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Speaker 1: And Amanda jam Nation.

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Speaker 2: One of my favorite living room stories was when I

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Speaker 2: visited the Big Potato in Robertson. Our next guest's family

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Speaker 2: owned the Big Potato. What you may not know is

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Speaker 2: a huge controversy surrounding this potato and its relationship to

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Speaker 2: the town. Really is a story about a local potato race.

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Speaker 2: It was so juicy it's been turned into a film

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Speaker 2: called The Appleton Ladies Potato Race. It's been written by

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Speaker 2: the girl whose family, the woman whose family owned the potato.

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Speaker 2: It's been described as a heartwarming, funny and smart show.

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Speaker 2: Like the woman who wrote it, She's here to tell

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Speaker 2: us more. Melanie Tato, Hello, Hi.

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Speaker 1: Amanda, Hi Jonesy, what a lovely introduction.

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Speaker 3: Well, Melanie, this story is fascinating. So it all goes

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Speaker 3: down to the Potato Sack Race, the world famous potato

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Speaker 3: sack race. The main prize is two thousand dollars for

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Speaker 3: the men, but for the women it's only two hundred dollars.

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Speaker 2: So take us from there what happens.

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Speaker 1: So that's right of the movie, But in real life

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Speaker 1: it was a thousand dollars and two hundred dollars for

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Speaker 1: the potato race. So Potato Race is where you put

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Speaker 1: a sack of potatoes on your back and you run

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Speaker 1: around the oval in front of everybody in town on

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Speaker 1: show date. And in twenty eighteen, I didn't discover because

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Speaker 1: you know, that was the case. I discovered though, that

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Speaker 1: it was one thousand dollars prize money for the men's

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Speaker 1: race and two hundred dollars for the women's race. And

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Speaker 1: you know how when you stupidly mentioned finding something like that,

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Speaker 1: you've got to do something about it. So I did

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Speaker 1: a little fundraiser, thinking, you know, just my friends would

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Speaker 1: we'd raise the extra eight hundred dollars and that would

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Speaker 1: be the end of it. And of course it wasn't.

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Speaker 1: It was like the start of it. And it was

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Speaker 1: one of those things where I raised the money and

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Speaker 1: I think maybe half the half the town were really

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Speaker 1: into it and really into it being corrected, and the

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Speaker 1: other half were just kind of a bit up in

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Speaker 1: arms about it.

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Speaker 2: Why were they up in arms? What was it that

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Speaker 2: upset them?

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Speaker 1: You know, I don't know. I think that whenever, you know,

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Speaker 1: we can look all throughout history, whenever women try to

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Speaker 1: get the same thing as men in a situation like that,

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Speaker 1: there's always people that are upset about there's always people

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Speaker 1: that think women don't deserve it, or they don't carry

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Speaker 1: as much weight on their in the in the potato race,

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Speaker 1: literally they don't they don't carry as much weight. And

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Speaker 1: it was stuff like that. So, you know, change is

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Speaker 1: really really difficult, and it made a lot of people very,

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Speaker 1: very uncomfortable. It was actually pretty awful. And with that

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Speaker 1: all those feelings, you know, because I'm a writer, there's

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Speaker 1: there's nothing else to do with the feelings, and so

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Speaker 1: I wrote a play sort of inspired on that. So

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Speaker 1: what you see on the TV tonight, which has been

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Speaker 1: made into a movie, isn't exactly what happened, you know

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Speaker 1: what I mean. Like it's very much dramatization that is

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Speaker 1: inspired by this like little moment in Robertson and my

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Speaker 1: own personal history.

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Speaker 2: But how surprised you were in that small town on

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Speaker 2: how quickly people could turn against you when your family

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Speaker 2: lived there.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it was so upsetting because my mum and dad

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Speaker 1: at the time, they you know, they they since retired,

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Speaker 1: but they ran the local shop and they had for

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Speaker 1: I think something like thirty four years, and I'd worked

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Speaker 1: in that shop for years and years and years, So

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Speaker 1: it was really surprising to me the way that you know,

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Speaker 1: people I'd known my whole life didn't want to talk

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Speaker 1: to me anymore, you know, Like I remember on the

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Speaker 1: day of the actual show, the day of the actual race,

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Speaker 1: going up to the to where they people registered for

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Speaker 1: the race to find out how many people had registered,

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Speaker 1: and the woman that was taking you know, down the

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Speaker 1: registration so I've known my whole lot, didn't talk to me,

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Speaker 1: just didn't answer my question, kind of blanked me, like

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Speaker 1: I wasn't there. And I said to my friend who'd

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Speaker 1: come up with me, you know, I had a bunch

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Speaker 1: of friends there for moral support, which was really nice.

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Speaker 1: I said to her as we walked away, Did that

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Speaker 1: just happened or did I imagine that? No, No, that

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Speaker 1: that really happened, you know, So it was it was

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Speaker 1: It was really really a very very upsetting time. You know.

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Speaker 1: It was really I was quite disconcerting, you know, and

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Speaker 1: people that you've known for a long time are upset

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Speaker 1: by something that you've done or don't want to talk

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Speaker 1: to you.

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Speaker 3: This begs the question, So with this movie coming out tonight,

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Speaker 3: how are you going to go walking around Robinson?

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Speaker 2: Now?

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Speaker 1: You know, I don't I don't know I'll be really

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Speaker 1: honest with you, Jonesy. I still feel a little bit

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Speaker 1: embarrassed about it. So when I am at home in town,

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Speaker 1: like I don't live there anymore. I live in Sydney now,

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Speaker 1: and I only live in Sydney because I can't afford

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Speaker 1: to live back there now all.

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Speaker 3: The hipsters have taken over.

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Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, I would love, like I would love more

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Speaker 1: than anything to live there now on it just ten acres,

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Speaker 1: you know what I mean. Yeah, I'm not I don't

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Speaker 1: think that I'm greedy, just ten acres. But still when

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Speaker 1: I you know, Mum and Dad left the shop in February,

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Speaker 1: and of course I went down and I always used

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Speaker 1: to working on holidays, you know, like Christmas and Eastern

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Speaker 1: and stuff like that when they needed a help. And

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Speaker 1: I would still feel really embarrassed about it. And I

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Speaker 1: kind of, you know, if somebody would come in and

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Speaker 1: not be all that polite to me, I would, you know,

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Speaker 1: I would have this and this is crazy. I mean

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Speaker 1: it was five years ago. I'm sure it's the last

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Speaker 1: thing on people's mine, but I would think, oh my gosh,

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Speaker 1: did they you know, are they are they being rude

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Speaker 1: to me because of the potato Race, you know, I know, yeah,

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Speaker 1: it's still there. I still feel a bit embarrassed about it,

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Speaker 1: which is so strange because we had a great outcome.

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Speaker 1: You know, we what the money sequel, you know, it's great.

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Speaker 3: Hopefully this movie makes you lots and lots of money

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Speaker 3: and then you can buy Robinson, you can buy the

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Speaker 3: whole town.

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Speaker 1: That would be wonderful and only allow people that support

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Speaker 1: your supporters.

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Speaker 3: That's your follow up movie, and that's when your dictatorship starts.

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Speaker 1: Exactly are those people are allowed to live there?

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Speaker 3: Well, this is a great movie, The Appleton Ladies Potato Race.

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Speaker 3: It's tonight seven thirty on Channel ten and ten play

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Speaker 3: melody tape.

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Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you so much, Jonesy, Thanks Amanda to

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Speaker 3: Love Okay forgot yourself