Malcolm Searle

malcolmsearle Former TV quiz show host and radio presenter Malcolm Searle passed away earlier this week at the age of 77.

Tamworth-born Searle was the original host of the Melbourne-based quiz show Coles £3000 Question from 1960 until ill-health forced him to resign in early 1963. He was later one of the ‘Good Guy’ presenters on Melbourne’s popular music radio station 3AK.

Searle then moved to Brisbane as a presenter on the recently-launched TVQ0 before moving to Sydney to host The Marriage Game. He later returned to Queensland, working in the hotel and restaurant industries and maintaining other business ventures.

In the late 1970s, Searle had returned to Brisbane to host the game show Pyramid Challenge for the 0-10 Network.

The funeral for Malcolm Searle was held today in Nambour, Queensland.

Source: Jocks’ Journal

Permanent link to this article: https://televisionau.com/2008/09/malcolm-searle.html

15 comments

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  1. Actually he was born in Tamworth, on the 7th of July 1931, which would have made him 77. I know this for a fact as I am his niece.

      • Nark Jones on 14 February 2023 at 12:22 PM
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      He did a humorous interview with J Lennon in June 1964.

      • Greg Grimes on 28 February 2023 at 2:18 PM
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      I live in Tamworth and I was originally from Toowoomba . My mother new Malcolm’s mother who worked/owned Mum’s cake shop in Toowoomba. I met Malcolm in Toowoomba in the early 1990′ via a mutual friend Peter Barr.

  2. Hello Sophie, thank you for your comments and I apologise for the errors in this entry. My information was based on articles from TV Times magazines which had him age 46 in August 1978. I have amended my article above accordingly, and of course, sincere condolences to your family at this time.

  3. I appeared on Ten's New Faces in 1969 and managed to get a job with Ten as a freelance booth announcer. They said I was too young for anything on camera. So my first job was with Malcolm on the Marriage Game and I was paid the handsome sum of $26.10. I also discovered that Noritake is pronounced Nora-taa-key. Hehe. How embarrassing.

  4. Also in later years, Malcolm used to own a fish shop in the Wilsonton Shopping Centre in Toowoomba QLD.

      • Kim Bownas on 3 April 2019 at 8:22 PM
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      I remember our times with Judy, Malcolm, the boys washing dishes. Mal would put a bet on and if he won, he’d come back and say,’Get yourself a can of softdrink.’ He’d always tell me to sit down, that I was a ‘bomb’. The many laughs I’ve shared with the crew at ‘Malcolm Searles.’. My first real job. Never learned to cook, do anything until Judy taught me. So much love for this family, they truly taught me so much, forever grateful for their love 😘

    • Tim Predovan on 10 April 2014 at 12:03 AM
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    God Bless your Soul Malcolm Searle

    • Edward Thirkill on 2 March 2016 at 4:03 PM
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    And before all that he was an announcer on 4BK/AK in the late 50s&early 60s

    • Geoff Carruth on 27 February 2019 at 10:19 AM
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    I met him in Brunswick Heads NSW.
    He relayed his life to me over the course of 3 weekly meetings . Led a full life
    Nice guy.

    • Trevor Rogers on 16 April 2021 at 8:42 AM
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    Many years ago, I recall Malcolm Searle on many TV game and Quiz shows. He was terrific and I formed an opinion that he would have been a really nice person off air.
    He always displayed manners, courtesy and a very caring attitude to those who were nervous as contestants on his TV shows.
    He was fabulous and it would do good to have people like him back on television. Trevor

      • Michael von Zink on 5 August 2021 at 10:33 AM
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      Hi Trevor, he was a beautiful person off-air, he was my friend and mentor for over 20 years here in Toowoomba, and later at Mt Coolum where he lived with his son’s family. We shared many a late night with conversions about the many ventures he pursued as both a media personality and as hotelier/restauranter in Sydney and here in Toowoomba. He gave me some original photos where he was seen with some of the greats of both TV and Radio/Music including the Beatles, Lorraine Bailey, Chips Rafferty, Don Lane, Ernie Sigley, etc etc. He was a caring man but as with many in the entertainment industry fell into the traps of it. He showed me many ways of avoiding the hazards of life and was always there to guide me in my informative years, he was, in many ways, the father I never had. He lives on in my heart today through the words and inspirations of all those years ago.

