Variety with Heart

Appears in
Tried, Tested and True: Stories and Recipes Celebrating the Traditions of Australian Community Cookbooks
Tried, Tested and True

By Liz Harfull

Published 2018

  • About

Variety Club Entertainers’ Cookbook, 1983.

It is a bit hard to imagine two people less alike. One was a knockabout bloke who had worked as a rigger, most often seen in shorts, steel-capped boots and cut-off shirts. The other was closely related to British royalty; a man who had served as the last viceroy of India and held the highest rank in the British navy, usually resplendent in full regalia at formal occasions.

Australian comedian Paul Hogan and Lord Louis Mountbatten came together one memorable night in 1975 to help raise money for the newly established Australian chapter of the Variety Club. As inaugural chairman, Hogan was master of ceremonies for the evening, and the late Mountbatten was guest of honour. The two men traded repartee throughout the dinner at the Sebel Townhouse in Sydney, delighting a large gathering of the rich and famous, who responded by donating more than $100,000 to the cause.