TV Week has announced Bill Collins as the 26th inductee into the TV Week Logies Awards’ Hall of Fame.

For over forty years, Collins has shared his passion for movies with many thousands of magazine readers and TV viewers.  Formerly a lecturer at the Sydney Teachers’ College, Collins began presenting movie reviews on ABC’s afternoon program, Roundabout, in the early ‘60s. 

From 1963, Collins started writing movie reviews for TV Times magazine and later moved to commercial television to review and introduce movies – first at TCN9 and then at ATN7 Sydney, where he also presented movie reviews on the Sunday night news!

By the early ‘80s, Collins had moved across to Network Ten where his movie presentations, with passionate and often unscripted reviews that were almost as epic as the movie titles he was presenting, became a long-running staple of Saturday night television across the country.   As well as The Golden Years Of Hollywood, there was The Bill Collins’ Picture Show, and many midday and weekend movie matinee presentations for Network Ten.  Also during the ‘80s, Collins reviewed movies for TV Week and his weekly column, You Asked For It, ran for several years.

In the mid-‘90s, the advent of pay-TV saw classic movies appearing less and less on free-to-air TV – so it was inevitable that Collins would move The Golden Years Of Hollywood to Foxtel where it currently appears on the Fox Classics channel.

The TV Week Logies’ Hall of Fame was introduced in 1984 to recognise the achievements of those who have made significant contribution to the Australian television industry.  The first recipient was legendary TV producer Hector Crawford.  Over the years, the Hall of Fame has welcomed actors and actresses, producers, executives, presenters and even programs that have made extended contributions to television.

Bill Collins will be inducted into the TV Week Logie Awards’ Hall of Fame at this year’s awards presentation on Sunday 3 May.

Source: ABC, TV Week