It’s nice, it’s different, it’s unusual, and it’s almost 20 years old: Gina Riley and Jane Turner’s seminal bogan comedy series Kath & Kim is about to have a milestone birthday, and the entire team is reuniting to make an anniversary special happen.
The sitcom first premiered on ABC in 2002, releasing three seasons and widely-watched telemovie Da Kath & Kim Code before being lured to Channel Seven for a fourth season in 2007. Because of this, it’s uncertain where the upcoming 20th anniversary special will air, but we’re sure that an audience of devoted foxy morons will tune in.
Riley, Turner, and the rest of the main cast Magda Szubanski, Glenn Robbins and Peter Rowsthorn have all been filming at South Melbourne’s NEP Studio complex for the impending birthday celebration. We should expect some all-new sketches, perhaps revealing what the Day-Knight clan have been up to all these decades later, plus some classic clips and behind-the-scenes material.
Superfans will remember that the third season’s eighth episode did in fact give us a glimpse of Kath & Kim 20 years into the future, where the grey-haired mother and daughter are seeing baby Epponnee (played by Victorian icon Kylie Minogue!) get married off.
kylie minogue in kath & kim is outstanding pic.twitter.com/RKW5IeLnQM
— livia soprano (@ohpooryou) March 20, 2021
With that episode’s visions of flying cars, it’s unlikely that these newly filmed segments will match the original canon, but we do hope that Sharon Strzelecki is still wearing a neck brace/eye-patch all these years later.
One tragic omission we can count is that the anniversary special won’t be filmed in Kath’s original, fictional Fountain Lakes home: the Patterson Lakes filming location was recently bulldozed. It’s a heartbreaking loss for Aussie screen history, and Brett actor Peter Rowsthorn fondly remembered some of the most hilarious moments that took place there as such: “I played cricket in the backyard with Shane Warne, I danced in the garage with Kylie Minogue, I sat and had dinner with Barry Humphries dressed up as a monk.”
All things must come to an end, of course. Australian free-to-air TV being one of them: in its heyday, Kath & Kim consistently attracted more than 2 million viewers a night, a figure that’s entirely unachievable now in the age of streaming competition. Before it’s all over (spelled O-V-A-H), make sure to celebrate with some Gogurts, little baby cheeses, and a well-time hair flick.
