Thirteen-year-old Susan has just moved to a new part of town. She's practising her skills at the local roller-skating rink when Buzz, the prince of the rink, spots the talented newcomer and moves in on her. Susan joins Buzz and his gang but doesn't know what she is letting herself in for. Meanwhile, her family are distracted with their own worries: her dad has lost his job, her mother is an exhausted working mum, and her older teenage sister is pregnant. Susan has to work her way through the difficult process of making new friends in a tough environment. Buzz wants to be more than just friends and Susan has to decide what she is prepared to accept and what is important to her. (Source: Australian Screen).
In her memoir Bloodbath: A Memoir of Australian Television (Melbourne: Melbourne UP, 2006), Patricia Edgar recalls that
Jan [Sardi] wanted to speak to the audience with an authentic voice, using the language of the western suburbs where the film was set. This time I was not on the writer's side. I believed the language would draw attention away from the content of the story and ultimately prevent the film from being seen by the children it was intended for. While I agreed in principle with Sardi's view, I felt it would not work in practice. I insisted that swearing was not acceptable.
The script had only a provisional C classification from the tribunal, where all final drafts were being scrutinised carefully. Smoking had to be kept to a level essential to the plot. (Too much smoking could also jeopardise an overseas sale.) Violence had to be kept in context, within acceptable limits. The party punchbowl scene, which was essential, should only have one character, Maggs, showing any signs of intoxication. The shoplifting scene should be directed to show that the film was not condoning stealing. The 'lip twister kiss', so described in the script, should be directed carefully. The film should promote a sense of children being responsible for one another. The characters must look like twelve to fourteen year olds. All these issues required sensitive direction. (p.168)
Just Friends
Fitzroy
Ringwood
:
McPhee Gribble
Penguin
Australian Children's Television Foundation
,
1985
Z371032
1985
single work
novel
young adult
Susan is new to the neighbourhood. She makes friends at the roller rink and has to decide what she is prepared to accept and what is important to her. (Source: Libraries Australia)
In her memoir Bloodbath: A Memoir of Australian Television (Melbourne: Melbourne UP, 2006), Patricia Edgar notes that this novelisation attracted some controversy:
Hilary [McPhee] had gone along with Jan Sardi's wish to use western suburbs' language in the novelisation. By today's standards, it was tame, not extending beyond terms such as 'really pissed off', 'bitch', 'shut up, would you?', yet the book was described in the Victorian Parliament by Ian Smith, the Member for Polworth, as containing 'the worst form of gutter language'. Apart from the language, he drew attention to a description of kissing. He asked the Minister for Education 'to intervene to ensure that this literature is not made available, at least in primary schools'.
By 7 October 1985 the Director-General of Education in Victoria, Norman Curry (who was also an Anglican minister), had sent a memorandum to principals of all primary schools requesting them to 'bring to the attention of their school community the opinion of the Education Department that the book is not suitable for younger readers as the language is inappropriate'. Foundation staff tracked down the history of this memo which I sent to McPhee Gribble publishers, who were deciding what to do. Norman Curry had taken a personal interest, read the book and annotated it himself, then asked a curriculum officer, Robert McGregor, for an opinion. McGregor drafted for the Education Minister's signature a letter to Ian Smith with the same content as the memo sent to principals. No copy of the Curry memo could be found in the Department, and the English Curriculum section knew nothing of McGregor's memo and advice. It was an unusual step for such advice to be given; normally the Department keeps out of such things and leaves decisions to the discretion of the school community. [...]
I advised Hilary to so nothing. Hilary agreed. But there would be no more swearing in Foundation publications. (pp.173-74)
