Season 1 1999

TV-G

"Federation - A Three-Part Journey To Nationhood" is an epic tale about the birth of a nation. It's a tale of winners and losers, of great debates that unified the country, of struggle, not just to make an Australian nation, but to create Australian democracy. This entertaining product of seven years’ work and research brings to life the events, personalities and experiences that led up to the federation of the Australian colonies in 1901. FEDERATION depicts a struggle to create an Australian democracy. It does not glorify events or characters or avoid the nastier facts of our past. It faces the hard issues of who was excluded from the rights and privileges of Australian citizenship, and so includes the voices of women and Indigenous people who were largely ignored at the time. It is told as a ‘ripping good yarn’, narrated at a cracking pace by John Doyle (aka Rampagin’ Roy Slaven) from ABC-TV and Radio 2JJJ. The story is enlivened through the use of interviews with descendants of federation characters and contemporary commentators, interwoven with well-known actors speaking the words of characters of the period. Leo McKern (Rumpole) is the voice of the grand patriarch of the federation movement, Sir Henry Parkes. FEDERATION focuses on primary source material such as photographs, letters, journals and newspapers from last century. It even includes rare cinema footage of federation celebrations in 1901. A Film Australia National Interest Program Produced with the assistance of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation See also http://www.abc.net.au/federation/journey/ and http://museumvictoria.com.au/federation/