    • Mary Mc Kenzie-McHarg on 5 February 2022 at 9:13 PM
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    When I was a child in the 60’s we holidayed every year at Chelsea. I met and developed a crush on Malcolm when 3AK came to broadcast on the beach. Years later arounf 1971 I was working for the ABC mail desk on William Street Sydney. There was a kind of pub/bar just up the street designed as a kind of faux castle where I went for my favourite lunch of a prawn roll. I was delighted to discover that Malcolm was the owner or manager of the bar and amused him no end when I recounted to him the story of my childhood crush. We had a good laugh about it and I really enjoyed my daily lunches at that place. Malcolm was a lovely, funny, and pleasant person. I’ve only just googled him when something on tv made me remember that time. As I am now 71 I didn’t expect him to still be around but it has made me happy to read all the nice things written here and to remember those happier carefree days. Vale Malcolm. Mary

    • Nicqui Yazdi on 17 January 2024 at 8:11 AM
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    Malcom was a very dear friend of our family, over many decades, throughout his many years in Toowoomba and beyond. Throughout my childhood, I spent countless hours with Malcom, especially at his various eateries, and in particular Mumma Mia’s at the Range shopping centre, where my Mum, younger siblings and I, were often to be found out the back, making pizzas, all night long, just for fun. I always loved the smell of his pizza shop, and only just last week thought of him, as I walked past a little pizza joint in Brunswick Heads, where the scent of the raw pizza dough wafting out of the place, took me straight back to the 70’s and our special late night Friday nights at Mumma Mia’s with Malcom!

    He also had the Spaghetti Factory restaurant at Toshack’s Great Western Hotel and Malcolm Searle’s Food Factory at the Wilsonton Shopping Centre.

    But it was his radio shows that were really his claim to fame, even more than the tv games shows and his famous interview with the Beatles. Malcom had THE best voice for radio, and he was so engaging. His talk-back was just legendary, and the subjects he was game enough to talk about, at times were literally scandalous! He did a talk-back show with a co-host for a while, Margaret Foy, Margie as she was known as, and they were just the best duo! Her speciality, a bit like Malcom, was that she was a foodie, so had done cooking shows, but on radio together, they were a riot, both so funny, and both so quick, that some of their conversations were just hilarious! I remember one such discussion, about masturbation, that created a huge number of phone calls to the station! Malcom had a habit of touching his face, he’d do it all the time, from a ‘thinker’s’ moment, to just brushing his cheek with his hand, he was always touching his face. So Margie tells him that she’d read that this kind of regular face-touching was a form of masturbation, well, you can imagine the discussion that ensued, as Malcom asked Margie for more information, and the whole discussion became about various forms of masturbation, the scandals on the tv show Number 96, and the whole topic of sex, which was still a bit taboo in the early to mid-70’s.

    Malcom was wonderful with kids, and he had a very special way with troubled kids, teens in particular, and he had friends who ran youth programs, so he was able to hook some up with help. Every week on his radio show, he’d play a song for my little sister, who was adopted, and who had some real challenges when she was little, twisted knees and eyes, and quite a few surgeries through her childhood. And often the song he’d play for her was Coat of Many Colours, and I have thought about that over the years, and believe that this song had meaning to Malcom, and it made him think of my little sister. He was a wonderful friend and mentor to all of us, and a great friend to my Mum, who he also shared many mutual friends with, they were literally in the same circle for many years. My Mum was a hairdresser, and Malcom came to our place for haircuts, every few weeks. He liked to think of himself as being a bit dapper, and always liked to be “presentable”.

    Malcom also sadly loved a drink and was always at parties at our place in the 70’s, but that drink was a big issue for him too, and he had diabetes, which got worse as he aged, also effecting his eyesight, literally nearly blinding him. He also spent a lot of time drying out as such, in the 70’s, often at Wacol, and we would go and visit him when he was there, Mum would pack us all into the car, and we’d drive to Brisbane with a picnic lunch, and we’s spend a whole day with him, making him laugh, and loving him up. He was a beautiful man, a really special friend to us and one of the most important early influences in my life. I often think of him, and always with a smile… and that is how I found this thread, so thought to add to it.

    1. That is a lovely story and tribute. Thank you for sharing it.

      He was lucky he wasn’t sacked for that very candid radio discussion. The broadcasting authority was a lot harsher on such topics in those days. Would have been a great listen, though!

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