Series spotlight: The Genie from Down Under

A spoiled teenage aristocrat, a magic opal and two father-son genies named Bruce and Baz: The Genie from Down Under was a quintessentially Australian, one-of-a-kind comedy series contrasting two national cultural stereotypes.

The Genie from Down Under tells the story of Penelope Townes, a 13-year-old aristocrat from Britain who discovers an antique pendant in the attic of her family’s decaying mansion. The necklace contains two Australian genies, Bruce and his son Baz, who’ve been living inside the opal for 130 years. When Penelope wishes she were somewhere else, she’s whisked to Australia to her inheritance – a rundown property in the middle of the Australian outback. Penelope hates Australia and wishes she was home in Britain, but Bruce yearns to stay in Australia – and so begins a comedic battle of wills where Penelope can summon her genie, but never control him.

The Genie from Down Under was co-production between the ACTF, the BBC and the ABC which came about following the success of Round the Twist with audiences in the UK. It was a landmark production for the Australian Children’s Television Foundation: it was the first time the BBC entered into a live-action co-production on a children’s show and heavily invested in a children’s series made outside the United Kingdom. It was also the first time the ACTF relinquished part of its creative control, with the BBC a part of production decisions. 

At the time, executive producer Patricia Edgar said: “[This partnership] marks the beginning of a new phase for children’s television here and in the UK. It is recognition that the audiences in both nations can benefit from a blend of the talents of both worlds.”

The idea for The Genie from Down Under stemmed from the debate about Australia becoming a republic, which was a significant issue in the mid-nineties. The series was intended to satirise the stereotypes that exist of Brits and Aussies alike. In a review in the Courier Mail in May 1996, Natasha Wallace wrote: “As British as tea and crumpets and as Australian as a meat pie, [The Genie from Down Under] takes a humorous look at the dichotomy between two cultures which love to hate each other.”

Audiences and reviewers alike loved it. The show premiered to 2.5 million viewers in Britain alone – 40 per cent of the audience. In an Australian review of the series, Jim Schembri wrote in the Green Guide: “The new offering from the Australian Children’s Television Foundation has it all: toffy, curry-eating Brits; dopey, upper-class twits; obnoxious outback tour guides; magic; humour; naughty kids; and a snappy Aussie larrikin genie with a bastard son… Genie is genuinely witty, funny and substantial children’s TV fare.”

The show’s main character, Penelope, was a departure from the children’s television protagonists of the time, who, according to Schembri, “is not as unquestionably sympathetic and likeable as most heroes in children’s TV shows often are. As the girl with the licence to wish for whatever she wants, Penelope often gets intoxicated with the power.”

Esben Storm, a director and script producer on the series, said at the time, that was a conscious decision – and one they had to fight for, with the BBC initially reluctant to feature such a flawed character.  

“She’s greedy and she’s vain and she’s basically got these human foibles that we’ve all got,” he told The Age. “I was interested in having a main character who wasn’t a goody-two shoes, who wasn’t perfect… who was like most of us in that she was vain and greedy and selfish.”

The Genie from Down Under didn’t just appeal to Australian and British audiences. Over the past 25 years, it has been watched in 32 countries across the world, including Canada, Hong Kong, Israel, Thailand, and many European countries. And its success continues – both series were recently acquired by Urban Pictures in South Africa, where it is still airing.

Dr Joanna McIntyre is part of a research team based at Swinburne University of Technology which has been investigating the role of Australian children’s television in people’s lives. She says participants in her research remember the series well.

“Our recent nation-wide survey about television nostalgia revealed that The Genie from Down Under looms large in the cultural consciousness of at least two generations of Australians,” Dr McIntyre said. “Australian adults who came of age in the 1990s tend to remember with great affection the Akubra-wearing genie, Bruce, and his son, Baz – both of whom embodied the classic ‘Aussie’ trope of the lovable larrikin. The show’s catchy theme song also helped cement its place in Australian pop culture. 

“The Genie from Down Under combined the much-loved quirkiness of Round the Twist, an outback setting, and the whimsy of a genie tale. It was a landmark Australian co-production with the BBC, and UK audiences also loved this ‘ocker’ twist on a magical tale.”

As well as being the first major role for Rhys Muldoon, who played Bruce in the first series, the program brought together some of Australia’s finest comic actors at the time: Ian McFadyen, Monica Maughan, Magda Szubanski and Mark Mitchell. Mark, who played Mr Fish in Lift Off! and Harold Gribble in Round the Twist, plays ladies man and shady tourism operator Otto von Meister. He believes the unapologetic Australianness of the show was part of its charm.

“I love The Genie from Down Under because of the Australian nature of it… I just found it delightful. Round the Twist was universal. Lift Off! was universal. The Genie From Down Under was Australian in the worst and best possible ways. It was set in the bush, it involved a genie who had a magic opal... I mean, it was Australian through and through. And of course, there’s the magic, which everyone who was ever a child or remembers being a child can understand and desire. Who doesn't want to have their own genie? Who doesn't want to have magical abilities or live in a magical world?

“Everyone who remembers childhood, I think, remembers the magic of childhood and that’s what the Australian Children’s Television was able to capture so brilliantly in all those shows, but especially in Genie… every adult looking at that I think has a nostalgic pang of remembrance knowing that was the world they wished they could inhabit and still do secretly, probably. Who wouldn’t want a magical power or a genie?”

Series 1 and 2 of The Genie from Down Under are available to view on the ACTF’s Twisted Lunchbox YouTube channel.