ABC2's blog

8:30pm – Sunday, October 14 on ABC2

After four decades, America’s most notorious conman has been caught.

His arrest unravelled a shocking and extraordinary story of multiple identities and deception that stretches from a Bavarian village to California, where, in January 2012, he was charged with murder.

With exclusive access to many people who knew him at each step of his journey, this Sunday Best documentary paints a portrait of the man who started life as Christian Gerhartsreiter, a poor country boy from a tiny mountain village in Upper Bavaria who pursued the American dream for years in order to reach the upper echelons of society, ending up as Clark Rockefeller.

He became a banker, a socialite and a member of one of America’s richest families, married to a successful businesswoman and living in a $2 million townhouse, with a country estate in the grandest part of New Hampshire.

Documenting the many lives of one man capable of astonishing deceit and manipulation, the film has access to the FBI, police detectives, former friends and key players close to the case.

Six Million Dollar Conman unravels Clark Rockefeller’s story, bringing to life his motivations and interior world, and his elaborate and fantastical confection of lies and fake identities.

This is a gripping and revelatory account of the most complex con America has ever known.

9:00pm – Tuesday, October 9 on ABC2

After Malory’s brief scare with breast cancer, another ISIS agent decides to be tested for the disease, with a tragic result. The other agent is Archer, and the tragic result is that yes, he has breast cancer. Because a career spent disarming nuclear warheads and having sex in x-ray machines will tend to do that.

Archer is an animated half-hour comedy set at ISIS, an international spy agency, where global crises are merely opportunities for its highly trained employees to confuse, undermine, betray and royally screw each other.

8:30pm – Saturday, October 13 on ABC2

Henry (Rip Torn) is an ex-pat in Paris who is always broke and looking for someone to lend him money. His wife, Mona (Ellen Burstyn) comes to Paris from America but leaves immediately when she finds out the poverty he is in.

Henry’s friends give him one meal a week for him to survive but he burns bridges by flirting with their wives.

Destitute again, Henry tries teaching English at a school in Dijon, becomes a low-life guide to a wealthy Indian man, then gets a job as a proof reader for the Herald Tribune.

Will Henry ever discover his own happiness.

Directed by Joseph Strick, Tropic Of Cancer stars Rip Torn.

10:15am – Monday, October 8 on ABC2

Play School fans will love Little Ted’s Big Adventure, a new interstitial series (20 x 2minutes) following the adventures of Little Ted as he sets out to explore Australia using things that move.

During each episode, one of the Play School presenters helps Little Ted explore as well as providing preschoolers with fun facts about what they are doing.

Little Ted’s Big Adventure was filmed across Australia – from trams in Melbourne to sailing boats on the Great Barrier Reef – exploring all the diverse and exciting ways Little Ted can find to ‘move’ on his big adventure.

Episode 6: Fire Engine – Monday, October 8 at 10.15am Little Ted and his friend Teo go on another big adventure. This time Marian the fire fighter is taking them for a ride in the fire truck. Look out everyone, here comes fire fighter Little Ted.

Episode 16: Helicopter – Monday, October 16 at 2.05pm Little Ted and his friend Rachael go on another big adventure. This time they are riding in a helicopter! The helicopter propeller spins around and around, faster and faster, until the helicopter lifts up off the ground and into the air.

9:30pm – Friday, October 12 on ABC2

Seven people live under one roof to share the experience of changing their gender identities to become the men and women they have always wanted to be.

Max, 25, hopes to become Britain’s first transgender rabbi.

Former policeman Karen, 52, is preparing for full gender-affirmation surgery.

Drew, 22, is stuck living at home, desperate to escape the world where people constantly ask, ‘Is that a boy or a girl?’ Lewis, 22, is raising money for a double mastectomy and is investigating a phalloplasty (penis construction) – surgeries that he feels will make him fully male.

Fox, 30, has been transitioning for six months and he struggles to overcome his feminine looks.

Donna, 25, is content living between genders but finds it difficult to navigate relationships.

And Sarah, 28, has recently begun to live full-time as a woman and is building up the courage to tell her parents.

Although some housemates derive enormous strength from family and friends, others are cut off and many struggle to find work. The members of this group develop friendships and support each other to overcome some of the challenges of being transgender.

7:30pm – Friday, October 12 on ABC2

The four remaining food trucks arrive in Memphis, Tennessee, the barbeque capital of the world.

