Channel Seven is testing its drama pilot Winners and Losers with online sample groups.
As first revealed by TV Tonight, the drama centres around females, in this case a group of four, Bec, Jen, Frances, and Sophie who reunite after being invited to a school reunion by Tiffany Turner (Michala Banas, McLeod’s Daughters), a girl whom everyone once despised.
The group were the ‘losers’ back in school and taunted by Tiffany. After the reunion they purchase a lotto ticket and become winners (coincidentally a lottery win was the premise for Nine’s Chances, a set-up it soon abandoned for more outrageous plots).
Filmed in Melbourne, the pilot is said to include Virginia Gay (All Saints), Melanie Vallejo (Packed to the Rafters), Damien Bodie, Eliza Taylor-Cotter, and Blair McDonough (all from Neighbours) plus Francis Greenslade (Newstopia, The Micallef Program), Denise Scott (The 7PM Project), Lawrence Mooney (The White Room) and Scott McGregor (Temptation).
Testing of Pilots with audiences is certainly not new, and when your investment is as major as a new drama it makes a lot of sense.
Updated.
Steve Says : I think channel seven has backed a winner , the show is entertaining and witty . The main characters are all interesting in their own way !
I started watching the show from ep 4 and 5 and yes “winners and losers” i am Hooked !!!!
* Please keep Michala Banas as a regular on the show ,her playing the bitch gives the show a character we all love to hate Lol
What a lot of rubbish its. good so l can watch ncis with no competion
yes it is a hit for me i loved it i hope u all do to
Herald Sun reported that it has been.
so..how long til we hear officially if its got the green light??
We watched it too, as part of the survey … a couple of corny scenes, but overall we loved it and wanted more …. hope it makes it. Scott had a small scene, but Blair was good !
Great feedback! Has any of the people who have seen the pilot able to let us know how you got chosen to be one of the test audience and how one might go about signing up to be a potential test audience for things like this???
I agree they should change the title, it sounds a bit like a gameshow if you’ve never heard of it before
DC: Blair plays the boyfriend of one of the 4 girls, but as Scott said, the characters background and history and relationships were very breif. As a guy, I didn’t mind it too much but it was a very female early to late 20s target audience. I don’t think the 30s-40s audience will warm to it as much since all the women seem to be single or have boyfriends and havent settled down yet in life. They all seemed immature characters for their age (well they acted like that in the pilot!).
The main key to the show will be where they go next now the “losers” have won lotto? Will this be the main theme in the show? The show is half serious half light hearted comedy but it is boring on being a bit over the top, unless they change it.
It reads as a very female skewed show with absolutely nothing for the male audience to connect to. Presumably Seven beleive that they do not need viewers from the 48% demographic?
Very interesting Scott! And what were your comments on the show Positive or negative? Could you see the show getting a big revamp if it was to make it into full series? IThere seem to be A Lot f characters but im guessing most of them would only be in the pilot because they appear as guests at this reunion???
Yes it aired here on TEN.
@Scott, Francis Greenslade was the father, whilst Lawrence Mooney was the boss of Virginia Gay’s character.
@Buck @dylan @craig not sure if there is an actual way of signing up to things like this. I looked around, and I can’t see how to actually subscribe. I was sent mine from The ORU (‘The Online Research Unit’) and have been sent things from them ever since I chose to fill out a survey from the Big Brother site way back. Someone out there may try uploading a copy to YouTube though if it isn’t already up there. I tried viewing it again after I had done so and it said that it was closed.
David have you ever seen or heard of the New Zealand TV show “Go Girls”?, the show sounds a little bit similar to that except the the characters in Go girls are only 25
I have also seen the pilot. For those that were asking, Denise Scott plays the mother of a character with Lawrence Mooney as the father.
Scott Mcgregor is a boyfriend I think.
I didn’t find the pilot to describe the extras character relations all that well so it was difficult to determine the exact relationship between some characters i.e. brother, boyfriend, friend.
I wonder if our comments will be taken on board. They didn’t listen to the last one I did which was for The White Room!
If anyone knows where i can watch this can you please post it on here!
Sounds like an interesting show, but they need to change the title, it sounds so stupid.
Casting is obviously subject to change because if it goes into production, it will be next year and i depends on actor availability, cause the original “City Homicide” pilot had a few different actors than whats in it now
Ria Vandervis isnt in this, its Melanie Vallejo instead, cause shes already doing Cops LAC
Sounds interesting.
How do you get to be involved in these testing viewing things? I would love to have a look at it.
Cheers for the updates Richard!!!
