Julia Zemiro's Home Delivery

Hi, I'm Julia. I am your driver.

This is Home Delivery, where I use all my driving skills

to take some of my favourite funny people back to their childhoods.

Well, where are we going today?

We are driving along the Victorian Coast down to Warrnambool,

home to one of our biggest comedians.

Dry as a bone, laconic and self-deprecating,

he is the larrikin boy next door.

Let's meet Dave Hughes.

Hey, guys, look who is here.

How exciting! It's a little family! You must be Rafferty?

Hello. How are you?

This is Sadie. It is Sadie.

Hello, Sadie. How are you?

Say 'hello, Julia'. Hello, Julia.

She is incredible. And this is little Tess.

This is Tess. Hi, Tess.

Just very quiet, just for today.

Holly, how are you? Nice to meet you.

Nice to meet you. Hello, Dave. Hello.

How are you? I am very good.

Tickle, tickle. Ahh, tickle, tickle!

Why have you brought us to this bridge, Dave?

This is the bridge... I learnt to swim, in this water just down here.

Every summer was just spent around here, just snorkelling.

I wasn't cool enough to surf. I was a snorkeller, but yes.

I mean, who is cool enough to surf? Not many of us have that skill.

Do you mind if we take Daddy away?

What do you want to say to Julia? Um, see you later, alligator!

Don't forget about your pooey toilet paper.

See you later, alligator.

Don't forget about your pooey toilet paper.

I think there is something in that for everyone.

See you, gang. You guys going to go to Penguin Island?

And we'll be back. Run! Run to Penguin Island!

See you, guys. Thank you, Holly. Thank you so much.

See you, guys. Good on you, Tess.

It's good to have a break, to be honest. Let's go.

Um, so this is the car. Oh, here we go. Kingswood.

Takes me back to 1976. Does it?

Yeah, although we had a sedan.

We dreamed of having a station wagon.

Seriously. That is the ultimate, that thing.

Oh, listen to that. I know.

Oh, maybe if I put it in drive.

You were going backwards. I was going back... Oh.

You are going backwards. Oh, hang on. I was going backwards.

That is alright. Oh, you know what it is?

I have got the hand brake on.

Dave Hughes is a little bit Paul Hogan, a little bit Ginger Meggs.

I tell you what I am annoyed about.

I went through 12 years of schooling, I think.

It could have been longer. I can't remember.

Not one of my teachers said 'should be a comedian'.

After spending the last 15 years forging a career on screen and radio,

he's going back to his roots -

travelling around Australia with a microphone,

doing what he does best.

I love crab sticks. I do.

You get all the goodness of a crab with all the convenience of a stick.

Julia, this used to be...

that big building there used to be the Lady Bay Hotel.

That's where I used to drink, mainly,

and we used to get really, really drunk.

Never forget my mate,

we were watching Hunters & Collectors one night

and my mate grabbed the lead singer, Mark Seymour,

by the collar from the stage...

Go this way. No!

..from the stage and said, 'Play your old stuff.'

And Mark Seymour punched him in the face.

Whoa! We were very proud of that moment.

This is the dirty angel. You'll see it up here.

If you have a look at the... see, the dirty angel. Yeah.

You see what it looks like it's doing

with its left hand down at the groin area?

Can you see it now? Yeah? Yes.

You can see that? See what that looks like that's doing?

Wow! That is why it is called...

That's why it is called the dirty angel.

Here we are. This is the main area of town.

And may I say how beautiful Warrnambool is?

It is a lovely place. I say it a lot.

No-one really listens to me.

We're going to see my mum. We're a bit late.

A little bit late. But she'll be alright.

Pull up here. I reckon pull up on the nature strip, just here.

Are you sure that is alright? We always nature strip park.

Oh, like that.

Are you sure we can park on this thing?

Yeah, absolutely. As I said there's no permit parking

in this area of Warrnambool

and we have been parking on this nature strip for years.

Oh, this is lovely! Yeah.

Is it the same as it was 20 years ago?

Pretty much. It was my dad's pride and joy.

Dad, who is now passed away,

but these rose bushes were his pride and joy.

He would spend many, many hours out here.

So a lot of cricket here?

