More Classic Aussie Drama out now

Crawford Productions have released the next batch of Cop Shop episodes on DVD.

In volumes nineteen and twenty Riverside Police Station is upgraded to divisional headquarters and Inspector Timms (John Lee) is determined that they’ll have the best arrest record in the force. When Timms receives an award for his police service he’s targeted by a crazed amateur actor who has been left with mental scars following his service in Vietnam.

Detective Mike Georgiou’s (John Orcsik) hopes of romance with Gina Rossi (Jackie Woodburne) are dashed but his broken heart is soon mended when he becomes engaged to Senior Constable Danni Francis (Paula Duncan). Danni goes undercover as a streetwalker when the crazed Riverside Strangler begins targeting prostitutes, and Senior Sergeant Reg Wallis (Alwyn Kurts) suffers a crisis of confidence when a new-fangled computer is installed at the charge counter.

Constable Roy Baker (Gil Tucker) is heartbroken to learn that his wife Melissa (Rosie Bailey) has been doing the dirty on him with her employer and their marriage well and truly hits the skids. Tragedy strikes when Detective Julie Mitchell (Olga Tamara) is killed whilst in pursuit of a joyriding cretin, and on her return to Riverside, Detective Amanda King (Lynda Stoner) struggles with the pressures of work because she constantly becomes too emotionally involved with individual cases.

Cop Shop continues on DVD: Left: Roy Baker (Gil Tucker) learns that his wife Melissa (Rosie Bailey) has been doing the dirty on him. Right: Singing policeman Constable Frank Rossi (Alan Fletcher) and his sister Gina (Jackie Woodburne) have family strife in Cop Shop.

Detective Tom Shannon (John McTernan) is punched on the nose by a female truckie when he begins investigating a spate of truck thefts, and singing copper Constable Frank Rossi (Alan Fletcher) takes part in a TV talent quest. Iris Baker (Monica Maughan) decides to stand for the local council elections when she learns that historic homes in the district are at risk of being bulldozed, and Detective Jeff Johnson (Peter Adams) is taken hostage at gunpoint by a killer.

Elsewhere, a struggling businessman with multiple sclerosis becomes involved in a half million-dollar diamond robbery so that he can fund new medical treatments overseas, and alcoholic derelicts are being brutally bashed by two vicious punks. A deranged young man goes berserk with a knife after catching his ex-girlfriend in bed with her lover, and a petty thief is found crushed to death under a ute after he stumbles upon a hardcore pornography racket.

A sexually inexperienced mechanic becomes embroiled in a payroll job so that he can dispose of his asthmatic mother in a plush retirement home, and an old-fashioned SP bookie joins forces with a computer whiz to set-up an illegal gambling operation.  A fifteen-year-old girl runs away from home and tries to survive as a prostitute but when she’s picked up by a weirdo it appears that her first client could be her last.

Left: Homicide and E Street star Les Dayman appears in Cop Shop Volume 19 as the Riverside Strangler. Right: Reg Wallis (Alwyn Kurts) is forced to accept a new-fangled computer at the cop shop.

The law enforcers investigate the disappearance of the wife of a womanising taxidermist, and a crazed bondage freak abducts a woman subjecting her to a terrifying rape ordeal before mutilating her with a knife. Two teenagers turn themselves into self-styled urban guerrillas and run amuck with a handmade machine gun, and a young con-woman begins approaching wealthy widows claiming that she’s carrying their late husband’s child.

A four-year-old boy is killed by his mother’s abusive lover, and a deranged peeping tom begins terrorising courting couples near a local lake. A member of parliament witnesses the bashing of a cleaner at a pub for homosexuals but he’s reluctant to help the police in case details of his sexual predilections are made public.

A young street kid is assaulted by a bash-artist when she goes on the game to make ends meet, and junkies begin dying when a pusher decides to cut heroin with strychnine.

Left: Detectives Tom Shannon (John McTernan) and Amanda King (Lynda Stoner) are confronted by a mentally ill wife basher wielding a garden fork. Right: Alan Lander from Crossroads appears in Cop Shop Volume 20 as the middle-class Kelvin Nichols who turns to crime when his career goes bad.

Guest artists appearing in these episodes include Judy Nunn, Roger Oakley and Debra Lawrance from Home & Away; Tom Oliver, Linda Hartley, Francis Bell, David Clencie and Ernie Bourne from Neighbours; Barry Quin, James Smillie, Louise Siversen, Maggie Millar, Anne Phelan, Louise Le Nay and Tommy Dysart from Prisoner: Cell Block H; Norman Yemm, Reg Gorman, Michael Caton, Nick Waters and Peter Harvey-Wright from The Sullivans; Elaine Lee and Ron Shand from Number 96.

Also Les Dayman from Homicide; Ric Herbert, Lisa Aldenhoven, Robert Korosy, Kit Taylor and John O’Brien from The Young Doctors; Betty Lucas from Taurus Rising; Alan Lander from Crossroads; Lenore Smith from The Flying Doctors; Gerard Kennedy from Division 4; and Ilona Rodgers from Sons & Daughters.

If you are based in Australasia, you can order Cop Shop from Crawfords DVD. Fans that live in the UK or anywhere else in the world can place their orders with Eaton Films.

Grace Gibson Productions have released another selection of classic Australian radio serials on CD, USB and as digital downloads.

In volume 4 of Spiral Ten we return to the colourful King’s Cross district of Sydney where private investigators Frank Connor and Joe Mintz take on another batch of hazardous cases.

In the latest release of the political satire How Green Was My Cactus we hear all about bogan climate change, survivor Pauline, underdog Bill, and there’s even an election duel. You can order these radio serials and a wealth of others from the Grace Gibson website.

Main Picture: There’s more detective drama in Spiral Ten Volume 4. Inset: Political satire returns in How Green Was My Cactus.

Photographs copyright Crawford Productions/WIN/Eaton Films. IRS Grace Gibson Productions.