Melanie Vallejo…she was great in rafters and funnily enough I love her in that ad she’s in for iced coffee, the one where the guys GF says ” we need to talk” and he imagines all the horrible things she could be wanting to talk about…hillarious.
So what is the other cast members parts like Blair Mcdonough, Denise Scott and Scott mcgrgeors roles. Are they the characters boyfriends, teachers??
Anything more you can tell us Richard? Very keen to hear all about this!!!
Watched is last night, was good to see something different from a police or medical drama. The casting of the female leads, most of whom I dont know worked well. I hope that Seven make sure this show has a good lead in and put it someone at the start of the week with a decent advertising campain which is not taken out of context and makes the show look childish.
Good to see a lot of Australian faces back on tv.
@girlygal: There is a character in the show which Rebel Wilson could have played, they must have gone along the same lines with the look of the character.
So what’s the deal with a pilot? if everyone says it Horrible do they remake the whole thing or just blow off the idea completely. It does sound tediious with the whole lottery thing….why not just make a comedy drama about a group of twentysomethings, where lacking one of those since secret life, it would probably do really well with good writers. Channel 7 make odd drama choices, I think by far Channel 10 commision the best dramas.
You may be shocked but Blair Mcdonough was actually really good in the pilot. His acting has improved a lot and was quite warm and funny. However its mainly to do with the 4 girls so there is still a lot of character development to come.
Rebel Wilson is not in the show but they have a similar character who is one of the four girls. Overweight, glasses type, still lives at home who looks like the computer chick from Criminal Minds! Good actress though.
People who like Michala Banas will be disappointed cause she plays the ex High School popular girl with a stuck up nature. Shes not one of the 4 main characters.
One of the four girls is Melanie Vallejo (ex Pack to Rafters/Dare Ice Coffee ads), she plays the party girl type. Apparently she was grossly overweight and picked on in school… silly and far fetched I know.
Ducko: list isn’t necessarily complete. Haven’t been able to confirm if Jansen Spencer is also an inclusion actually.
God….. Blair Mcdonough and Scott Mcgregor a ‘model from Temptation’ as our male cast members….Geez what am amazing caliber of actors they have lined up there!!
Someone who has seen the pilot Please tell me they aren’t regular cast members and are merely just some bogans who are @ this reunion and never heard from again?
More info guys who have seen it please!!!
I watched it, and thought it was good too. Wasn’t sure what to think of it all before I did see it, but as it was coming along I really liked it, and now I’m just hanging to see the next episode!
Please green light this new drama, it sounds like a really fun and different show, i think the more Australian drama’s we have on air the better it will be for the television industry and the viewing public. Lets just hope if Winners and Losers does make it to air, 7 give it enough time to find its feed and hopefully gain a healthy audience figure to survive in the fickle world of tv! I will definatly be watching if it makes it to air.
Well they need something to replace Desperate Housewives which is just tanking. It’s core audience has totally abandoned it. Good on Seven for giving it a try. Ten are also not afraid to go for character based drama. Nine on the other hand keep serving up RSO and SP – it’s all a bit lame and skews 55+anyway. It’s about time Nine tried something else too, so maybe this will spur them on.
I thought Melanie Vallejo was also involved. Are you sure about Ria Vandervis?
Sounds like a cross between Out Of The Blue and Chances both having a similar premise when they began.
ok so that explains why Blair is on Dancing with the Stars this seaon
I received this email survey and have viewed this 42 minute pilot. It was Very female skewed. A very different type of drama to the usual Aussie series which I liked. A bit like an Aussie version of Sex in the City/Lip Stick jungle but more about the friendships than the “I’m a successful independant sexual women” theme.
Acting was okay but a bit over the top in places. It had a comedy element, but sometimes it felt like an Aussie teen movie like Hating Alison Ashley than an adult targeted series. The 4 losers end up winning $8 million dollars at the end of the episode. Don’t know how it will continue but it could become quite far fetched if the script writers have their way.
This sounds terrible – a school reunion & lottery winners?
Sounds interesting, also having Michala Banas is a plus.
I’m sure you’ll let us know if it appears online somewhere for us to ‘sample’
If you’re having a show with 4 females, one of them has to be funny. I’d heard actress/comedian Rebel Wilson was offered this pilot but her work in America conflicted with the pilot dates. She’d be awesome in a show like this playing one of the ‘loser’ girls (mean that as a compliment!).
I watched it and loved it! I also watched a preview of a reality home renovation show ‘Race for a Better Space’ hosted by Tom Williams. That was a bit lame though.