Phillip Adams

by Philip Luker

  The best Late Night Live sessions are conversations, not interviews, and this has been a big reason for its success, plus Adams’ ability, knowledge and devotion to the program (even after twenty years), the wide range of usually provocative subjects and guests chosen by his producers and his ultra-conversational style. Adams tries hard to break down barriers, to himself, to whoever he is talking to and to their audience — as if two people are talking to a third at dinner.

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  The third person became known as Gladys one night when Adams said on-air that he had only one listener, Gladys, and they were going around to her place. Some ABC executives chastised him for talking down to the audience, but he made Gladys such a permanent feature that he often introduces programs by saying, ‘Hello to all the Gladdies and Poddies.’

  ‘Gladdies’ have nothing to do with the ‘gladdies’ (short for gladioli) which Dame Edna Everage throws to theatre audiences. ‘Poddies’ are the rapidly-increasing number of LNL podcast listeners. Adams once welcomed another listener, a one-year-old baby whose mother told Adams by email that she listens in Hobart while suckling her new son, George. Adams called the new listener category, ‘Titties’. In 2010, he added another listener, ‘Noddy’ after a young boy sent him an email. With Gladys apparently the only listener to what Adams often calls ‘our little wireless program’, inevitably some people invited to speak ask how many listeners LNL has. In 2010, the cumulative audience (the number of people who told Nielsen Research they had listened to the program in the past week) was 98,000 for the night session and 135,000 for the repeat, a total of 233,000, in Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. But Radio National is also broadcast in 220 other cities and towns rarely or never audited such as Canberra, Hobart, Newcastle, Wollongong, Ballarat, Albury-Wodonga, Townsville and Rockhampton. So LNL’s total audience would be more than 350,000. Only two Australian daily newspapers, the Melbourne Herald Sun and Sydney Daily Telegraph, have bigger circulations. Late Night Live is the top program on Radio National, with 7.8 per cent of audiences in the five mainland state capitals, and is only third in all ABC Radio programs in spite of ABC Local Radio having a much broader audience than Radio National.

  Who are LNL’s listeners? It’s very interesting. Ninety per cent are aged 40 or more; 55 per cent are female; a massive 65 per cent hold university degrees; 36 per cent have annual household incomes of up to $50,000 while 20 per cent have incomes of $110,000 plus; 40 per cent are in ‘AB’ (high level) occupations (for example, white collar professionals); and 45 per cent are not in the workforce — they have retired or have home duties but are not unemployed. Melbourne has a slightly bigger audience than Sydney. But the boom in LNL’s podcast listeners is the big news and has turned it into an international program. In August 2010, the program was downloaded 217,463 times, third among all ABC programs after New Music on Triple J and AM on both Radio National and Local Radio. Three-quarters of the downloads are in Australia, 6 per cent in the USA and 3 per cent in Britain. The ABC management is impressed.

  A podcast listener who had been four months in Hamburg from Sydney emailed LNL to say she listens each day at the same time as her father listens in Brisbane and asked Adams to give him a 75th birthday greeting, which he did. One, teaching English in Japan, said he always tunes in ‘over coffee and misty eyes’. A listener in Poland said LNL helps him to improve his English and this shows how podcast technology makes the world smaller. One in Chile said LNL ‘remains the most intelligent update on the continuing comedy known as Down Under’; one in the Czech Republic listens on a bus taking him to a school where he teaches English. Another in Kenya chided Adams for not mentioning Poddies in Africa. One listens while working night shifts in an English supermarket. Another email, which Adams mentioned on-air, told how ‘Gladys, of Perth’ went to hospital to have a baby, her husband forgot to pack birth music, so the nurses brought her a radio, she listened to LNL and as the final music came on, gave birth. Her family now calls Adams ‘Uncle Phil’.

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  Adams’ conversation on-air is as casual as it is off-air, spiced with Australian slang and occasional swear words. He likes stirring the possum: he obviously enjoyed having an on-air conversation with the author of a book about US place names such as Squaw Tit, Shithouse Mountain and Whorehouse Meadow. He never uses ‘Mr’, ‘Dr’ or ‘Professor’ but introduces people by their first and last names, then adds their qualifications and continues using their first names. If an academic comes from an overseas university, he asks them who their university was named after and this slows them down and makes them more conversational. He’s inquisitive rather than interrogative and this natural curiosity makes for a better experience for his guests.

  LNL, like any broadcast program, has to be kept moving but Adams deliberately talks slowly on-air because he’s found that radio requires a slower pace so listeners can take in the thoughts and ideas. That’s also what he’s found when chairing public forums. His main aim is to make the program enjoyable and informative; he wants to go off-air knowing more than when he went on-air and for listeners to do the same. But his relaxed on-air style is not often easy to achieve: most of his on-air conversations are with people in another ABC studio or on the ‘dog and bone’, as he calls it, and this means he can’t read their body language and react accordingly. If they pause during the conversation, he wonders whether they have slipped off their chair.

  The main reason LNL is viewed as left-wing is Adams’ left-wing views, which he never hesitates to give. He often mentions that the former prime minister, John Howard, declined to appear on the program. Why advertise a failure? Appearing humble is part of Adams’ style. But he is one of the very few left-wing Australian media commentators or writers.