A lot of cricket down here. A lot of cricket in here.

Just sport the whole time. You were sport mad, weren't you?

Absolutely obsessed with sport.

Were you one of those kids who thought,

'Yeah, maybe one day I will represent my country?'

That was my dream. Here we go. Oh, fantastic.

This is the front door already open in preparation.

You go. You show me in.

My mother Carmel, this is Julia. How do you do?

Great to meet you. Thank you for letting us come into your home.

That's fine. That's fine.

Look, this is a great opportunity, just quickly, to find out...

The truth. The truth. That's all.

So, you know, he is obviously a very accomplished young man.

Yes, he is. Old man.

What was it about Dave that sort of stood out?

That seemed to make him, I don't know,

possibly have a little special thing to be on stage?

No, he was just very quiet. I never thought he would be on stage.

He was a quiet fellow. Didn't tell you anything. He'd go to school.

The only way you ever found out was look through the bag every day.

If he hadn't been a stand-up, if he hadn't gone in to comedy,

what would you have liked to see him go into?

I would have liked to see him in some sort of profession, perhaps.

It was going to be an accountant, but that didn't...

No. No.

There was long time where Mum wanted me... well, my parents wanted me

to finish my degree after I'd quit, so that went for a long time.

Which degree? Any degree?

I was halfway through an accounting degree.

I started a computing degree as well.

Yes, I had a scholarship to do information technology

at Swinburne Uni in Melbourne, yeah.

Then he turned around in six weeks,

he's back here looking at me and saying, 'I didn't like that.'

Get out your thinking, Dave. Come on.

What year did you move into this house?

Um, '69.

It was grand final weekend

and Richmond won the grand final, I think, in '69.

I love how you remember it by a football final.

That is amazing!

Can I start with this... above Mum there, this print.

'Empty your mind of all thoughts, let your heart be at peace.'

I gave that to my parents when I was on the dole.

They put it up there proudly, you know, even though they'd probably

soon find that I'd never do a days work in my life.

I just have an empty mind. Wow!

This is a house for four kids.

So Anne Marie, Fiona, Mick and you.

Now I look back and understand

why my parents might have been grumpy at certain times.

This is me and my brother's room.

Me and Mick used to live here for many years.

We didn't have bunk beds, we used to have side-by-side beds.

Look, that kid with the balloon has been there for at least 40 years.

Did you get on? Being in the same room?

We used to fight a lot. He used to be able to make me cry.

He was very good at making me cry.

But I still remember, when he moved out, I was lonely,

in here on my own, you know.

You missed him. Yeah, absolutely, I did. Aw.

He left to go in to the Navy when he was 15 and I was like 13.

I missed him. And he just disappeared.

What would have been on these walls when you were a kid? What posters?

Big M girls which was the local milk.

Well, I think it was Victorian milk but...

Big M girls. Yes.

There's the kitchen area. We used to have a different table.

A bigger table. The whole family sat around here?

Well, yes, this area. We had a bigger table.

Still. Yeah. There wasn't a lot of room.

Six of us around that table. We used to eat dinner together every night.

I have got to start that with my own family.

We have got to start eating dinner around the table.

Why are you not eating around the table now?

Because there's just TV and iPad... Yeah, no TV.

You can't do that. I know, I know.

We've got to get disciplined.

Out you go. So this is the porch. Oh, I love a porch.

My father spent about probably 35 years sitting out here, or standing.

He would stand out here with a glass of beer in hand

and just look over to the oval. Just stand?

Just stand there and say whenever I was around,

'Dave, this is the best place in the world.'

He would just say that on a daily basis.

A football field. Yes, that's an Aussie rules oval.

I played there, some of my finest moments happened on that field.

I kicked 15 goals there once in an under-18 game.

Till 9 o'clock you'd be out playing cricket over in the nets over there,

and my whole childhood was spent over that back fence running around.

So you are the youngest of four. Were you spoilt?

My sisters would definitely claim...

actually the other three would claim I was spoilt.

That they did the hard yards.

They fell on the barbed wire and I was able to jump over the top.

You know, there's some sort of war analogy.

So your mum, Carmel, grew up in and orphanage in Ballarat.

Your dad was in a place that,

you know, he didn't have much money either.