This film was a spinoff of a popular TV show, Number 96, that ran for five nights a week from 1972 to 1977. The show was a late-night adult soap opera, and broke new ground for Australian television by showing regular nudity, by its frank inclusion of regular unmarried sex and promiscuity, and by its inclusion of a sympathetic non-effeminate gay man as one of the main characters.
The show consisted of the interlocking stories of the various inhabitants of the apartment building: the gossiping Dorrie Evans (Pat McDonald), her hen-pecked husband Herbert (Ron Shand) and their flatmate Flo Patterson (Bunney Brooke), English battlers Alf and Lucy Sutcliffe (James Elliott and Elisabeth Kirkby), bumbling shop assistant Arnold Feather (Jeff Kevin), gay lawyer Don Finlayson (Joe Hasham), elegant fashion designer Vera Collins (Elaine Lee), shopkeepers Aldo and Vera Godolfus (Johnny Lockwood and Philippa Baker), the bitchy Maggie Cameron (Bettina Welch), wine-bar operators Les and Norma Whittaker (Gordon McDougall and Sheila Kennelly), the very camp Dudley (Chard Hayward) and many others.
The film is like a big-screen extended TV episode, and was popular on release with the show's many fans. The film did not include the show's most famous character, the sex-symbol Bev Houghton (Abigail) who had recently left the show, but Rebecca Gilling fills in as the 'bad girl' flight attendant Diana Moore, and she has the main nude scenes in the movie. Nowadays it's hard to see what all the fuss is about, with the corny humour and unbelievable plot twists, though some people like it because 'it's so bad it's good!'
The show consisted of the interlocking stories of the various inhabitants of the apartment building: the gossiping Dorrie Evans (Pat McDonald), her hen-pecked husband Herbert (Ron Shand) and their flatmate Flo Patterson (Bunney Brooke), English battlers Alf and Lucy Sutcliffe (James Elliott and Elisabeth Kirkby), bumbling shop assistant Arnold Feather (Jeff Kevin), gay lawyer Don Finlayson (Joe Hasham), elegant fashion designer Vera Collins (Elaine Lee), shopkeepers Aldo and Vera Godolfus (Johnny Lockwood and Philippa Baker), the bitchy Maggie Cameron (Bettina Welch), wine-bar operators Les and Norma Whittaker (Gordon McDougall and Sheila Kennelly), the very camp Dudley (Chard Hayward) and many others.
The film is like a big-screen extended TV episode, and was popular on release with the show's many fans. The film did not include the show's most famous character, the sex-symbol Bev Houghton (Abigail) who had recently left the show, but Rebecca Gilling fills in as the 'bad girl' flight attendant Diana Moore, and she has the main nude scenes in the movie. Nowadays it's hard to see what all the fuss is about, with the corny humour and unbelievable plot twists, though some people like it because 'it's so bad it's good!'