  He is a conversationalist, not an interrogator: he doesn’t grill people but prefers to let their views stand, even if he disagrees. His program presents ideological subjects with him as a moderator, not a player. He has never told his producers he doesn’t want a certain person on the program. Some people he’s had spats with have come back on, although there is a fairly long list of people who won’t appear.

  Chris Bullock, who was the program’s executive producer until he was switched to another program in 2010, told me Adams is easy-going and easy to work with. ‘He’s not demanding. After all, he’s been around for a long time and doesn’t have to prove anything. He knows LNL back to front. He’s comfortable with what he does, likes doing it and has developed a warm relationship with listeners, with the program and with many guest speakers, some of whom return years later and find that Phillip remembers their last conversation. Even if the guests disagree with his views, they want to have on-air discussions with him because he doesn’t try to impose his views on them and also because of his large audience. Many guests, for example, have just published books and jump at the chance. The conversational LNL format is what attracts many listeners. It is relaxed compared with current-affairs programs, at times of the evening (10.05 p.m.) and afternoon (the 4.05 p.m. rebroadcast next day) when listeners are starting to slow down. No other program in Australia, the United States or Britain is as personable.’

  Bruce Shapiro, who has been the program’s US correspondent for the past 12 years, told me on a visit to Sydney that LNL is unique in the English-speaking world: ‘Phillip is far more subtle that US broadcasters. I can’t think of any broadcaster in America or Britain who brings such a combination of intellectual subtlety, craft and connections to the listener. Phillip is one of the greatest interviewers of English-language radio. The way listeners are invited into the program makes it different from any other. It’s a powerful program and I always encourage Americans invited to take part, to do so. The guests are shown respect, and the intimacy Phillip has between him and his guests and his listeners is remarkable. But we mustn’t neglect his producers’ hard work and dedication to getting the right guests and the right background.’

  Each week, Shapiro sends the producers an email saying where he�
��ll be for his usual Tuesday night slot and suggests topics he could talk about. The producers also suggest topics. But Adams likes to make a game of it and sometimes asks Shapiro something not on the radar. Adams is good at creating a dramatic structure so the listener is taken by the hand at the start and walked through the program. It’s expertly crafted. The story-telling craft of having an underlying argument is the big secret challenge of doing good radio. It’s rare and invisible to the listener. Few broadcasters master structured conversations on-air. Shapiro writes a column in The Nation in the US and is executive director of the Dart Center for Journalism and Trauma, a resource think-tank for journalists covering violence and tragedy.

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  The most common criticism of LNL is that Adams interrupts his guests too much. He also sometimes talks too much before introducing them. He has a lot to say on many subjects; he has a good memory of a rich life and brings some of those experiences into on-air conversations, often while his guest is talking. His producers talk to him about this habit of interrupting guests and give him the emails complaining about it, but to no avail. Other listeners complain about his left-wing views; some say they don’t agree with his views but like hearing his guests. The listeners who complain most strongly claim he has sold out to the right wing. Others accuse him of making fun of serious subjects. As an example of the many ratbag complaints, The 9/11 Truth Movement attacks him because he doesn’t believe its claim that 9/11 was a conspiracy.

  Sometimes Adams’ producers wonder why he spends more time talking to one person and less on another, or takes the program in a particular direction. They discuss these matters with him but ultimately see it as his program and believe he knows what listeners want to hear. It is up to Adams to decide which questions to ask; his producers suggest questions and he may ask them, or he may take the conversation in another direction. Adams, not his producers, carries the program and they will not tell him what to say.

  LNL’s presentation style and content have not changed over the years except that, while the standard program still has three stories, there are more one-hour conversations on a single subject with one, two or three guests, usually in three different locations around Australia or the world. The only people LNL avoids having on-air are the celebrities who fill popular magazines, and it has few politicians, as they are current-affairs fare. Not only John Howard but also Kim Beazley won’t talk to Adams. He has fallen out with Bob Hawke. But the ex-Attorney-General Philip Ruddock and ex-Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, both strong Howard supporters, have appeared. LNL policy is to have guests who are actually doing something rather than reporting it, but this is often harder to achieve. The program is necessarily locked into the English language and Adams admits it doesn’t do a good job with the rest of the world because it is often hard to find Eastern European, Asian, African or Latin American decision-makers who can speak reasonably fluent English. Even among English speakers, many people who are good at writing are not good at speaking. So LNL often has to use commentators rather than decision-makers. Rarely, Adams turns down a conversation with someone whose views or personality he detests. But many of the people who won’t go on-air with him, or who he doesn’t want to talk to, are pro-establishment or right-wing. He sees no point in having hostile people on air with him in a conversational program, although many people he does have on-air disagree with him or he with them. But in four years of listening almost every night I have never heard voices raised.

