From Mamma Mia, I'm Mia Friedman, and you're listening to No Filter, a podcast where people from all walks of life tell their stories very candidly and aren't afraid to be vulnerable. And on the subject of candid and vulnerable, this is part two of my interview with the iconic, Lisa Wilkinson. And if you haven't listened to part one, I'd suggest scrolling back through your feed and doing that now. You will not want to miss that.
The second half of the story starts at the Logie's and comes crashing down in a tuna aisle of a supermarket. Mainly because this is about Lisa's time on breakfast TV, specifically her 10 years at the Today Show, alongside Karl Stefanovic. And I'm not gonna lie, it gets pretty raw. Again, there was stuff in here that I never knew. Lisa and Carl had incredible chemistry on air, but off air? Well, that's where things start getting a little murky.
I couldn't talk to him for 2 hours, apart from what was scripted. I just couldn't talk to him. For the first time in over a decade, I didn't trust myself that I was gonna play nice.
Here's part two of my chat with Lisa. The way women's magazine editors are depicted often in the male mainstream media, whether it's in Devil Wears Prada or newspapers, is often dumb, just high heels, frivolous. It's a really
sexist stereotype, I think. When you went into television, and particularly into news television, so when you started hosting Weekend Sunrise, and filling in on weekday sunrise, Was there a sense of, oh, she's the, the Cleo lass, she doesn't know the serious business, cause not many people also change careers or change mediums at that stage in their life. You weren't 25. No reception did you get?
Well, I was never planning on going into television, ever. I used to look at television and think, You know, there's some women on television I really like, but my God, what an awful medium to be working in. Why did you think that? Well, because it was sexist for a start, I mean, you'd never see a woman hosting any kind of current affairs program. Very few women were taken seriously as, as political journalists, whereas now that's the norm.
And women were sort of like the decoration,
yeah,
decoration, who the bauble that sits on the side and, Ironically, as Ginger Rogers said, does everything that Fred Astaire does, but backwards in heels, while the man does all the serious stuff. And even when it was, you know, Kochie and Mel, even though Mel is an extraordinary journalist and that wasn't the reality of the situation, it was often. Depicted like that, or Steve Liebman and Tracey Grimshaw on the Today Show, back in the 90s. Did you have a lot to prove?
I am the archetypal frog that got put in a saucepan of cold water. And then slowly came to the boil is how I see my career in television because I went on maternity leave with my second child, Louis, in 1995. I'd had 10 incredible years at Clio and I said, I'm done. I think I'm done and I want you to put a new editor in. They didn't want to put a new editor in. They said, we'll just hold the job for you for 12 months. And I said, I'm a mum, I've got 2 kids. I feel like
I need to do something new. Right now, I wanna be a mum. I just, I've worked so hard for so long, and I know I'm smart at what I do.
How old were you when you had Louis? Mid-30s. You wanted a rest, you'd been going, not a rest, it's not a rest having two kids at home, but you had been working nonstop since you were 21 and answered that Girl Friday ad. So I get that you had the break. What did you find most, like, surprising and difficult to adjust to when you, cause when you went to the Today Show and hosted with Carl, you were the, what, 4th co-host in 4 years or something? Less?
Somebody asked me this the other day. So there was, he started with Tracy started with Tracy, and then he had
Jess Rowe, then Sarah Murdoch.
Sarah Murdoch, and then Kelly Connolly.
Kelly, and then
you, and then me.
And so, first of all, when was the first time you met? You tell a story in the book about meeting at the Logies, when there was all this speculation in the newspaper about you were gonna jump from sunrise to We in Sunrise to the Today Show. What was that meeting like? Basically,
what had happened, I mean, right throughout my career, when I went from Fairfax to ACP, when I went from Channel 7 to Channel 9, and when I went from Channel 9 to Channel 10, I've always moved because an offer has come along and I've always agonized over it because every single job I've ever had, even right back to at the age of 15 working at Wrench's shoe store in Campbelltown on Thursday nights and Saturday mornings, I've loved every job I've ever had.
I've always approached work with enormous gratitude. And I've made the most of every single day and every single job that I've had, and I've never had an eye to something else. It's always been because something else has come along, and I've thought, I wonder if I'm done here.
