Outsiders (Australian TV program)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- Rowan Dean
- Rita Panahi
- James Morrow
- Ross Cameron (2016-2018)
- Mark Latham (2016-2017)
| Outsiders | |
|---|---|
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| Genre | |
| Presented by |
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| Country of origin | Australia |
| Original language | English |
| No. of seasons | 9 |
| Production | |
| Running time | 1–2 hours (incl. adverts) |
| Original release | |
| Network | Sky News Australia |
| Release | 4 December 2016 – present |
Outsiders is an Australian television news and commentary show broadcast on Sky News Australia.[1] The show is currently co-hosted by editor of The Spectator magazine Rowan Dean, The Friday Show host Rita Panahi, and The Daily Telegraph opinion editor James Morrow, and features long-form discussion of political issues between conservative contributors.[2][3]
The show is broadcast from the Sky News Centre in the Sydney suburb of Macquarie Park. The series debuted in a pilot episode on 4 December 2016,[1] and began airing weekly in 2017,[4] before the format expanded to a two-hour Sunday morning edition and hourly primetime episodes in 2018.[5] From October to December 2018, the show aired late at night, four times a week.[6]
The show debuted with three co-hosts, two of whom were fired for separate controversial comments. Former Labor leader Mark Latham was the show's primary host until his employment was terminated by Sky News on 29 March 2017, following several controversial statements made on the show.[7] On 2 November 2018, former Liberal MP Ross Cameron became the second co-host to be sacked, after using offensive racial stereotypes to refer to Chinese people.[8]
The format was designed as a response to the long-running ABC program Insiders, which many conservatives see as aimed towards the "inner-city leftist class".[2] The hosting trio described themselves as "[Donald] Trump's Aussie mates"[9] and proudly boasted "absolutely no balance whatsoever", intending to "do the opposite of [Insiders host] Barrie Cassidy".[2] In 2017, the program aired at 10 a.m. AEDT, beginning as Insiders concluded, but in 2018, the program added a second hour, beginning at the same time as Insiders and competing with it directly.[1]
The program was the second format co-hosted by both Cameron (following the now-defunct Keneally and Cameron) and Latham (who continued co-hosting Jones + Co until his sacking), and is the first hosting role for Dean. It was developed following the appearance of all three men on an episode of Paul Murray Live.[10]
Reception
The pilot episode on 4 December 2016 was watched by 22,159 viewers, a 79 per cent increase in the timeslot average of Weekend Live ratings over the previous four weeks. Amongst homes with subscription television (STV), Insiders on the ABC was watched by 790,070 viewers, and including viewers without STV rated 220,000 viewers.[11]
An episode on 5 March 2017 had 37,000 viewers but that dropped to 24,000 viewers on 26 March, following a series of controversial comments by Latham.[12]
An episode on 27 August 2017 was the twentieth-most-watched program on subscription television, with viewership of 41,000.[13]
In the first half of 2018, Sky maintained that the weekend edition of Outsiders increased its audience by 24 per cent, the Monday edition by 84 per cent and the Thursday edition by 105 per cent in their respective timeslots "year-on-year".[14][15]