Show Notes
What made Australia's fringe cultural scene so generative in the 1980s — and what can it teach us about sustaining creative industries today? Tony Moore and Mark Gibson, co-authors with Chris McAuliffe and Maura Edmond) join Reg Mombassa (of Mental as Anything and Mambo fame) to launch their book Fringe to Famous: Cultural Production in Australia After the Creative Industries. In a wide-ranging discussion, hosted by journalist and academic Catharine Lumby, the panel examines how music, comedy, film and design crossed over from fringe scenes into the mainstream — and why that transition was never a sellout, but a negotiation. The discussion ranges from the Sydney pub rock circuit and the role of Countdown, to the institutional infrastructure — public broadcasters, independent labels, accessible welfare — that quietly made it all possible. And they ask the harder question: without that scaffolding, what does the future of Australian creative life actually look like? Enjoy a cameo appearance from Paul Fenech, actor, director, producer and comedian (Pizza, Fat Pizza and Housos). Fringe to Famous is published by Bloomsbury Academic, and the launch was held on Gadigal land, at Sydney's Gleebooks. Voices Tony Moore is a cultural historian and Professor of Media and Communications at Monash University, where he leads major ARC-funded projects on Australian comedy and the convict roots of democracy. A former ABC documentary maker and book publisher, his previous books include Dancing with Empty Pockets: Australia's Bohemians, Death or Liberty: Rebels and Radicals Transported to Australia, and The Barry McKenzie Movies. He is co-author of Fringe to Famous: Cultural Production in Australia After the Creative Industries. Mark Gibson is Professor in the School of Media and Communications at RMIT University. His research spans cultural and creative industries, the history of cultural studies, comedy and the role of audiences in cultural production. He is the author of Culture and Power: A History of Cultural Studies and co-author of Fringe to Famous: Cultural Production in Australia After the Creative Industries. Reg Mombassa is a New Zealand-born Australian artist and musician. A founding member of Mental as Anything — inducted into the ARIA Hall of Fame in 2009 — he is also a member of Dog Trumpet alongside his brother Peter. As principal artist and designer for Mambo Graphics, his work helped define the visual identity of one of Australia's most iconic and irreverent surf and streetwear labels. He continues to work as a visual artist and musician. Catharine Lumby (host) is Professor of Media and Communications at the University of Sydney and foundation chair of its Media and Communications Department. The author and co-author of six books, she writes regularly for The Guardian, the Sydney Morning Herald and the ABC, and has advised the public and private sectors on cultural diversity, bullying prevention and social media. She is a leading public intellectual on media, culture and gender in Australia. Paul Fenech is an Australian filmmaker, writer, director, producer and actor. After winning Tropfest in 1998, he was able to parlayed his 1995 third-place entry, about his life as a pizza delivery driver, into the SBS series Pizza, which ran for five seasons from 2000. He went on to create Housos — winner of the Logie for Most Outstanding Light Entertainment Program in 2014. Credits This episode of History Lab was recorded on Gadigal Land, Sydney, at Gleebooks. For more literary events like this one, see the Gleebooks events page. Edited and mixed by Daniel Wiggins. History Lab is brought to you by the Australian Centre for Public History and UTS Impact Studios. Executive producer is Sarah Gilbert.
More from History Lab
In this bonus episode, Ana Filipa Vrdoljak speaks with Rob Quinn, executive director of Scholars at Risk, about the international network's work protecting the human rights of threatened scholars and defending academic freedom. Founded in 1999 at the University of Chicago by a group of academics moved by a radio interview with an exiled scholar, Scholars at Risk now spans more than 650 member institutions in over 40 countries. Quinn traces how the organisation's work has grown from offering individual fellowships to campaigning against wrongful imprisonment, monitoring attacks on higher education, and building international legal standards for academic freedom. The conversation connects directly to Vrdoljak's own research: an Australian Research Council-funded project on the European émigré lawyers who fled fascism in the 1930s and 40s and found refuge in Australia, soon to be released as the podcast series Emergency Exit. Quinn and Vrdoljak discuss the parallels between that earlier era and today's, the crucial distinction between academic freedom and free speech, and the stories of scholars including Iranian human rights lawyer Nasrin Sotoudeh, imprisoned for defending women protesting Iran's mandatory hijab laws, whose cases show what is at stake when that freedom is denied. Voices Ana Filipa Vrdoljak is UTS Professor of Law and the UNESCO Chair in International Law and Cultural Heritage. She is co-coordinator of the UNESCO-UNITWIN Network on Culture in Emergencies. Robert Quinn is Executive Director of Scholars at Risk. He hosts the Free to Think podcast. Further reading and listening 'Fighting to Protect - and Define - Academic Freedom' by Robert Quinn Find out about the work of Scholars at Risk and how you can contribute here. To listen to the ‘Free to Think’ podcast link through here. Credits This episode was recorded on Gadigal Land, in Sydney. It was recorded by Siobhan Moylan and edited by BLAH. Emergency Exit was supported by funding from the Australian Research Council. History Lab is an Impact Studios podcast. Its executive producer is Dr Sarah Gilbert.