And Eddie McGuire came and tapped you on the shoulder. He was CEO at the time. Well, Eddie
approached me via, it's all explained in the book of how it all happened. I'd known Eddie from my Cleo days because when I took out the centerfold, I thought, you know, if you're gonna take away 12 naked guys with one hand, you've gotta give Australian women something back. And not long after I got rid of the centerfold, I thought, I know, I'll start Australia's list of 50 most eligible bachelors. And Eddie
was one of them,
Eddie was desperate to be on that list, let's be honest, and a few of his mates were on the list from Melbourne. And he came along a couple of years in a row, and he kept giving me his business card, and he was incredibly charming, and he was single, and he was very successful, and I thought, I'll give this poor guy a break. And then, you know,
I didn't know that, so all those years later, he came and approached you
for this job. At that point, I'd been asked by the infamous Mark Llewellyn. On the very day that the whole boning incident broke, I was at lunch with Mark Llewellyn, who was the head of news and current affairs at Nine, and I'd known him since I was 19, 0 no, it must have been 21, because he was a mate of my then boyfriend's who worked at the ABC and we ran into each other at a friend's wedding. At a time when I was hosting Weekend Sunrise, so
he was trying to poach you. Well, no, we were just getting together for lunch, because when we saw each other at this wedding, he said, oh let's get together, we've got so many stories to share, and he'd just come back from, basically being the guy on the ground for both the Today Show and The Current Affair at the mining disaster in Beaconsfield in Tasmania. And we sat down to have lunch and he was distracted throughout the entire lunch cos he said, I've got
a really important phone call coming through. That was, which was the infamous shit sandwich story. You've gotta read the book to understand all this so
so there's so delicious detail. The first time you met Kyle, what was it like?
Well, I had been offered the Morning Show, which was just about to start on Channel 7 after Sunrise because Sunrise at that time was a runaway success. It was doubling the Today Show's numbers. And Adam Bolan, the genius behind the Sunrise brand, going back, was starting up the morning show and he said, I really want you to host this show and I've already
got your co-host, it's Larry Emda. And he said, I can see it already, the Lisa and Larry show, but we're gonna call it the morning show, but everybody will knows Lisa and Larry because obviously Mel and Kochie were a single entity in Australia's mind at that stage. And I remembered thinking, I know Larry Emdda's a journalist, but he was best
known as a quiz show guy at that point. And Adam looked at me and he said, I know what you're thinking, he's a quiz show guy, but he's not, and I know you two will be fantastic together, but that happened at the same time as I was offered the Today Show, and no one knew that I'd been approached by Channel Nine. It all happened very quickly. But on the day, That someone tried to obviously force my hand, it was leaked to the papers.
Now, the Today Show co-hosting role at that point was the most talked about job on Australian television, and it was a bit of a poisoned chalice because Carl had had so many women he'd sat next to. Sunrise had double the numbers. And
it was a bit of a hospital pass in a way, wasn't it? Well, yeah, I mean, no, that sounds bad, but it was like daunting because there'd been so many people through that chair, they hadn't confirmed that it was gonna be anybody, so it was like, who's it gonna be?
And also the media. hated the Today Show at that stage. Sunrise was the hottest show on television. It was. But the problem was having hosted Weekend Sunrise and having filled in for Mel a couple of times, you had the bug. Breakfast TV is intoxicating because you are.
In people's lounge rooms in the morning, you're helping them wake up at a time in the day when everyone's unshowered, everyone's feeling a bit raw, you know, parents are trying to find missing socks and make school lunches and if you can be a bright, informed presence in their lives, I mean, that's such an extraordinary privilege to be welcomed into people's homes and for them to trust you. And I understood what that was at sunrise, but I also understood that Mel had a job for life. The
obvious successor, yeah, the obvious successor was Natalie Barr. Um, if I was really, really, really lucky when I was 112, that job could be mine.
You might be in with a chance. And
I just thought, I know that. That job looks like a poisoned chalice at the moment. But I've got the bug and I know everybody's kind of having a bit of a go at this guy Karl Stefanovic, but every so often when I tune in I think he's kind of funny. And a few times I'd seen him out on the road at breaking stories and I thought he's actually quite
a good journo. He's very good at that. So when I was offered I was unsure, but if there's one day in the year when you don't want that story on the front page of the papers, it's probably the day of the Logies and that story broke on the day, That I had landed in Melbourne as a guest of Channel 7 to sit on the Sunrise table and front page of many newspapers.
Lisa goes to Channel 9. Well,
it was, she's probably going to go,
right, and you hadn't decided yet.
I definitely hadn't decided. The, the offer had only been made a few days before, and I was desperate that no-one knew about it because I didn't, I didn't want the pressure of deciding. Publicly,
who introduced you to Kyle that night?
Well, I went to the loo, and as you may know, when you go to the loo at the Logies, you have to do it in about 13 seconds flat because it's a live broadcast. Yeah, and the problem with going to the loo at the Logies, particularly the women's loo, is everybody's got zippers and buttons and chill and you know, there's stuff going on in the toilets that, you know, means that there's a very long queue because a lot of women are catching up, haven't seen each other.
In a long time, and so going to the loo takes a long time, so getting in and out in the space of one commercial break is well nigh impossible, and they slam the doors shut, the minute they're back from the ad break, and I got caught, and I sort of looked around and there's always a bar right outside the room.
Back in the days when it was at Crown, and I saw Larry Emer standing at the bar, and Larry and I had not had any conversation about the fact that I'd been offered the morning show, so it was news to them as well wow that I was not, Necessarily going to go to the morning show, and I saw Larry and I thought, I'm just gonna have to face this front on, and I waved, and he went, oh hi, how are you? and he sort of walked over towards me, and um he said it's great to see you, how weird is this?
And I said, yeah, I know, look, I'd love to chat to you about it, but I really can't. And he said, that's OK, I think there's probably somebody else you'd like to chat to. And he sort of grabbed the shoulder of the guy standing behind him at the bar and said, Lisa Wilkinson, I'd like you to meet Karl Stefanovic. And I thought, oh my God, this just isn't gonna get any worse than this, like, so what did Karl say awkward. We basically started making each other laugh from the opening sentence.
And we got through yet another commercial break and stayed talking, because I think we both knew that this was now. An audition,
a chemistry test,
for both of us. And We just knew that we got on really well. We made each other laugh, there was no pregnant pause in the conversation. And I think Larry Emda just sort of stood back and folded his arms feeling like a very proud old builder.
Well, the rest is history. You became the host. Today dominated the ratings, you and Carl were a formidable team. A lot has been speculated on in terms of your off-air friendship and what went on, you've written about it extensively in the book. How would you characterize your off-air relationship compared to your on-air relationship?
On-air was pretty magical. And it was an on-air relationship that Was kind of so good we never talked about it, because it's one of those things where you think, if you start to question it or examine it, maybe some of the magic would go, in some ways Carl and I were quite different, and that was also part of the magic. And we could definitely make each other laugh, we could definitely challenge each other. But it was actually a really good on-air relationship.
We almost never saw each other off-air. And there were times when I wondered why that was, because I did tend to reach out a lot more than Carl ever reached out. But, you know, the magic continued on air, and we went from a show that had half the ratings of Sunrise to building, like, we had our first win within 12 months of us being together, which, you know, Carl and I went out and celebrated.
With his wife and my husband, because we couldn't believe that in the space of just 12 months, we'd managed to do that, and we both looked at each other that night and said, whatever happens from here, we can always say that once upon a time, we beat sunrise. So it was a great night of celebration. But, um, as I say in the book, for a long time Carl wanted to get off breakfast TV. He wanted to do prime time.
Um, did you ever talk about that?
No, I never found out about
that. Were there parameters in your, like, I imagine it's very intimate, you're with each other from 5:30 in the morning or whatever it is, you turn up half asleep, see each other in your most difficult times, you're covering breaking news, the highs and the lows. I think it was 4 hours a day at one stage, the Today Show seemed to go for hours and hours. 5 days a week.
The day that um Julia Gillard became Prime Minister, we were on air from 5 a.m. Until 4 p.m. So
the amount of trust I imagine is massive, where you have to have each other's backs and I've watched you two on set
and know each other's strengths and weaknesses, which is crucial when you're sitting next to somebody, you know, particularly when there's a camera on you, because you want to cover for each other.
Correct. So, given that, Things were not quite like that off-air. I mean, you weren't fighting, but it just wasn't as close as it seemed. What do you say to the people who go, Oh, were you, were you faking it? Was everything on air fake?
No, because journalistically, we respected each other enormously, and our job was not to sit there as Arthur and Martha and, you know, mum and dad, and, you know, just pretend that we were, A couple, yeah, because we were there as professionals, and you know, to be a professional journalist, you are presenting the news, but also, yes, there's lighter segments, I mean there, there's those videos on YouTube called the Today Show funny bits, and I think there's something like 100 episodes of it,
and occasionally I'll go on YouTube for something, And you know how YouTube decides what you're probably gonna be interested in next, it's amazing how often the Today Show funny bits come up, and in writing the book, you know, a few times I've gone down that rabbit hole.
And I look at some of those videos and there was so much joy in sitting next to Carl because we could really make each other laugh, we could really surprise each other sometimes, and there is so much about that on-air relationship that I feel so grateful for. There were also times, you know, when we'd be doing political interviews, and we were doing them solo and Carl would pass me a note and say, ask this, or I would pass him a note and say pass this.
So, I watched you on set a lot when I used to come on the Today Show and, you know, off-air and on air and in between the commercial breaks and everything, and you knew each other so well, like watching a doubles match or something, you know, like two people who just, Move so effortlessly. You write in the book about when you got married, you know, there were some moments where you felt really
let down by him. So when you and Pete decided to renew your vows and he RSVP late, or the rumors were that he was having his vasectomy reversed in LA and he didn't turn up and he didn't, or he said he was gonna come and then two days later he canceled. What struck me reading that is that you didn't confront him about anything, about when you read about, oh, he's been negotiating with Channel 7 about maybe moving or getting
off the Today Show. He didn't, you know, come to the wedding, and he was quite cavalier about that. You never sort of said. Hey, I was pretty pissed off with you, or I was pretty upset, or why am I reading this in the paper? Was that just not the relationship
you had? In writing the book, I really wondered why I didn't do that. Yeah,
cos you're not a wallflower.
No, I'm not.
Listen to what you said to Kerry Packer.
I've had to really examine why I did that. I think part of my problem, and I'm sure a lot of women listening to this will recognize it. We can tend as women to want to be the peacemaker, to be the one that sort of stills the troubled waters. And I was also very aware that I could have agitated a lot more than I did, and I could've questioned a lot more, but I always felt that if I did, it would muck up our chemistry.
And yet he didn't feel that way.
I don't know, you'd have to ask him. Over the years, there were a few tensions on set, not necessarily between Carl and me. There were others on the team, and there were times when I felt like the meat in the sandwich where I had to calm things down before we came back from a commercial break, and we got through it. And in the end, my loyalty was always to the audience.
I had my relationships with the team and you know both on air and off-air, but my loyalty every single day when I walked into that studio, It was twofold. First of all, it was to the audience and my profession as a journalist to do the best possible job as we presented the news every day. It also goes back to the very first day that I was ever on TV sitting at a desk, and that was when I did Beauty and the Beast, and
that was when I went on maternity leave. For starters, I thought, how weird that I would, Get this opportunity to work on television because it was only for 13 weeks I think we were doing this show, Beauty and the Beast, and it was Foxtel which had only just started, so no one was watching anyway, so it wasn't really much of a test, but on that very first day when I walked in, I was sitting, The idea behind Beauty and the Beast was there was one guy sitting in the middle who was meant to
be the sort of misogynistic agitator as he read out letters from viewers to four women sitting at
deliberately controversial
and deliberately or solve my dilemma, you know, I've just discovered that my brother's sleeping with my, you know, sister-in-law and whatever. When I sat down at the desk that day, I was with 3 women, including Jennie Little. Between them I think they had something like 60 years of experience in television.
I had exactly 0. And I was sitting next to a guy called Stan Zamani, who was a late night shock jock on AM radio at the time, and the head of Foxtel came out and, you know, obviously there to pump us all up and said to us, how are we all feeling? And the other three women were beside themselves with joy, and Stan and I said nothing.
And Brian came over to us and he said, What the hell's wrong with you two, and almost in unison, Stan and I, you know, felt this brotherly, sisterly relationship as absolute, you know, novices in television, and almost in unison we said, we've never done this before. We have no clue what we're meant to do now. And it was another OFFS moment in my life because he said, for fuck's sake, get over yourself, it's only television. And it was such a wake-up call to me. It's
just like, I'm not curing cancer here. None of us are curing cancer. We're hoping to entertain some people, maybe have some intelligent conversations
with their cornflakes, looking for their socks. Totally.
Totally. And so, that was my first time of ever looking down the barrel of a camera and trying to pretend that that black hole is one person that I can connect with. And so, Brian taught me also the lesson of approach every show as if it is your last. Working in television is something that very few people get to do and if you enjoy it, and as a journalist, if you feel the enormous privilege of what you're getting to do, I mean the fact that I get to
interview prime ministers, like, who gets to do that? Who gets to hold politicians to account, and so, you know, particularly every day on the Today Show, when I walked in that studio, I presumed that today was gonna be the last day and that someone was gonna tap me on the shoulder and blow me down if somebody did.
I'm Mia Freedman and you're listening to part two of my conversation with Lisa Wilkinson. I wanna ask you, when you found out that Carl was being paid so much more than you to do the same job.
That was, that was, I. Somebody contacted me who'd been Involved in the negotiations, his negotiations, in Carl's negotiations with Channel Seven, and there was no reason to question this person.
Because Carl was planning to maybe leave Channel 9 and go to Channel 7. Yeah.
And he was the master. I mean, you talk about Donald Trump's The Art of the Deal. He was brilliant at it. I take my hat off to him because there's a lot of what goes on in television that
involves bullshit, let's face it. You know, there's a lot of the stuff behind the scenes, and I've somehow, you know, who knows how I've managed to survive in that environment by, Making sure that I've followed a A set of personal values and a moral code that I'm comfortable with, because there's a lot that can go on behind the scenes that I'm not comfortable with, and I stay away from, but when it came to negotiations with other networks,
And with the network that Carl works for, he was brilliant. And it was, Almost entertaining to watch, he was so good at it.
He played the game very well. Yeah,
and,
and to his credit, to his credit, but obviously finding out that you weren't being paid the same or anywhere near the same as him, you then asked for not even parity, but something closer to parity than you had. You were then in the supermarket, negotiations were dragging on, you write in the book, you were in the supermarket.
In the tuna aisle, holding a can of tuna, when you get a phone call from your agent to say that it's over, that they've said they're not renewing your contract and the negotiations are dead. What brand of tuna was it?
John West, basil and oven dried tomato. And
what was the emotion that you felt, what was the first emotion that you felt when Nick, your agent, told you that?
Uh, oh, shock.
Did you feel humiliated?
Oh, all of the emotions just cascaded out. No, I didn't get to anger. No. Took me a while to get to anger. Yeah. Uh So what had happened was I'd been negotiating for Most of that year. For my contract renewal. And I'd made it clear that because I'd had the absolute detail of what Carl was on, and I don't take anything away from him, I want to make that absolutely clear. If he could negotiate a deal like that, good for him.
But The breakfast TV market is a really lucrative market, and we had taken that show together. In the space of 10 years to number one. Coming from a place where, you know, That job that I took on was a bit of a poisoned chalice. And I felt it was about time that the spoils got shared around a little more equitably. And We'd had 3 attempts to speak to the head of Channel 9 about. How we maneuver closer to something that feels. Fair And they'd actually put an offer on the table.
And I went off and Pete and I got remarried, and I was first day back at the desk. And I did the show. And that afternoon, as I always did, I did the afternoon conference call with all of the main producers and the executive producer. So that I knew what was on the next day's show.
And I'd actually been trying to get in touch with my executive producer for 4 or 5 days because I discovered while I was away on our second honeymoon, that I had been cut from the upfronts, which is the annual presentation that every network and every major media organization does to the advertising industry to say, look at this suite of fabulous shows and talent that we've got
for you, um. Loved and most valued talent prominently on display,
yeah, and a few months, or maybe a month or so before, I'd found out that the role that Karl and I always played in the upfronts wasn't gonna be happening this year, and that Georgie was doing it with Karl. And I approached both Carl and Georgie and said, do you know, do you know what's going on here? And they both sort of dismissed it and said, oh, you know, oh, I don't know, I'm just, no, don't know.
And I thought, oh, that's OK. The timing of that's actually really unfortunate because that's when Pete and I are gonna be away on our second honeymoon, and every year you're told you have to be at these upfronts because, you know,
you've gotta schmooze with advertisers. All
holidays get canceled. And anyway, I asked, is there any chance I can still go away, I'll fly back and do the upfront in the middle of this week off. And I was told by the head of Channel 90 no, don't you worry, you just go off and have your holiday, it'll be fine. Did you feel a bit sick? I was so excited about. All of our beautiful friends and family, including your gorgeous self, being there, because none of you knew that we were
getting married again. We were just saying to all the people who have been such a support to us.
It was just gonna be like a celebration, wasn't it? And then you renewed your vows.
It was while I was away that I got calls from mates at Channel Nine who said, why weren't you in the upfronts? And I said, no, don't be silly. I know I wasn't hosting, but I spent a morning filming in the car park for something that was gonna be slotted in along with all the other people who couldn't be there for the big event. They sent me the link to the video and I was definitely not in the video. And I'd been ringing my executive producer for days trying to find out what was going on.
And he wouldn't get back to me. When I got on the conference call, I said to my executive producer Mark, Mark, did you get all my messages? I've been waiting to hear from you. And he said, oh no, I didn't, I must have missed them. Look, come on, we've got to do the rest of the call. He said nothing. And I'd literally just hung up from the conference call when Nick, my manager called me.
So no one at Channel Nine even called to tell you that you were axed.
Never. I've never heard from any of them.
And why would they not let you back on air the next day to say goodbye? Why did they treat you like some kind of criminal and disrespect the Today Show fans and not allow you to come back and say goodbye? What was their reasoning?
I was never told, so I can only guess. What
did they think you were gonna do?
I have no clue, you would have to ask them that. I think they were trying to make an example of me, because there had been talk about the big gender pay gap that existed at the Today Show desk. There'd been a lot of talk about it. Charlie Pickering had asked me about it on his show. And I had to do a lot of, I was a duck, and I was paddling real hard under the
throw your employer under the bus, but you also didn't wanna lie,
but I also didn't wanna throw Karl under the bus, so I had to kind of say, look, I don't really know what Carl's on, but he doesn't really know what I'm on, and of course Charlie Pickering said to me, I call bullshit. Awkward. So there were a lot of headlines about the gender pay gap.
You think it was like, don't any of you get too bolshy. Well,
it's a good way to scare other women off who might be asking for a pay rise. And I'm not the first, and I'm not the only industry where that stuff happens, but you know, if you If you start to Think maybe I'm worth more to my employer than. Than they do, that's when you start thinking, Do I really want to be here anymore, and quite bizarrely, Just 4 weeks before I'd been approached by the project, and, Again, Channel 9 had no clue.
That I've been approached by Channel 10. So, that was just something that I had in my back pocket, and I'd been questioning for a couple of months, whether I was still happy there, and I still don't know where I was going to go with the fact that there was an offer on the table, and Nick had said to me while I was away, This offer from Channel 10 is sitting here. They really, really, really want you. There's an offer from Channel 9 as well, what do
you want to do? And I couldn't decide, and I was so confused by Carl not contacting me after he didn't turn up at the wedding, and I was so confused that my executive producer wouldn't speak to me. And I said to Nick, I think I just need to go to work on Monday and decide how I feel. And I went to work on Monday and something. A couple of weird things happened. Carl never said anything about the fact that he didn't turn up at the wedding. Until the cameras went on.
And I had a moment of thinking. Right, so this is actually just a relationship for the cameras. He never texted me, he never said congratulations, he texted Pete and said we're not coming, but he never texted me. And I was trying to compute all of that because I never understood. Why he wouldn't talk to me. And That morning The only congratulations I got was when we started the show at 5:30. And I was, I was furious. Cos I also felt a bit foolish, cos I just thought.
I don't even know what this relationship is. I don't. This is purely just a relationship for the cameras. And I couldn't talk to him for 2 hours, apart from what was scripted, I just couldn't talk to him. For the first time in over a decade, I didn't trust myself that I was gonna play nice. And so I chatted to Sylvia, who'd also been at the wedding and who remains a good friend. But then I got to 7:30. And I remember the promise I'd always made to myself.
That I would do every show as if it was my last. Because part of the problem also was the rundown for that day was really weird. Almost every interview was being done by Carl on his own. I got the girls chat. At 8:40 And I ended up sending an email to both Pete and Nick, my manager, and said there's something really weird going on.
I've just come off a show that's gone from being the Today Show to being the Carl Show, and I don't even know where I fit in here anymore, I mean, what is this, the 1960s? And then that afternoon, got the phone call from Nick, and he said um he'd just come from the head of Channel Nine's office. And I said, oh, how did it go, because I knew that he was having a conversation with him that afternoon. And he said, you're off the show. And I said to him, off what show? And he said the Today Show.
You're never to appear again. And I was literally I was deciding between the, the lemon vinaigrette can of tuna and the oven dried tomato can of tuna. I had a moment where I thought, I know I just heard that. But did that just come over the loudspeaker? Like, is everybody who's wandering around this supermarket right now, did they hear that as well?
Oh, you felt so vulnerable and exposed.
I felt. I felt really. First of all, it was shock. And then it was. Humiliation. And then it was. Thinking Wow All those moments when I didn't go to the kids' school concerts because I had work things going on. All those birthdays because we were on the road for our We Love Australia tours, all those wedding anniversaries that I missed because I was, you know, somewhere in outback New South Wales. All those times when I was grumpy because I wasn't getting enough sleep.
When it came to loyalty to the show, I don't think anybody had the loyalty to that show the way that I did. And yet And I know I was paid well. I don't for a moment want anybody to feel sorry for me in that way, because I was paid well. But the loyalty that I had to that show was not reciprocated by the person that was running Channel 9 at that time, that counted for nothing. I had to grow up really quickly, and I had to sort of remind myself. It's only the television.
And I remember driving home and thinking, cos I tried to call Pete and his phone went straight to voicemail. And then I thought, oh, I'll call Carl. And then I thought, Is that why you didn't come to the wedding? Is that why he never texted me? Is that why the show this morning, because remember, you know, Carl's the guy that wore the same suit for a year because he didn't like, he said, the way that women in television were treated, and yet, why didn't he question the rundown that morning?
That was so Carl heavy, it was just the Carl show that morning. Like why didn't he stand up and say something? And then I thought, does my executive producer know that I've just been sacked? Oh, hang on Is that why he didn't return my calls? Is that why he wouldn't come down on set that morning? Because, you know, and I'd questioned him, I'd, on the internal messaging system, I'd sent a message to him, you know, what's going on with the rundown, why I'm hardly in here?
Is this a mistake? And all I got back was, it's not a mistake. And I waited about 5 minutes because that kind of chilled me to the bone. Cos I was thinking I don't, I don't know what's happening here, and I messaged him again and I said can I see you after the show, and I got no response. And I went upstairs to see him. He wasn't there. He was normally running a 9:30 meeting, didn't turn up for that, no one knew where he was.
How do you get closure on all of this? Did you ever have it out with
Carl? I insisted that we go to lunch two weeks afterwards. Did he call
you that night? I can't remember. Well,
you were there that night,
but I can't remember that night that. I just heard on the radio, I think that you were leaving the Today Show cos they just put the press release out straight away, didn't they? It all happened quite quickly.
No, no, you turned up cos I think Billy told you.
No, I heard it on the radio. Lisa Wilkinson has left the Today Show.
Were you there that late in the piece, were you?
It's all a blur. I can't, unless I got a text from Pete, I don't know. Ah, you got a text from I got a text from Pete. Because
he texted all of my closest girlfriends to, to let them know what was about to hit that
cause then I grabbed some champagne because then he said, also the project because it had all happened within about 20 minutes. She's going to 10, and so I just grabbed some champagne, got in the car. And then it all just unfolded, kind of in slow motion that night. It was, you know, I was so worried about you, you were sort of in shock. You still had your makeup on from the show that morning. I don't even remember what there was no tuna in sight,
that's for sure. Um, I think someone ordered pizza, I can't remember. The tuna
was put back on the shelf along with the toilet paper.
I was in my pajamas and I'm trying to remember your phone was blowing up and I'm trying to remember if Carl called you that night.
To be honest, there were so many messages from people, texts, everything. That even in more recent times, in writing the book, I've gone to text people to check facts with them, and I've found that they sent me a message that night that I hadn't seen.
I remember you stepped outside to speak to Carrie Bickmore to welcome you and Carrie
and Wali called me that night. And so far, and the executive producer of Sunrise rang, Michael Pell, to thank me.
But so you called Carl and said, let's go to lunch. Two weeks later.
To be honest, I can't remember who contacted who, but, It took a little while for the lunch to happen. I was so happy to be going to the project. I was beyond thrilled to be going to the project. I mean, that was such an important step in the right direction for me. I was sad about the, um,
the fact that they smeared you as you walked out the door at Channel 9. Were you sad about that? I was pretty fucking enraged about that. Well,
you know, a lot of that, I've only seen in recent times. Again, in writing. The book, I've had to go back and read what was being put out
there at the time. They painted you out as being greedy.
I do know that 9 producers were gonna be sacked.
They said, if we'd have paid her what she wanted, we would have had to sack 9 or 10 producers, which was never said about Kyle's salary. And the other thing that was said by the head of Channel 9 at the time was, I've got 7 or 8 women who can sit in that chair tomorrow. Which Putting you to one side, the level of disrespect that it showed.
The Today Show audience, it treated you as so incidental, and what came after this, and I can say this, you don't have to, but when the Today Show ratings fell in a heap, And the next thing that incensed me was how all these TV critics and media journalists were writing about, was it Kyle's marriage breakdown that caused people to leave the Today Show and move to Sunrise. And it's like, nobody
pinpointed the fact that ratings collapsed after you left. After you left in such an undignified, rude, unfair, unjust way, without explanation in the dead of the night. That's when ratings tanked. That's not a question, that's just a comment. Would you like me to write an addendum in your book?
Tony Jones on Q&;A?
Exactly. I'm giving myself a comment. How do you heal from that? Closure is such a cliched word, but how do you process all of that when it happens in such a shock, and it must have triggered a whole lot of things about bullying and a million different things for you?
I just had to make peace with it.
Therapy?
No? No, no, not at all. I um. I just had to make peace with it and be realistic about it's television, yeah, and, again, I earn a good wage, I can't complain too much about, What happened, because, you know, a lot of television is a crapshoot. You know, sometimes you win, sometimes you lose.
It so happened that at the time, That I left, the gender pay gap was a real issue that was starting to open up wide for a lot of women, and a lot of industries were having to address it, and they were having to look at the skeletons in their own closet. So I think the timing of it was really unfortunate for Channel Nine and even more surprising because it was such a, a big talking point.
And In terms of getting closure, there is nothing like moving on to something that brings you enormous joy and to be working with colleagues, the caliber of Walid and Carrie and Pete Hellier and Hamish McDonald and to be working with an extraordinary group of producers, you know,
feeling appreciated.
Yeah, the Walkley Award winners and you know, just, Amazing people, and it was about going to something brand new where I could learn a whole new lot of skills because the project is very different to the Today Show and I finally was gonna get to go out and do long form interviews and get my teeth into really meaty stories because breakfast TV absolutely has its place. But if it doesn't fit into 3 minutes then probably
won't get to address it. Whereas on the project, you know, I can do something like Brittany Higgins that, that goes for half an hour. And I never got those opportunities at 9, and for whatever reason, 9 obviously decided that I didn't fit their mold or their brand or, you know, yeah, I wasn't Carl. So, you know, I got treated differently, but that's OK because I, will forever be grateful to David Gyngell, at 9, who was my great champion there.
And there were so many good people that I worked with and particularly young producers and Tom Malone, who was my, who remains one of my closest friends, who was my first executive producer there for the 1st 6 years. I mean, he taught me more than just about anybody I've ever worked with. So I walk away having had incredible experiences and with a couple of really significant friendships that remain to this day. Who remains?
I won't give them up because it probably makes it easier for them, because I don't, I think there's a legacy that I've got at Channel Nine that, That, so I, I,
I'll give you an example if you said who your close friends are still at 9, it could make things difficult for them. Yes. My last question. Is not about TV it's about. You were an editor at 21. You were the youngest ever editor before or since, I think, of a mainstream magazine. Not that there's many magazines left now, but I became an editor at 25, and I thought that was really old, because, how funny is that? Because you did it at 21.
I was the youngest editor of Cosmo at the time. Anyway, you and I have both been the youngest in the room. We're not the youngest in the room anymore, Lisa, we'll consider ain't. I'm the oldest here at Mamma Mia. I don't know if you're the oldest at the project, but.
Um, I probably am. I love it when Barry Cassidy comes in. That's right.
A bit of crusty Barry to make you feel youthful. How have you felt about milestone birthdays in an industry that really judges women by how they look, and not just TV but just being a woman in the public eye, it's very hard to get older.
I've never found that.
I
mean,
I tell me more about that.
