You’re probably wondering if I can get sued for this. Well, I’ve sent it to my lawyer (my best friend who also used to work for the puppeteer) and she said it was fine. Play on.
My time working for M****** media began the same way as Meghan Markle’s marriage with the Royal family: they asked me to delete my blog, writes Maddy Morwood.
I’m staring down the barrel of a zoom meeting in my mum’s office, and a panel of old men are asking me to name prominent political Queensland figures. They show me a picture of Annastacia Palaszczuk. This is pre-Covid, so I have no idea who she is. Instead, I tell them that what I lack in political knowledge I make up for in creative passion and that I run a dating and sex blog with my best friend. They love it! They say I have “the X-factor”. They offer me the job. They ask me to delete my blog.
Days later, my ex-best friend’s mother calls me to congratulate me and I break down in tears. “They want me to delete rood!” I exclaim. “We will not be silenced”, Tom tells me through gritted teeth. I take the job anyway because I can’t stop thinking about them telling me I have the X-factor.
I love a newsroom. I love the sound of televisions broadcasting news from all over the world, the bright, unflattering lights, and the fact that everyone is always in a bad mood. It’s a rush. I also immediately notice that everyone my age is hot. I can’t be too sure it’s not the reason we were all hired, but I push that to the back of my mind. Just like when you’re running alongside someone with a sculpted body, it will spur me on to work harder.
The newsroom is full of characters, and I’m taking a mental note for my eventual memoir (hey, you’re no one until you’re talked about). The leggy blonde who sleeps with people’s boyfriends is sucking up to a particularly successful department so they’ll give her three extra lines in their story. Flicky is manically typing out two-page spreads about the weather with titles like ‘DANGEROUS MONSOON DELUGE’. A fresh cadet is crying in the kitchen. The tall boy next door is charming the editor with an unseen sex tape of an NRL star that ‘just fell into his lap’. The beloved sports journalist is telling me that I could be the next Trent Dalton if I just write 800 words a day and love what I do.
Merely weeks in, I accidentally befriend the 17-year-old aspiring photographer who turns up to every crime scene to advance his career. While I’m walking around and hoping the ground swallows me whole, he’s furiously taking photos of banged up cars and burnt down homes in an insensitive manner only a future M****** photographer could. He will go far, I think, as I try to avoid his eyes in the hopes he won’t recognise me. He does, of course. I’m fresh-faced, gorgeous and I have a media pass that screams to nearby police ‘I DON’T CARE ABOUT ANYONE’S WELLBEING INVOLVED IN THIS INCIDENT AS LONG AS I GET A BRILLIANT QUOTE.’ He proceeds to text me every time he’s at a crime scene for the rest of the year.
Some time later, I get assigned to stake out the key witness in the extremely high-profile trial of **** ******-*****. They tell me not to worry, though, because the 48-year-old photographer that definitely hasn’t put his hand on my lower back for no reason is coming too. He can keep you company, they say! Brilliant. We’re sitting together in his car in the promised land of suburban Caboolture waiting for the witness to walk outside so I can ask him something groundbreaking and get punched in the face, like if he believes **** ******-***** is a war criminal.
Hours pass. The photographer slinks off to buy me a cappuccino. When he comes back he asks me if I’ve ever considered working for Women’s Weekly. Eleven hours have now passed and my editor won’t pick up his phone. The witness is bound to come out of his house eventually, and I’d rather lose my job than be here when it happens. I’m tearing down the highway with relief when my editor calls me to let me know the photographer had to interview the witness himself. I’ve let the newspaper down, he says. That photographer may or may not land himself into some legal trouble.
There’s 20 minutes left of my Saturday night shift and the police officer with the sexy accent from the media department calls to tell me there’s been a murder in Newmarket. While I like that he’s thinking of me (which may sound insensitive to anyone who hasn’t been desensitised by working for a media giant), I had been in the middle of doing a full glam and was planning to meet everyone at Susie Wong’s by 1am. That was the most happening bar of the time, btw. Flicky and her now fiance said ‘I love you’ AND had their first kiss there (on separate nights). I reluctantly drive to the scene and give an extremely half-assed effort of door knocking, knowing that the paper has already gone to print and that my friend with the 6am shift can pick up my slack. He yearns more to land a front-page story anyway.
Spoiler alert: They didn’t make me delete my blog. I honestly think they forgot all about it, just like they forgot to treat us fairly and let us take adequate breaks. But the juice was worth the squeeze, because I am trauma bonded to some wonderful people who are now my dear friends. Also, I have the resilience of Meghan Markle and stories to share on my blog.
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