Head Start is an Australian television teen drama series broadcast on ABC. It ran for 40 episode from 4 March 2001 until 2 December 2001.
Contents
Premise
A large banking corporation runs an ongoing competition to foster innovation, creativity and achievement for young Australians. Applicants aged 18 to 21 submit arts, sports, science, business and community projects. Each winner receives a $20,000 grant to make the dream project a reality.
They also get full board in a freshly renovated inner city warehouse with six other high achievers to keep them company. Living together in this hothouse environment opens the doors to hysteria, tears, innovative brainstorms and the odd flirtation with success. The successful seven are advised and directed by Garrett Quinn (Blair Venn), a 40-year-old former corporate high flyer who lost everything in the crash of '87. He now sees this job as a way of redeeming himself.
Among this year's successful applicants are Loc Minh Vu (Gareth Yuen), a Vietnamese internet programmer determined to set up a website to help refugees, and Clare (Nadia Townsend) and Patrick Gormley (David Hoflin ), a brother and sister combination from the country who are attempting to establish and market their line of yabbies for the fresh food market. Basia Lem (Freya Stafford) is a documentary maker striving to complete a film on the life of one of the country's pioneer female aviators. Seth Wallace (Garth Holcombe) and Kyle Richter (Ryan Johnson), designer and promoter of a new automatic gear change prototype for bicycles, and Katherine Ingram (Megan Dorman), a classical piano prodigy who is putting together a recording of her compositions.
Production
Filming for the series began in late 2000 in a warehouse studio in Sydney. It was broadcast on ABC on 4 March 2001, and repeated on pay-TV channel Fox8 a few weeks later.
Cast
Main
David Hoflin as Patrick Gormley
Nadia Townsend as Clare Gormley (episodes 1–18)
Megan Dorman as Katherine Ingram
Garth Holcombe as Seth Wallace
Gareth Yuen as Loc Minh Vu (episodes 1–22)
Freya Stafford as Basia Lem
Ryan Johnson as Kyle Richter
Blair Venn as Garrett Quinn
Mereoni Vuki as Jade Matu (episodes 23–40)
Charlie Clausen as Aaron Symonds (episodes 31–40)
Recurring
Melissa Jaffer as Amanda Villiers (9 episodes)
Lara Cox as Posy
Marshall Napier as John Allott (4 episodes)
Matthew Le Nevez as Terry Vaughan (3 episodes)
Rel Hunt as Jordan Gray (6 episodes)
Guests
Ally Fowler as Felice (2 episodes)
Amy Mathews as Louise (1 episode)
Gerry Sont as Journalist (2 episodes)
Inge Hornstra as Rhonda (1 episode)
Jessica Napier as Amy (1 episode)
Jodie Dry as Carla Mann (2 episodes)
Michael Denkha as Tom (1 episode)
Peta Sergeant as Nicole (1 episode)