), and I've found that people who are incredibly sentimental and self-pitying about themselves are usually quite nasty (it comes from being so narcissistic--you have trouble extending sympathy to other people).

But that doesn't mean I dislike Allen's music. I like his fun, sunny, cosmopolitan side, and many of those songs ("I Go to Rio," "Bi-Coastal," "Everything Old is New Again") almost typify the fun glamorous side of the Seventies to me. I like how he has such a definite "sound" in them--you'd rarely mistake one of his fun songs as being written by anyone other than him.

Do your tricks complain that you taste and smell vaginal when they get near you, R85?

Well, that was pretty feeble, r86. A fourteen year-old girl could have done better.

Does anyone remember Bob Fosse's tart retort to Allen's request to play the autobiographical womanizing choreographer in All That Jazz?

And I am free at last/what a blast. Inspired.

How can I ignore "Not the Boy Next Door"?

14 Yearl Old girls get rather a hard time on DL. I wonder why some of you seem to think them the epitome of lame.

[quote]I wonder why some of you seem to think them the epitome of lame.

The music they listen to is crap. The TV shows they watch are crap. The movies they like are crap. They are why we have so much crap foisted on us.

[quote] The music they listen to is crap. The TV shows they watch are crap. The movies they like are crap. They are why we have so much crap foisted on us.

The taste of 14 yr old boys is so much better?

What do 14-year-old girls have to do with Peter Allen?

They defended him from bulllies his entire life.

[quote] The taste of 14 yr old boys is so much better?

Well, not if they're heterosexual.

The ending has Peter joining Judy in heaven. Anyone who knew either of them would feel that there were in the place.

... that they were in the wrong place.

Dirk said this in a BBC documentary about Judy, claiming that Judy was from hell after his experience of working and being with her for I Could Go on Singing.

More dirt on Peter Allen, please. I remember him appearing on a weekly show called the Midnight Special in the USA that aired at...midnight! He was so over the top that even at 5 years old, I knew he must be gay!

Any tales o his sex life?

I was working at the Sydney Theatre Company when Hugh Jackman was preparing for The Boy from Oz. I remember find it most amusing how he had a vocal coach to help him get Allen's speaking voice. I was close enough to overhear the voice training in a rehearsal room.

Anything else?

R84 Any details you can provide about seeing the Radio City shows would be much appreciated! I had the version from Showtime (early 80's) on videotape and wore it out. I wish they would re-release it...

[quote]Any tales o his sex life?

I had sex with him a few times, both in Atlantic City and at his place on 77th street and CPW, in 1987.

He was a very attractive man with a very big beautiful dick and great legs. Predominantly a bottom and very generous in the sack (or the jacuzzi). Anything else you'd have to ask specifically.

Our sessions were not conducive to a romantic relationship, yet we became friends and I have nothing but very fond memories of him.

Has Liza recorded any of his songs?

Baz Bamigboye in The Daily Fail is reporting that Funny Girl starring Sheridan Smith will open at the Savoy Theatre in the West End in April directly following its run at the Menier Chocolate Factory.

R107 And what does that have to do with this thread?

Oops, sorry, wrong thread.

It's a shame Allen wasn't still alive when Baz Luhrmann was emerging. Together they could have come up with something special.

Where can one watch this? It sounds pretty good.

You can watch it on amazon prime.

Thanks R112!

Sorry for being a bump troll, but I didn't see a need to start a new thread for this. Just watched it on Amazon Prime (I'm in US). It was well done and Joel Jackson was fantastic as Allen, and cute, too. Sigrid Thornton stole the show as Judy.

Peter Allen embodies gay crossover popular culture in the late Seventies for me.

I watched this a few years ago and enjoyed it, except for the Oscars speech when he said "Hi mum!" WHICH NEVER HAPPENED. Ruined the whole thing for me.

Whenever I think of I Still Call Australia Home I think of the royal reception given to Oprah when she did her Grand Australian Tour.