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  The funniest LNL story Adams tells concerns David Hill when he was the ABC managing director in the 1990s: ‘I used to attack him in newspaper columns, although it was a golden age compared with one later under Jonathan Shier. David was intensely disappointed with me and LNL but heard we had booked a conversation with Henry Kissinger, who had written a wonderful book on diplomacy. David was particularly interested because he had visions of becoming secretary-general of the UN, as did Bob Hawke and Gareth Evans, in spite of the fact that no-one with English as their first language has ever had the job. I was not entirely convinced that Henry would turn up in our New York studio to have a talk with me in Sydney. I had one ear on the studio and the other on the rest of the program, which I was stretching in case Henry spat the dummy. I heard that David had flown to New York to meet Henry. To my delight I heard David welcoming Henry in our studio. Henry sounded as if he was in a foul mood as he sat in a chair to be interviewed by someone he had never heard of in far-away Australia. So I quickly wound-up the other conversation I was having on-air and tried flattery on Henry. It always works. I said it was a tradition in the US that anyone could go from log cabin to White House but the log cabin can’t be in Poland, which had prevented my next guest from getting to the White House — he had always worked for someone else there. Henry purred. After the interview I could hear him telling David it was the best interview he had ever had and who was I? David replied that I was a very good friend of his!’

  LNL has hour-long and shorter conversations in reserve in case it can’t make contact with people. Sometimes Adams stretches the rest of the program and tries to work out what is happening on the other side of the sheet of glass between him and the producer. If they can’t locate the first person to come on, they often start with the second or third. Often it’s a chat between Adams and three others in different parts of the world and if one or two can’t be found at the crucial time, Adams starts with the others and hopes the two lost ones are found before the segment ends. If not, he apologises to the audience, which proves it’s a live program, although some ABC people regard an apology as bad form.

  Adams’ interviewing technique is carefully crafted and practised. He uses the well-worn device of praising guests on-air, slightly exaggerating their influence and often downplaying his own, to get the guests and listeners onside. He briefly outlines the guest’s career before easing the conversation into the first topic and then steers it the way he wants it to go. He aims to make the conversation a subtle, sophisticated dance, although sometimes it goes off in other directions.

  He leads the conversation and keeps it going. The LNL producers give him a written introduction to the speaker and the subject, but often he does his own introduction because he believes that too much on Radio National is read, which results in a loss of spontaneity. He has never found a subject that is simple — there is always something to say on either side. Much thought goes into the questions. Some guests would have been answering the same kind of questions for 30 years and Adams could leave the studio to make a cup of tea. Each program is planned days or weeks in advance. The producers might start by phoning a potential guest on the basis of researching a subject, to see if they are articulate and if their ideas would fit in with others’ to make a good program. Not everyone wants to take part anyway.

  Although Adams sometimes interrupts his guests, he doesn’t argue with them. Confrontation doesn’t work on radio because, when people who would lustily argue with each other in print face each other in a studio or over the air, they’re irritatingly nice to each other. But chatty conversations do work on air. Speakers tend to relax when they can’t see their audience. If Adams is not reasonably nice to establishment guests, they won’t return. Some nights, he comes off-air furious with himself, a guest, the technology or the producers for mistakes in the brief, although he always admits mistakes on-air and cops the flak for monumental clangers.

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  Adams has never had a cross word with an executive producer, but he believes cross words would improve other Radio National programs because some presenters depend too much on their producers. Other Radio National programs are jealous of LNL having a staff of six: Adams, acting executive producer Gail Boserio, the other producers and the technical director. Some producers have good contact books; others have good subject knowledge — and these individuals have to be prevented from bending the program their way.

  Often Adams’ age (he turned 71 in July 2010) and 56 years experience as a journalist collect
ing information on many subjects gives him an advantage over a young producer. If he doesn’t know much about a subject and cares less, he sticks to the brief. Otherwise, he speaks off the cuff to get into the subject, introduces his one or more speakers and it’s off and running. He told me that sometimes his producers don’t even listen to what he’s saying on-air: he can see them through the glass wall, chatting. They regard their job as preparing briefs, not babysitting their host. They have even been known to type suggested questions on the computer, only to have him reply on the intercom, ‘I asked that five minutes ago.’ He often suggests subjects and speakers that are eventually taken up by his producers, although in the end it’s their decision. That said, they’re constantly looking for new topics and speakers. The media is incestuous and many subject ideas and speakers’ names come from other people in the industry. Regular topics are: the Pacific Islands (particularly the Solomon Islands, East Timor and Papua-New Guinea), Aboriginal affairs, philosophy, political ideas, science, the environment, Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East, justice, freedom, the Iraq war and the US and British governments. Australian politics are covered regularly only in one third of a program a week.

  Former executive producer Chris Bullock told me LNL’s aim is to present cutting-edge discussions on public debates; Adams said its prime duty is to alert people to ideas and issues that have not yet reached the other Australian media. Usually, few of the program’s guests are in Sydney. The 10 p.m. timeslot makes it easy for Adams to have conversations with people at breakfast time on the US East Coast, lunchtime in Europe and early evening in Asia but not with people in the early morning on the US West Coast or the Pacific Islands, when stories are often pre-recorded. Each of the four producers does one night shift a week. In the ABC’s head office at Ultimo, they sit at work stations and talk a lot about possible subjects and guests and no doubt about how Adams handled the previous night’s program.