Up The Workers!

Bob Hawke & John Singleton

To harbour side Balmain and the launch of The Workers Bar in Darling Street. The Workers is part owned by media mogul John Singleton who also hosted the launch party and it's part of Unity Hall, the pub Singleton owns and the location for a legendary meeting of unionists in 1891 that coincided with the famous Shearer's Strike in Queensland.

Out of that strike and the Balmain meeting came the formation of the Australian Labor Party, the first 'worker's party' in the world and now the longest surviving political party that is still in government under the  leadership of PM Julia Gillard.

Ned Kelly (?), Benny Elias & Sally Singleto

So who better to invite to launch the Worker's Bar than the great legend himself, former trade union boss and the 23rd prime Minister Bob Hawke.
 Bob is 83 and as sprightly as a 40 year old. He's also a great pal of Singleton's and told a fairly racy joke about his friend which we won't relate here. Suffice to say it's not hard to see that Hawkie is still one of Australia's most beloved political figures who during his tenure at the top received approval ratings of around 80%.

As for Balmain it's hardly a worker's paradise anymore and the fine convict built sandstone houses and terraces are more likely to be inhabited by bankers, stockbrokers and celebrity figures like playwright David Williamson and actors Judy Davis and Colin Freils who have a large waterside mansion. Still there are plenty of young professionals living locally and The Worker's bar is bound to become a favoured watering hole.

exclusive : Great Gatsby Gaff #1

Above is a screen capture from the trailer (below) that has just been released for Baz Luhrmann's $130M
Great Gasby 3D epic that is having the finishing touches put on it at Fox Studios. It's a scene from New York's Time Square set in the 1920s.

Luhrmann imported half a dozen fabulous automobiles from the USA and rounded up dozens of similar era cars from around Australia. With the magic of cinema the right-hand drive vehicles magically become left-hand drives. Sydney's Centennial Park doubled up as The Hamptons and Long Island and several mansions including Strickland House in Vaucluse capably passed for grand US estates. The old Balmain power station looks perfect as industrial New York and only the trained eye-judging from the great clip below-could spot the parts of Sydney that stand in for 1920's Manahttan. While the film's stars Leo Di Caprio, Carey Mulligan and Tobey McGuire have long departed Sydney, around 200 technicians are beavering away at Fox on the production.

The Shuttle's sub-editor, a dyslexic moggie named Mildred Pierce with a fierce catnip addiction prone to making more mistakes than she corrects, however draws our attention to a major boo-boo that will hopefully disappear from the final production due to be released in early 2013.

The Ziegfeld Follies ran on Broadway from around 1907 to 1931 as well as making it to the big screen in several lavish productions. Yes, that's the Ziegfeld -not Zeigfeld!