TV Week
27th March 1982
For John it was Logie he said he didn’t deserve.
COP SHOP’S John McTernan was humble about winning a TV WEEK Logie.
The American-born actor, who took off the Best Lead Actor In A Series laurel, said his TV colleague, Gil Tucker, should have won it.
“Gil works so hard and gives so much of himself that he deserves this award,’’ he said.
“I feel embarrassed because I’ve only been with Cop Shop for just over a year, and Gil has been in the series four years.”
After accepting the Logie, McTernan was angry at himself for forgetting to praise the Cop Shop crew.
“We work so hard to do two hours of TV a week and there are no tantrums or fights — ever,” he told TV WEEK
Sitting next to McTernan on the night was his good friend and Don Lane Show dancer Laurel Babb.
McTernan, who plays Det. Sgt. Tom Shannon in the series, is so convincing as an Irishman that often people stop him in the street and tell him Irish jokes.
He started acting when he came to Australia in 1968. His first job was singing and dancing in cabaret shows.
One of his first professional jobs was in a double vocal comedy act with friend Timothy Bean. John also wrote their material.
McTernan worked for seven years in theatre in Sydney, doing everything from Godspell to Shakespeare.
In television he has appeared in Number 96, The Young Doctors and a few ABC plays.
A former sailor, McTernan might feel the longer service and loyalty of his cast mate Gil Tucker deserves an award — and there would be few that would disagree with that — but McTernan’s effort in getting to where he is in public esteem in such short time makes him real Logie material.
John McTernan has had a meteoric rise in the ranks of Australia’s favorite TV People.
It wasn’t long after he joined the cast of Cop Shop playing a wily Irishman that audience started to warm to him.
He even had a spell away from the show for a couple of months to do a stage play and that didn’t affect his popularity.
— JACKIE JOHNSON
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