This was published 10 years ago
The Moodys ride again: Australia's first family of crazy returns
They've lost Christmas but kept the madness of family events as The Moodys goes into production for a second series.
By Giles Hardie
The Moodys are back. The quintessential crazy Australian family who gave us the real meaning of the silly season in A Moody Christmas are back on set to shoot The Moodys which will air on the ABC next year.
It is a second season of sorts. Where the first series presented six consecutive Christmas Days, the new season presents 13 months of family events – from Australia Day to a wedding, through Easter holidays, a court appearance and a very Moody election.
The Moodys return for season two, with typical anarchic fervour.
“I think it was great to let go,” says series producer Chloe Rickard. “It appeals to the everyday Australian circumstance. Going down the coast for Easter, a 40th birthday, all that sort of stuff, people do that. It broadened out the storyline and allowed for comic opportunity.”
Series one followed the visits to Australia by youngest son Dan (Ian Meadows) and his romantic entanglement with Cora (Jane Harber), showing the dysfunctional family through the eyes of a child who thought he had escaped to England.
This season, uncle Terry (Darren Gilshenan) finds love or, rather, is pursued by it, in the form of fellow Customs worker Yvonne (Sacha Horler), a big enough character to take on the entire Moody clan.
“She's pretty full on,” says Horler of her cycling-obsessed character. “She invites herself to the senior Moodys' wedding anniversary at the RSL.
"When she meets the family, she's upscaling herself into the next part of the relationship with Terry. She has the relationship even though he doesn't actually agree to it.”
In addition to entertainment, the series may provide a clue as to what to expect from the American version of The Moodys. The series, which has been picked up for a pilot by the Fox network in the US, will be written by its Australian creators Trent O'Donnell and Phil Lloyd of Jungle Boys.
Given that the number of episodes per season in the US can be as many as 23 for a comedy series, the Christmas theme would prove a complication there. “We kept waiting for someone to say it will never work,” laughs O'Donnell. “They never did.”
Nonetheless, Lloyd and O'Donnell have removed that rod from their back and, in doing the same for the Australian series, have vastly improved their prospects for a third season, should everything go to plan.
The Moodys will go to air on ABC1 next year.