
Two Seven News stories book-ending Graham Kennedy's arrival and departure on the network's daytime news program 11AM.
Four years before his hugely successful Graham Kennedy's News Show/Coast To Coast return on the Nine Network, Graham dipped his toes into hosting a news bulletin on Seven's 11AM in April 1984. Initially signed to appear for five weeks, while regular newsreader Vincent Smith was on holidays, the positive audience reaction saw his tenure extended to eight weeks.
Graham told The Sydney Morning Herald prior to his debut, 'I’ll probably stutter for the first few minutes. Nerves affect different people in different ways. Some people sweat and some tremble at the knees but for me, it’s stuttering and yawning. People think I’m tired or bored but it’s nerves.'
These two brief news stories aside, none of the 40 complete editions of 11AM with Kennedy at the helm are presently known to survive.
Notes by Simon Smith
The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia acknowledges Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the Traditional Custodians of the land on which we work and live and gives respect to their Elders both past and present.