For the most gruelling Truck Stop challenge yet, the teams have four hours to retrieve a 100 pound hog from legendary BBQ joint The Rendezvous, carry it back to their truck, butcher it, and use the meat to create a dish accompanied by home-made BBQ sauce. The dishes are judged by Jim Neely, the godfather of Memphis barbeque, and the winning team receives a head start on opening for business in Tennessee.

Later, when host Tyler Florence calls with the Speed Bump challenge, the teams need to come up with creative ways to impress the meat-loving locals. The visit of a local food blogger also gives the food trucks their best chance to stay in the competition, while elimination day delivers a huge shock.

8:30pm – Friday, October 12 on ABC2

The biggest West End shows, the most famous pop acts, the world’s most successful dance teachers and the most incredible cast of characters TV will ever see all pass through London’s Pineapple Dance Studios.

Blurring the lines between reality, comedy and drama to create a new genre of ‘performance documentary’, this series gives exclusive access to the world-famous dance space, capturing every bit of drama – from auditions to dance-offs, spray-tans to pop meltdowns.

It features a host of unique and outrageous characters; from millionaire founder Debbie Moore to the hilarious artistic director Louie Spence, a truly groundbreaking, must-see television phenomenon that has taken the UK by storm.

This week Pineapple Dance Studios’ newly formed dance troupe prepare for a promotional shoot by slapping on the baby oil. Meanwhile, Louie holds a class at his old dance college and Andrew is reunited with his mum ahead of a big gig.

7:30pm – Thursday, October 11 on ABC2

A series featuring some of Britain’s worst fully licensed drivers as they spend time with a professional driving instructor in an effort to eliminate their dangerous driving.

In this episode, we follow 25-year-old Harry Middleton, an architectural technician from Essex. He’s addicted to speed, but his girlfriend worries he’s an accident waiting to happen.

We meet 23-year-old legal student and single mum, Stephanie O’Hara, who also gets a kick out of driving too fast. Steph’s loved ones think she really should know better and set a good example to her son.

Finally, there’s Pat Howard, a grandmother from Warrington whose only problem with speed is a lack of it. Pat’s been off the road for a decade and has forgotten almost everything about driving. Now she’s desperate to win back her independence.

9:30pm – Wednesday, October 10 on ABC2

After cooking up a storm with some of Australia’s most surprising politicians in the first series of Kitchen Cabinet, Annabel Crabb is coming back to ABC2 with a second helping.

Food and politics are never separated for long. The best plots are hatched over lunch, the best stories told over dinner. In Canberra, dinner bookings are an anthropological study in themselves. If you go for a walk around Manuka or Kingston during a sitting week, you see a graphic illustration of the capital’s power shifts. Why is that minister sharing noodles with that factional opponent? What is that disenfranchised bunch of back benchers plotting? The best way to get to know a politician is to break bread with one.

Each week our veteran political journalist invites herself over to the home of a sitting member, offering dessert in exchange for dinner.

“When you ask someone how they learnt to cook, it’s like asking them their life story,” Annabel says.

Watch our most influential yet inscrutable politicians tell you theirs.

Joe Hockey is the landlord of a notorious Canberra-based share house that has provided accommodation to many senior Liberal figures including Ross Cameron, Bob Baldwin and most famously, Brendan Nelson who whilst Liberal leader, lived out in the back shed. Barely any real food is ever consumed there, but Annabel is so keen to get the gossip on Hockey’s share house shenanigans she accepts his offer to come over for a BBQ.

8:30pm – Wednesday, October 10 on ABC2

Experts agree that bad dog behaviour is mainly down to bad owners and that the owners need to be fixed first. Don’t Blame the Dog, is a unique series that challenges young dog owners with bad attitudes to spend a week living with people who depend on dogs – some for their survival in extreme environments around the world, and others who depend on them for their jobs. In an effort to try and better handle their own dogs, these dog owners must first try to master the working dogs.

On tonight’s episode we meet 22-year-old Kim who has no control over her two dogs, including one left to her when her dad died, and 24-year-old Mark who has a husky that loves to chew everything, which is causing problems on the home front with his girlfriend.

They leave their dogs behind and travel to the Australian countryside to spend a week working with sheep dogs and expert dog trainer Matt Webb. Matt doesn’t believe that there is such a thing as bad dogs only bad owners.

They’ll learn to muster sheep and cattle across the vast landscape and take on a real, paid job that will push them to the limit. Will the experience with the sheep dogs help them re-evaluate their own lives and become better pet owners?