Seven Studios (the content division of Seven West Media) today announced Fam Time, a new narrative comedy wrapped in fibre optic cables starring Michala Banas (Winners & Losers, Always Greener, Upper Middle Bogan), Benson Jack Anthony (800 Words, Emo the Musical, High Life) and Duncan Fellows (The Letdown, Laid, Life Support).
Swiping for love, streaming for acceptance, posting for purpose. Meet Australia’s most postmodern modern family.
The queen of content is Belinda Box played by Banas, mum to a highly dysfunctional blended family that, like most families today, is struggling to combine their online and everyday lives in the suburbs. She’s the mumpreneur striving to have it all for her family – if having it all involves blogs, selfies and a good dose of Beyonce.
Belinda loves her family, but also craves the love of the growing fan base (97 subscribers!) who follow her blog adventures as a modern mum to a busy blended family in the digital age.
Fellows plays Belinda’s husband John, a.k.a. ‘Handy Andy’, an ordinary dad who prefers tinkering to Tweeting, while Anthony is her bedroom-bound son Rylan, who is so busy looking for love online that he’s oblivious when it walks through the door in real life.
Seven’s Director of Network Programming, Angus Ross, said:
“Fam Time is a fresh comedy format celebrating and skewering the family idiosyncrasies we all love to hate. Its contemporary delivery, pace and irreverent humour will be a hit with our audience.”
Completing the Box family are: Belinda’s stepdaughter Tahnee (Karina Banno: Circle of Lies, Friday on My Mind, Home and Away), who freaks out when she unwittingly discovers internet fame; adopted daughter Cherry (Chloe De Los Santos: Tidelands, Jade of Death), a sassy online gaming whiz; and Grandma Viv (Rhonda Burchmore: Kath & Kim, Love Child), a cougar and ravenous online dater better known as ‘Foxy Box’.
To add to the cast of misfits, Bill Whata (pronounced Fa-ta) – (Tainui Tukiwaho: Step Dave, Tatau, The Almighty Johnsons) stumbles into the Boxes’ lives as Australia’s friendliest and third most affordable handyman.
As this family next door post, swipe and hashtag their way through relatable dilemmas, Belinda tries to curate the best stuff for her blog. But amongst all the spin and filters, the family occasionally catch a glimmer of the truth. The best type of love is the offline type they share with each other…until the next notification pops up, that is.
Fam Time is directed by Hayden Guppy. Executive producer and series creator is Michael Horrocks. Supervising producer is Linda Ujuk, series producer is Muffy Potter and line producer is Tiare Tomaszewski. Writers are Erica Harrison and Jack Yabsley. The comedy is a Seven Studios production for the Seven Network.