In this bonus episode, employment and human rights lawyer Josh Bornstein talks with Katherine Biber about the family history that shaped his career. Bornstein's grandparents left Poland in 1933 hoping to escape, finally securing passage to Melbourne in 1938, only for his grandmother to be hospitalised under a Nazi doctor and his grandfather interrogated by German police during a stopover before they could continue the journey. Growing up in a politically engaged household — his mother a union official, his father a journalist and, for a time, a politician — Bornstein built a career defending workers and refugees against far more powerful opponents, including the Transport Workers Union's case against Qantas, which he took to a seven nil victory in the High Court and more than $200 million in combined compensation and penalties. The conversation also turns to the language used to describe how governments treat refugees. Bornstein pushes back on the term "bureaucratic violence," arguing that responsibility lies with political decisions rather than the public service, drawing on his experience acting for Shayan Badraie, the young Iranian refugee whom then immigration minister Philip Ruddock refused to refer to as anything other than "it." He also reflects on the legacy of the Tampa election, the use of refugee policy as a political weapon since, and his recent writing on international law and Israel's obligations under the ICJ's provisional measures order in the genocide case. Voices Josh Bornstein is a lawyer who specialises in employment and labour relations law, and author of the book, Working for the Brand: how corporations are destroying free speech (Scribe, 2024). Josh’s grandparents fled Poland, arriving in Australia in 1938. Katherine Biber is a legal scholar, criminologist and historian and Professor of Law at UTS. Her latest book is The Last Outlaws (Simon & Schuster Australia, 2025). Her podcast of the same name is featured on History Lab. Credits This special History Lab series was made on Gadigal land, in Sydney. It was edited and mixed by BLAH. Emergency Exit was supported by funding from the Australian Research Council. History Lab is an Impact Studios podcast. Its executive producer is Sarah Gilbert.
In the aftermath of World War II, a charismatic Estonian man named Ilmar Tammelo arrived in Australia as one of more than 170,000 in the Displaced Persons Scheme. Trained as a lawyer and shaped by the upheavals of Soviet and Nazi occupation, Tammelo was assigned to manual labour in regional Australia, a condition of his participation in the DP scheme. A chance encounter brought him into the company of the leading legal theorist, Julius Stone, and Tammelo entered a small but influential circle of European émigré thinkers. Together, they challenged the narrow traditions of Australian legal education, introducing new ideas about law, justice, and society. Through Tammelo’s story and those of his contemporaries, the episode reveals both the constraints of bureaucratic systems and the resilience of those who navigated them, forging intellectual and cultural communities in an often unwelcoming environment. Voices Josh Bornstein is a lawyer who specialises in employment and labour relations law, and author of the book, Working for the Brand: how corporations are destroying free speech (Scribe, 2024). Josh’s grandparents fled Poland, arriving in Australia in 1938. Katherine Biber is a legal scholar, criminologist and historian and Professor of Law at UTS. Her latest book is The Last Outlaws (Simon & Schuster Australia, 2025). Her podcast of the same name is featured on History Lab. The voice of Ilmar Tammelo is performed by Professor Rain Liivoja and Otto Bondy by Michael Stockenhuber. Paul McCartan voiced the Australian government officials. Credits This special History Lab series was made on Gadigal land, in Sydney. Writer and Producer: Olivia Rosenman Collaborating scholars: Katherine Biber, Sara Dehm, and Ana Filipa Vrdoljak Additional research: Eloise Chandler Sound design and audio engineering: Melissa May Thank you to everyone we interviewed and all the voice actors for this episode: Terry Kass, Michael Kirby, Anthony Blackshield, Arthur Glass, Eureka Henrick, Rain Livoja, Paul McCartan, and Michael Stockenhuber. Special thank you to Danny Mulheron, the grandson of Richard Fuchs, for allowing us to use his grandfather’s music in this episode. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions. Emergency Exit was supported by funding from the Australian Research Council. History Lab is an Impact Studios podcast. Its executive producer is Sarah Gilbert.
