Lurid, steamy and revolutionary, Number 96 gave middle Australia a peek into the Seventies’ sexual revolution, writes Alistair Sutton.

Number 96 is back. The steamy 70s soap has been released on DVD with more plot twists, lurid murders, flared trousers and bouffant hairstyles than ever seen on television these days.

The show also featured the first sympathetic gay male character in a TV soap, the debonair Don Finlayson played by Joe Hasham.

Andrew Mercado, the driving force behind this new box set release of The Panty Hose Strangler episodes says, “One of the great strengths of the show was it was made before the era of political correctness. 96 stands up as a more accurate record of Australian society in that period than anything Neighbours does today.”

The sequence plays out as a whodunit worthy of any Agatha Christie story. Everyone speculates on the identity of the strangler and who might be the next victim, not helped by the inept attempts of Les Whittaker to ascertain the culprit.

There’s an art heist, numerous relationship problems and an S&M sequence to keep the multiple plots bubbling along.

Charismatic Elaine Lee, who played psychic fashion designer Vera Collins, says the producers of the show were terrified any clues would be leaked.

“We were all sworn to secrecy. Mind you, we were kept in the dark as much as the audiences and the final sequences were shot on closed sets,” Lee tells Queensland Pride.

The strangler storyline is interplayed with numerous subplots in true soap style.

“No other show mixed comedy and drama so effectively and it was the comedy, not the sex, which drove the storylines.”

Lee’s character, Vera, starts speaking in tongues and experiences premonitions that seem to foretell the next victim. But is she right?

Lee laughs when she remembers the speaking in tongues sequences.

“The script had this gobblygook which I knew would sound ridiculous. Fortunately I was South African and had some familiarity with local dialects, so after a lot of practice, I was able to make it sound believable.”

Says Mercado: “In this sequence of episodes the viewer is treated to hours of television footage, which hasn’t been seen for decades. This was one of the most popular storylines of the entire series. It kept viewers and cast alike guessing for weeks the identity of the strangler.”

The biggest surprise is Chantal Contouri’s recent revelation that she used to babysit John Howard’s children, which is ironic given she turned out to be the dreaded strangler.

Contouri, who does the commentary with Mercado in this new release, confesses to being shocked at hearing her English accent in the show, having never seen the episodes originally.

Lee comments how the actresses always wake up with false eyelashes: “Nowadays I would refuse to wear makeup for those scenes, but you have to remember it was 38 years ago, so it’s best to watch the episodes with your tongue firmly in cheek and enjoy. I think it’s wonderful that Andrew is giving people an opportunity to rediscover this classic Australian television show.”

So why not be transported back to a time when you could chain smoke in restaurants, and when geometric curtains and helmet-style hairdos (as Elaine describes them) were de rigueur.

It’s life, but not as we know it.

Queensland Pride has five copies of Number 96: The Pantyhose Strangler to give away courtesy of Umbrella Entertainment. For details, visit the competition section at www.queenslandpride.com.au.

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