AustLit

Two series tracing the ambitions of Sim, who longs to be a clown.

In series one:

'Fifteen-year-old Sim wants to be a clown. His third set of foster parents think he's as nutty as an Australian fruit cake. So he runs away, joins an outback rodeo, then a travelling circus. He is taught the art of clowning by a former clown, Anatole, an iron-willed Frenchman who is no longer able to perform. When Anatole returns to Paris, Sim follows, and is finally given the chance to perform at the famous Winter Circus'.

In series two:

'Sim is now a clown at the Winter Circus in Paris. Ambitious and determined to become a great clown, Sim becomes intrigued with the 'modern' circus routines pioneered by Circus Oz and Cirque du Soleil. When Sim suddenly inherits a share in the Rathnow Circus back in Australia, he has a chance to create his own 'suitcase' style of circus that is unique to his own character and experience.'

Source: Screen Australia. (Sighted: 13/11/2012)

'The Sydney Harbour Bridge might look good on postcards, but it's a different thing if you have to live right under it, like Cherry and her kid brother, Sam. Their mum runs a boarding house and she's so busy all the time she forgets how to dream. But things change when Mr Edmund comes to stay. He believes that dreams can come true and he's going to show them all how to make sure they do.'

Source: Australian Television Information Archive (http://www.australiantelevision.net/more_winners.html). Sighted: 10/11/2011

Adapted from Ruth Park's novel of the same name, The Harp in the South is a six-part mini-series that follows the lives of an impoverished Irish-Australian family during the late 1940s. The Darcy family have moved from the bush to a housing-commission enclave in inner-city Sydney: a world of sly grog shops, prostitutes, pimps, and boarding houses. The father, Hughie, was a shearer's cook who lost his job through alcoholism. Although he is now able to hold down a job, his pay is often docked because he's recovering from a hangover. The family is held together by Mumma Darcy, a kindly but uneducated woman who still cannot get over the loss of her son, who disappeared as a child many years ago. The Darcys' two remaining children are Dolour (who is still at school) and Rowena (who works in a local factory). In order to make ends meet, the family take in boarders, some of whom are quite strange.