What We've Learnt From The Awesome 'Molly' Trailer

The highlight of Sunday night’s broadcast of the Peter Allen bio-series Not The Boy Next Door was almost Sigrid Thornton’s unhinged Judy Garland impersonation.

However, Thornton's turn was surpassed by something almost entirely unrelated. It was the two-minute Sneak Peek of Channel 7’s upcoming Ian Meldrum bio-series Molly. Speaking of unhinged…

So these are a few of the conclusions we can draw from this brief moment that made our weekend seem a whole lot more colourful.

CASTING SAM JOHNSON WAS GENIUS

We already know that Samuel Johnson is a great actor thanks to his years with The Secret Life Of Us (ah, remember the days when network TV actually served up half decent local drama?). But had anyone previously realised that he can be a dead ringer for music industry legend Ian “Molly” Meldrum? Whichever casting agent figured that out - kudos to you. And, given Johnson’s voice is so familiar to us from countless ad voiceovers (so much so that there’s a pretty good chance the ad you watch before the trailer will feature the actor), who knew he could also sound exactly like the stumbling-tongued Meldrum as well?

SOME LUCKY LOCAL ACTORS GET TO PLAY FUN DRESS-UPS

We see glimpses of actors recreating famous Molly-Meldrum-era bands like Kiss and Devo. Watching the foursome portraying Kiss in full make-up and costume (the boots! the boots!) stomping grandly through Melbourne airport (or a fairly good fascimile of Tullamarine) is enough to have us WANTING TO SEE MOLLY NOW. Also spotted in the trailer are actors portraying John Paul Young, Skyhooks, Boy George, AC/DC, Madonna, Freddie Mercury and Lynne Randell. (Oh, and Ed Kavalee is playing Gavin Wood.)

THE SOUNDTRACK’S GOTTA BE GOOD

The music in the trailer may not necessarily be what ends up in the show - but what publishing house wouldn’t want their tunes used in a show about the man who made everyone from Abba and Blondie (both conspicuously not mentioned in the trailer though) through to Icehouse and Madonna? In the trailer we hear snippets of Stevie Wright’s Evie, AC/DC’s It’s A Long Way To Top, Rod Stewart’s You’re In My Heart and, of course, the Countdown theme.

THERE ARE GENUINE LOLS

Hopefully the actual show is as genuinely funny as the trailer. The whole “tell me who I have to root to make it happen” gag works. If the show is edited as well as this preview the jokes might actually land (the INXS and Allen mini-series only garnered laughs unintentionally).

IT LOOKS LEGIT

Unlike the continual shots of shiny cars in Not The Boy Next Door (really? you expect the streets of regional towns in the ‘50s to be lined with shiny new cars?), the Molly crew look to have recreated the ‘70s and ‘80s time period pretty damn authentically - just look at those wigs. And it looks like they recreate some of Meldrum’s infamous house parties. However, if the party scenes are too authentic this will never make it to air.

Watch the full trailer here: