CONTENT KINGS - EGO: THE MICHAEL GUDINSKI STORY - BETHANY JONES

It's in the news today, but it was actually on TV Reload the podcast last week Neby.

Hi, guys, welcome back to TV Reload. I want to thank you for clicking and downloading on today's episode with Beth Jones, who is the Mushroom Studio's chief operating officer, along with the producer of Ego, The Michael Giddinsky Story, the feature documentary that we are talking about today follows the wild ride of Michael Gidinsky over five decades as he forged his own Maverick path. Consumed by his ambition and enduring passion for Australian music. Michael Gidinsky was a

So sit back and relax as.

We dive just that little bit deeper into the world of ego the Michael Giddinsky story.

Hi Bet, Hello Ben, Hi, hi Jin, how are you.

I'm very well. I'm very excited to be talking to you. It's funny. I read an article about you a few years ago. I think it was when you were going from maybe match box back to mushroom, and my brain saved you in my memory as Bethany Jones, like Bridget Jones.

Do you know what though I once got a Tellstonville addressed to Bridget Jones, you.

Did not I did.

Oh my god, did you hear that song in the background playing all by myself?

I totally did. I love that film film.

It's so good. It's so good it stands up still.

You can still watch that film and relate even though they don't have mobile phones, well, not like we do now.

No, I think you have to chase after you, you know, your men running down the street the snow. You couldn't just call them.

That's how I live my life. That's how I'm always chasing after my partner when he leaves the house. I want to congratulate you on this documentary because you must be so proud of this film.

You know.

I think what's been really exciting is just to see how it's resonated with people.

You know, you always make things hoping.

That it hits the audience, but you never quite know until it's released. So yeah, when you start to get the feedback, it's yeah, it's been it's been quite incredible.

You know.

We had obviously such great feedback from the cinema release, and then it's been unconscious for the last couple of months, and the amount of people that have seen it as they've been traveling and dropped us a note or we're for advis someone else. It's been really exciting because I think, you know, you make it to celebrate the person you're making the documentary about, So I kind of feel really happy that Michael I think would be really proud of it.

He would.

I mean, this is a real hero's journey story, you know, for people that don't even know that much about him, to people that are super fan of you know, there's something in this for everyone. It's very inspiring. I think it's heartwarming in a way as well, and it does what I think documentaries need to do and teaches you about the subject matter about something you don't know about them. And even if you are a super fan of Michael, there's still so much to learn.

That's it like, particularly for someone I can't really say it was behind the scenes because Michael loved the limelight, but you know, for someone who was so instrumental in so many.

Other artists' careers.

The feedback we've also received is that people didn't realize how many artists he was behind and how that's kind of formed the soundtrack to the nation. I think that's like a real surprising factor for people when they start to just hear all the different artists and all the different tracks that are featuring in the doco.

Yeah, becomes alive.

I mean, you are watching this documentary and for me, I can smell the scaffolding, the pubs. I can smell all of that about five minutes into the movie, Like it's so visceral.

And I think of the th real credit to our

She we had very.

Close people to Michael come back and just say to us how.

We'd really captured his spirit.

I can't speak highly enough of Sarah. She's just so incredible.

I think the backstory with his family and his parents was also stuff that I didn't necessarily know. Even he struggles along the way, is captured really well. Because we always think that stories happen in a straight line, you know,

And yeah, it was really you know. So I thought that I knew Michael's story before I kind of headed into this, but I learned so much. And I think the real moment where I started to understand the highs and lows perhaps was the when he sold Mushroom Yeah to Murdock. And it was a thing that I suppose from the outside, you're like, oh, how amazing.

You know, that's an incredible feat.

To be able to spell the company for you know, the rumor amount that he had, but you didn't quite realize until we're doing this documentary, until people were speaking quite candidly, like his wife Sue and Philip Jacobson, his business partner, how much of an impact that had on him. Yeah, that was a real surprising moment.

I think.

I mean, you've I want to go back into you just a little bit as well, because I mean you've got a long history with Mushroom yourself, and like a lot of people, they've come and gone with this company and they come back again. What is it about this company that draws you well, that drew you back?

Something special about it? Actually?

And Michael he was Yeah, you know obviously you knew Michael, and he just had this infectious nature that somehow just threw you in. And I think it was you kind of get swept up in the passion and the energy and the vision and you can kind of see what's possible. The amazing thing about Michael for me was that he would have you back. You know, you could kind of go oh, kind of wanting to take a bit of a risk, here and he would have you back and it didn't really matter if it worked or it didn't

To work for.

What does the power of the late Michael Goitinski look like, you know, only a few years after he's passing, working there day to.

Day it feels in a way like, obviously we miss Michael, you know, a lot, but Matt's also just been amazing to pick up and also run, you know what I mean. There's still the same drive and the same ambition and things. So yeah, I feel like in a way things have changed, but they haven't changed, if that may make sense.

It does, so yeah, day to.

Day, I think it's always a really great thing. Like there's a lot of people in the mushroom that work really really hard. But day to day you also just remember how privileged you are to be doing what you're doing. The really interesting thing is having that kind of independence

I think absolutely.

I mean when you're watching this documentary, I mean you just keep being reminded of some of his methodology and that just has you know, passed around the group because any interaction I've ever had, I've always found that there's some commonality amongst passion and amongst entertainment and art and culture, which I think is really important, especially in your industry. I love asking people about their personal stories about Michael because people who knew him have great stories. What's the

I have asked so many people that question, and then yeah, when I get asked, I'm like, oh my gosh.

Behind the scenes, he was super loyal.

He was incredibly supportive of if you're going through hard times, you know, yeah, take some time off or you know, do this.

And I know one of the.

Things that actually didn't make the film was a story from Michael's driver in fact, and Jeff, his driver's name is. He told us like how often people would turn up to Michael's office and they would either need money for a funeral or someone was going through a divorce and things.

It's so funny because my dad worked with him in the nineties, I guess, so my dad worked on AW So we've done some advertising campaigns with him, and I worked with Mary at Frontier touring a couple of times. I even have a certificate for working on sound relief.

Oh my god, how amazing.

Which I have framed in my house, which is quite amazing. That Mary had called me when I was working in radio sales and doing sales and she wanted some you know, some money to be put into advertising to get sound relief out there. And so I worked with Mary and that was my story, and I got a chance to you know, speak to Michael during that time, and I remember how proud and how much energy was going into

I mean, and what an incredible thing to be part of, you know, I mean that sound relief would have just you know, it's kind of obviously.

Again in the documentary, Michael talks.

About sound Relief and saying how it was one of his most proud moments.

Yeah, my tears realized when that was happening.

I was like, so you would have known then, you know that that kind of energy and how exciting. And I remember we were doing the Molly Meldrum mini series for ten seven. This is a good story about Michael, how he was so passionate about promoting you know, he was just a natural born promoters of people. That's a

Can you get?

And I could just have a picture of Michael goings with the Channel seven officers, you know, telling them that they got too more to promote these minisaries.

Yeah, you know this particular film, it started out as a three part documentary, which I don't know if people know before him lasting and that's why you do have so much pieces to camera.

Oh wow, actually anything before he died, that's all archives. So the idea had started before he passed, and he had was having discussions with Paul Goldman, who he had known since nineteen seventy nine because Paul has directed over two hundred music videos, and they met when Paul turned up with The Boys next Door Shiver's music video clip

And Yeah, then.

I rejoined Mushroom and we spoke about it because I think in the three part doco was going to be the focus on that Mushroom group, so all the different businesses and things, and we thought that it was maybe a better opportunity to do it as Michael's story as a feature film, because you know, I'd like to say that Michael was a big personality. You needed a big screen because we didn't have all those that interview with Michael.

All the archive.

And one of the things that was important to us is to allow Michael to tell his own story in his own voice. So that was an incredible challenge for us just in terms of getting archives to sync up and tell the story, but then also because Michael's voice.

Changed so much over the years.

You can see in the early archive he's you know, very well spoken and very clear, and then as he gets older, everyone has their Giddinski impersonation. But luckily, you know, he wasn't shy of the media, and so there was a lot of radio interviews, There was a lot of television interviews that we had.

Yeah, and the piece.

Itself has got eight hundred and fifty pieces of archive in it that's all signed together to tell the story. But it is still we kept reflecting on what a shame it was that we couldn't actually get those key interviews.

It still feels like you do though, like it still feels quiet. The tapestry of all of this is put together so well from the storytelling perspective, and having him being able to layer opinions at times is brought in really clever, clever, and that jigsaw being put together must have taken a lot of time. How long does the documentary like this take to put together from go to WO from when you started on it to getting it on screen.

This one was actually relatively fast in a way.

I have to say. I think we came on board.

Maybe in October two thousand and twenty War one, I think actually like that, and we really didn't start production until I think it was July thereabouts in twenty twenty two, and obviously then we released it in August twenty three. So it was very fast paced, and I think we spent about twenty weeks or so in the edit because that was obviously where so much of the work was done.

How long did it take to find the right people, because there are some key people that you'd need to have in this story in terms of interview, Yeah, like even just the artist, but also family.

I think we were really lucky because Michael had this ability to forge such personal relationships with people that when we went out to ask people to be interviewed, everyone made time for us.

You know.

We remember we had to organize to catch Billy Joel when he's playing I think it was I can't remember which stadium in the US, but he just was in between sound checks or something and he came into the interview for us sting was i know, just about to

Yeah, so everyone would have been wanting to be a part of it as well. It's hard to sort of lock people down and get them to do these sorts of things, but I guess people must have been you know, it would have been like a gravitational pull to give back to Michael like this.

Yeah, and the issue we really had is who to interview because there were so many people who were so important in his life. But obviously, you know, if you're covering fifty years in a doco, you've got about two minutes a year. We really had a hard time trying to establish who could tell multiple stories or multiple facets, because, yeah, had we done a three part I know that there would be in a lot more people that we would have loved to interview for it as well.

So did you have set questions for them or did you just let the role? Did you let them speak, because like it would be with documentaries, sometimes you know the story that you're putting together, so you've got certain questions to try and on earth things. Or were you just using the time to let them talk about their story and then putting it together afterwards.

Both Actually, like we never really had like a set question that got sent to them ahead.

We'd kind of say, look.

These are the areas that we're trying to cover, particularly because we knew certain people had certain threads story threads, so we needed them to maybe address that in terms of structure of the documentary. For example, like the early

Michael, of course, and I mean, you would have to have the sensitivity. For me, I found watching it some of the more emotional moments was watching Sue talking and putting her contribution forward. Every time she came on, I felt like a wave of emotion coming over me. Was that really sensitive to be able to get her in there to talk about him like that? And did she walk away saying it was cathartic? Or how did she feel about being in the chair.

And yeah about this?

Yeah, And you know, Sue was always for us a really important voice in this documentary. You know, she herself had quite they started out in three aw in radio, and so has been such a pivotal part of Michael's success as well.

He would always.

Say that too, you know, but I think Sue, unlike Michael, you know, was Michael would be quite happy to be you know, front and center, and so I think for Sue I could imagine that it would have been. You know, it's quite difficult in a way coming out and speaking

Yeah, I think she really was amused.

But like, it's interesting when you talk about people who have stories like this, who have achieved something like this, you do normally hear that there is someone behind them in a way that's kind of like a muse or someone of a champion that champions them on and she certainly had done that. I mean, I did love the documentary as well, where people were saying she kind of didn't look like the type of person that would be with Michael. You know, I loved that because I'd heard

Jimmy Barnes, you know, was obviously had such a deep personal relationship. I mean, the whole Barnes family and the Gininski family very close, and Jimmy was just incredibly generous and did speak about that aspect of being creative and you know, but you do and he's obviously come up with working class boy and we can see, you know, all the things that Jimmy was dealing with, and he also spoke about how Michael was there to support him

Then having knowledge and then know how to pick these people. I also love that in the documentary where you know, they talked about picking an artist is a little bit like putting on a bet. But Michael had a really good understanding of people, like he was listening.

He was a good com he did.

He did talk a lot, but he also listened a lot, and that's really key to working out whether someone can do what you want them to do and whether you put your money.

On them and read.

Simon said it didn't actually make the cut, but he had this fantastic line about Michael didn't read books, but he could read people amazing. Yeah, I love that because I was like, very very true, you know. And he also had incredible staff around him that could, you know, And I think that was the Amanda Pelman the kind of an Ogue story where you know, he would he would if someone saw something in an artist, they would

I'd say, Michael, would you ever think about using the footage that you have? I mean that sounds to me like there's an extended cut. Would you think about putting that on free to wehear like have a longer version of it? Or are you quite happy with the succinct version that you've put together?

Yeah?

Look, I think there's an incredible, bigger, broader mushroom story. I mean lots of people and unfortunately we didn't get covered in the documentary itself, but a lot of people are surprised to know that Michael was a producer on Chopper. For example, that he backed a lot of Australian.

Films poster in his office of Chopper. That's a real award thing to have in the background, because I remember when he was making Chopper. This is before under Belly, It's before any of that, and you know, people thought he was mad and people were shocked to see his name attached to this movie when it came out, But then it was it was the making of Eric Banner, it was the making of the Underbelly and going ahead

That's right, And you know, lots of people were kind of you know, a day on the Green and you know, all these other kind of aspects of the business. So yeah, there is definitely a big broader story to tell.

Well what do you hope that people take away from this from your point of view?

Probably two things, if I'm honest, I would love them to realize, or just to be reminded, not to realize, to be reminded how incredible Australian music is and can be, and just a reminder to make sure that we're supporting a local industry on all fronts from you know, from music to film to TV, the literature, you know, all that kind of reminding ourselves that.

We've got incredibly creative people here.

And the second thing is just to really be reminded of the power of belief, that sense of being able to kind of go yep, sure I can take it. I can try it, take a bit of a risk. Also give people that power yourself, you know, like give them the support and belief that they may need to go and try something or to take action. I think that was Michael's strength and it's partly why we kind of called it ego, you know, like you need a bit of ego and provado to get up on stage

And try it and believe in yourself.

Believe in yourself. Yeah, we do a bit of the tall poppy here in Australia, and I think you need people like Agininski who's not afraid to get up there and say, Yep, this is the vision, this is where we're going, and let's go for it.

Before I let you go, something I ask everyone who joins the podcast, what is something from behind the scenes, Something that we as an audience didn't get a chance to see, Something like a behind the scenes secret of what it was like to make this.

Oh, look, I think there was some pretty surreal moments in terms of just who you get to talk to. I think for me, I know that we had the director in the location we were filming, such as the UK and the US and New Zealand.

I me interview Tim and Nil Finn. But so I was zooming in.

But You're kind of sitting there at you know, three o'clock in the morning interviewing Bruce Springsteen, and You're like, what, I've never I never thought you a whole of my life, you know, am I going to be sitting here talking directly to Bruce Springsteen and sting? And even I mean, Kylie was amazing, you know, she was in Melbourne with us and we'd organized it all the Art Center and

Just so so incredible to watch.

It was just incredible, so generous, and again it was so personal. You know, you kind of just remember that you're making a story about a person and these people have all these personal relationships with him, and yeah, you never you never forget that as well. So we hoped that we could show the different sides of Michael.

There's a lot of subtext in our.

Film if you watch it, you know, but I think at the end of the day, people just did respect what Michael did for the Australian music industry and that's in itself an incredible feet.

Well, I have so much respect for you, Beth. I think you have so much warmth and you have been so generous with your time sharing stories and I delighted to talk to you to thank you so much, and I'm going to be in your audience with what you do, you know moving forward, You're incredible, So thank you.

My pleasure, and you know, it's always lovely to talk to people who also experienced Michael, you know, in that way, because it feels like a real shared experience. And thank you, and I hope you keep an out for Bridget Jones. Thanks so much, Ben, we'll talk to you soon.

Thank you so thanks to madic Well, thank