Clip description
Each week the closing credits were played over this sequence as Aunty Jack (Grahame Bond), with Thin Arthur (Rory O’Donoghue) in the side car, rode aggressively over the top and into her royal domain of Wollongong, to the signature tune of the series, Farewell Aunty Jack.
Curator’s notes
The musical clip 'Farewell Aunty Jack’ closed each episode of The Aunty Jack Show. Filmed by the ocean, it’s an odd setting which successfully emphasises the bizarre characters in the show. The song is a comical lament: while it’s sad the episode is ending, Aunty Jack promises to return – and if you don’t tune in, she will 'rip yer bloody arms off!’.
The clip itself is still visually fresh and amusing; stylish in its day although fairly amateurish by today’s standards. It does seem to lack any coherent direction, with characters simply moving to the music and miming while the cameras rolled. For such a signature tune it’s a shame more wasn’t made of the visual aspects of the clip.
As with most filmed sequences at the ABC in the transition from black-and-white to colour, the opening and closing musical sequences of The Aunty Jack Show were filmed in colour although all programs were transmitted in black-and-white until the changeover date. Then with a fanfare at midnight on 1 March 1975, despite Aunty Jack threatening to hold it back, colour was introduced on Australian television for the first time and audiences found themselves having to upgrade to a colour television set.