The Struggle

By Alicia McMilan

MFJ students have begun production of Season 10 of satirical news show The Struggle, which began airing on Channel 31 on Monday, August 15.  The eight-episode season will focus on local and international news and politics as it impacts (and amuses) Gen Z, creating a departure from other Australian-produced satirical news shows.

To produce each episode of The Struggle, students hold a pre-production meeting on a Tuesday morning and a writers' meeting on Wednesday night, where the 30-minute show is scripted.

The majority of the show is filmed in-studio at the Monash Media Lab (MML) on Thursday afternoons, with additional correspondent pieces filmed on-location across Melbourne and, at times, interstate and overseas.

Editing and post-production continues until Monday morning, when the show is sent to Channel 31 for broadcast.

During its five-year run, participating in The Struggle has seen two students - Amber Schultz and Caroline Tung - awarded a Jacoby-Walkley Scholarship.

In 2021 it received two Antenna Awards, including 'Best Journalism in a Program' and 'Personality of the Year', for graduate and Monash Teaching Associate Tavleen Singh.

Participating in the show, either on-screen or behind the scenes, has seen students seamlessly move into the television industry on graduation.

Those graduates include:

  • Matilda Bosely - Channel 7 reporter (now creating Tik Tok content for Guardian Australia)
  • Amber Schultz - Channel 9 producer (now reporting for Crikey)
  • Chester Ngan - Channel 7 chief of staff
  • Selby Stewart -  ABC  reporter
  • Natasha Schapova - ABC reporter
  • Katerina Kostakos - Channel 9 social media manager
  • Tavleen Singh - ABC producer

Current host, second-year Undergraduate student Wren Gillett, recently gained industry employment at Network Ten where she works as an autocue operator for newsreaders Jennifer Keyte and Stephen Quartermaine.

Students produce The Struggle with the assistance of Senior Lecturer (Journalism) Alicia McMillan in an executive producer role and Australian television personality Libbi Gorr (aka Elle McFeast) as a creative consultant. Technical support is provided by the MML team Bryan Schroeder, Gareth Popplestone and Doug Donaldson.

The Struggle can be seen on Channel 31, Mondays at 8.30pm, or streamed on Facebook at 7pm.