Australian Story: Award-winning producer Wendy Page reflects on memorable Western Australian stories
For three decades, Australian Story has told the tales that define us as a nation.
And invited us into the lives of ordinary Australians, many of whom have extraordinary stories to tell.
“I think because people see themselves in it,” Wendy Page, a founding producer of the program, told The Sunday Times from her home in Tasmania.
Page worked on the long-running news and current affairs program for 25 of its 30 years, winning two Walkley Awards for episodes she produced.
A few days after speaking to The Sunday Times, Page travelled to Sydney for Australian Story Live, an event which took place at the Opera House, recorded to air as an extended episode of the show this Monday.
It was Page’s way of honouring a program that has been a huge part of her life.
“I think people see their own lives in it, one way or another,” she said of the show’s impact.
“These are not programs about the reporter — if you watch 60 Minutes, for example, the reporter is there all the way through, front and centre almost — but you don’t see or hear the reporters from Australian Story at all.
Page has been instrumental in bringing many of the program’s most memorable stories to the small screen.
Known for her exploration of miscarriages of justice, she won one Walkley for an episode about the wrongful conviction of Perth man John Button, accused of killing his girlfriend in the 1960s.
She also produced a double episode titled “The Wronged Man”, which looked at the 1994 murder of a Perth jeweller Pamela Lawrence and the case of another wrongly convicted Western Australian, Andrew Mallard.
In 2004, she turned her attention to the then-unsolved Claremont murders, producing an Australian Story program about the case.
“I did that (original) program back in 2004, and so I got to know the parents of two of the girls very well,” Page explains.
“Because I did all the interviews, I still had relationships with various people who had been in my original story, so I went back.
5News aggregated this summary from the outlet’s public feed. The full article, with all the context, is on www.perthnow.com.au — the content belongs to PerthNow.