Well, I joined the Today Show in my late 40s, so. Age doesn't mean anything to me other than how bloody lucky am I to keep having birthdays. Yeah. Because we all know too many women who don't get that option, and I approach every year with nothing but gratitude that I'm still here. I'm still, you know, loving what I get to do for work. I still adore my husband, I have 3 healthy kids. I have nothing to complain about, but I have an incredibly rich tapestry of life experience.
And that was the reason why I wrote the book. It wasn't meant to be like this. When I was growing up in the 60s, you know, girls, when they got married, which was around about the age of 23, and by 30 you'd probably have a few kids under the belt, and really your life's mission.
Was not over, but it was certainly preset at that stage because your job was to bring up the kids, and when you got to about 50, and you can no longer reproduce and you can no longer, you know, employment would have been really difficult, you know, here I am at this age, still doing something that I absolutely love. It's just like I am so incredibly lucky.
And if I don't put down all of the incredible things that have happened to me and all of those, Huge disappointments that have also happened to me and how I've just decided I'm just gonna pick myself up and I'm gonna keep going, and in many ways those girls that bullied me at school, Allowed me to teach myself resilience, that, If you don't define yourself by the way others look
at you, then you're halfway to a happy life. Because we've all got to find it within ourselves, our day to day happiness, because we're the only ones living this life. I just believe in choosing happiness wherever I can find it. Being surrounded by people that I genuinely know value me and love me. It's interesting how you get a bit more choosy, the
older you get. You understand the things in life that really, truly matter, and you make sure that you're living every day with purpose and with gratitude and, You know, if you can take on board new teachings. That's an incredible thing. I want to be an amazing 90 year old. I wanna be one of those crazy 90 year olds
who's like Iris Apel.
Yes, I wanna jump out of planes and just do everything that 90 year olds aren't meant to do.
Let's go and get a tattoo.
Now that's the one thing you know I won't do. I, I was appalled when you got a tattoo when you were working I'm gonna
get another one. I'm gonna get another one just to
my belly button ring ever? Did the hole ever close over?
No, it got infected. I had to take it out. Australia is, is a better place having you in it. Australian women are lucky to have you. In the world, making the world a better place for us. And I feel lucky to call you a friend and You know, I'm one of many, many women who owe their careers to you, and I can't thank you enough.
I love you. Don't do that to me because now I'm gonna cry. Can I, can I just say in return.
One of the greatest joys of my life, and the greatest privileges of my life is to have had the opportunity to pay it forward, because when you know what it is, which I discovered really early in my career, The power That comes when somebody believes in you, at a time when you don't yet necessarily believe in yourself, in fact you might feel quite the opposite, but when you know what it is to have somebody believe in you and then experience that joy and want to prove to them
that that was well placed belief. To then find yourself in a position to be able to pass that joy onto other young women, cause it's mostly been women that I've worked with over the years, there's been a few, few men along the way, and I've had great experiences with male colleagues and male bosses. You know, what happened at Channel Nine has not changed my view of the great men who are out there. And early in my career, it was mostly men that
were giving me the opportunities. But to see what you have done with this media company, which I remember when you started this on your lounge room floor, and to see you encouraging young women in a way that has built so many careers, that's the power of positive female energy. And, you know, every time I see you push another little bird out of the nest and encourage it to fly, I take great joy out of that.
I learnt from the best.
Thank you so much.
I could have talked to Lisa for 100 years. She does love a good conversation. She is a great person to talk to about anything. And in fact, when we left the studio, we went and sat outside in the kitchen area at Mamma Mia, and no one else is in the office at the moment. And as the sun went down, we talked for another hour, at least. And in the end, I had to say, babe, I've got to go home.
There is just so much to talk about. And there were lots of things that we didn't even touch in these two episodes that you will read about in the book, about her magazine career, about her role as a mother, about having three incredible children, about her marriage. Oh, we could've done a whole other episode just talking about her
marriage to Peter Fitzsimons. You know, when I interviewed Pete on this podcast a few years ago, I asked him about his marriage to Lisa, because I knew everybody would be curious about that, and he said something which ended up making national news. He said, we have 50 blissful days, 300 pretty good days, and 15 shockers. And I wanted to ask her what those shockers were like. She talks about her marriage and being married to the same man for Oh, what would it be now? Close to 30 years
in the book. It is a tour de force, this book, honestly, I don't know, it spans so much. It's about magazines, it's about women, it's about generations of women in Australia. It is an epic, epic book. It wasn't meant to be like this by Lisa Wilkinson, it's published by HarperCollins and is available for pre-order now from Booktopia. We'll put a link in the show notes. The assistant producer of No Filter is Lucy Neville, the
executive producer is Eliza Ratliff. I'm Mia Friedman and I'll see you on Mamma Mia. And if you're after something else to listen to, you might wanna listen to our new podcast. It's been topping the charts. It's been very, very well received. Everyone's talking about it. It's called What Are You Wearing, and it is the first podcast for your wardrobe. You can find it wherever you get your podcasts.