Leonhard Adam’s life was twice transformed by bureaucratic categories. Declared a “non-Aryan” by Nazi rules, he was forced out of his career and from his home in Germany. He fled to England in search of safety, only to be classified as an “enemy alien”, a category formed in panicked haste as Europe descended into war. Adam was swept up in a wave of mass internment that made little distinction between refugees and real threats. From there, his world shrank to barbed wire and bureaucracy. Arrested, detained, and then deported on the infamous HMT Dunera, Adam was transported across the world to an internment camp in rural Australia. Yet even within the confines of captivity, Adam refused to be defined by the labels imposed on him. He taught, lectured, and helped build a vibrant intellectual community among fellow internees. Through Adam’s extraordinary journey, this episode reveals how abstract legal categories can upend lives and how, even in the harshest conditions, people resist, adapt, and hold onto their humanity. Voices Josh Bornstein is a lawyer who specialises in employment and labour relations law, and author of the book, Working for the Brand: how corporations are destroying free speech (Scribe, 2024). Josh’s grandparents fled Poland, arriving in Australia in 1938. Katherine Biber is a legal scholar, criminologist and historian and Professor of Law at UTS. Her latest book is The Last Outlaws (Simon & Schuster Australia, 2025). Her podcast of the same name is featured on History Lab. Sara Dehm is Associate Professor of Law at UTS, where she teaches and researches in the areas of public international law, legal history, international migration and refugee law, and the law of international organisations. She is also a co-convener of the advocacy network Academics for Refugees. Ana Filipa Vrdoljak is UTS Professor of Law and the UNESCO Chair in International Law and Cultural Heritage. She is co-coordinator of the UNESCO-UNITWIN Network on Culture in Emergencies. The voice of Leonherd Adam was performed by Thorsten Kostulski, Carl Wehner by Andreas Bork, Robert Ranulph Marett by Alistair Senior, and Esther Simpson by Toni Johnson. Winston Churchill's voice was generated by a bot. Olivia Rosenman reads the news articles. Credits This special History Lab series was made on Gadigal land, in Sydney. Writer and Producer: Olivia Rosenman Collaborating scholars: Katherine Biber, Sara Dehm, and Ana Filipa Vrdoljak Additional research: Eloise Chandler Sound design and audio engineering: Melissa May Thank you to everyone we interviewed and all the voice actors for this episode. Mary-Clare Adam, Andreas Bork, Alistair Senior, Toni Johnson, and Thorsten Kostulski who also provided invaluable assistance as a talent scout. The music in this episode included recordings of the Dunera Mass, composed by Max-Peter Meyer on the ship as it sailed for Australia. It was performed by the Luminescence Chamber Singers and The Oriana Chorale, directed by Roland Peelman A.M. with sound engineering and production Jim Atkins. It was recorded at the Wesley Music Centre Chapel in Canberra in 2024 with the support of Creative Australia. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions. Emergency Exit was supported by funding from the Australian Research Council. History Lab is an Impact Studios podcast. Its executive producer is Sarah Gilbert.
The Nazi rise to power looms over Europe in the 1930s, causing an exodus of emigrants seeking refuge from persecution. But fleeing fascism involves contending with the arcane - and often arbitrary - immigration systems of other countries who turn a blind eye to the unfolding crisis. Some escape; most do not. In Australia, a woman named Camilla Wedgwood works tirelessly, trying to help refugees navigate the requirements for would-be immigrants. Through her letters, archival records and personal stories, we meet individuals like German architect Richard Fuchs and Austrian lawyer Eduard Korten, whose futures were shaped by bureaucratic rules about money, age, profession and race. The episode reveals how seemingly neutral systems such as immigration permits, professional admissions and citizenship rules, can shape lives in profound and unequal ways. What happens when rigid categories fail to reflect the complexity of human lives? How do lawyers - who are pivotal in forming bureaucratic rules - respond when they become the victims of them? Through the stories of real people whose survival hinged on bureaucratic decisions, this podcast introduces the concept of bureaucratic violence: a quiet but devastating force that determines who is allowed to belong, and who is left behind. Voices Josh Bornstein is a lawyer who specialises in employment and labour relations law, and author of the book, Working for the Brand: how corporations are destroying free speech (Scribe, 2024). Josh’s grandparents fled Poland, arriving in Australia in 1938. Katherine Biber is a legal scholar, criminologist and historian and Professor of Law at UTS. Her latest book is The Last Outlaws (Simon & Schuster Australia, 2025). Her podcast of the same name is featured on History Lab. Sara Dehm is Associate Professor of Law at UTS, where she teaches and researches in the areas of public international law, legal history, international migration and refugee law, and the law of international organisations. She is also a co-convener of the advocacy network Academics for Refugees. Camilla Wedgewood is voiced by Phoebe Borwick, Josiah Wedgewood by Jonty Claypole, Edward Korten by Bernhard Schmitz, Margaret Hay by Rosa Saladino and Doc Evatt by Gideon Haigh. The voices of Colonel TW White, CH Herbert and the Australian government official were all performed by Paul McCartan. Olivia Rosenman reads the news articles. Credits This special History Lab series was made on Gadigal land, in Sydney. Writer and Producer: Olivia Rosenman Collaborating scholars: Katherine Biber, Sara Dehm, and Ana Filipa Vrdoljak Additional research: Eloise Chandler Sound design and audio engineering: Melissa May Thank you to everyone we interviewed and all the voice actors for this episode. Dr. Eureka Henrich, Justice Hament Dhanji, Professor Steve Hochstadt, Carina Camamile, Phoebe Borwick, Gideon Haigh, Bernhard Schmitz, Jonty Claypole, Rosa Saladino, and Paul McCartan. Special thank you to Danny Mulheron, the grandson of Richard Fuchs, for allowing us to use his grandfather’s music throughout this episode. Additional music from Blue Dot Sessions. Emergency Exit was supported by funding from the Australian Research Council. History Lab is an Impact Studios podcast. Its executive producer is Sarah Gilbert.