Jamie Dunn has died at his home in Imbil, on the Sunshine Coast Hinterland.*
Dunn was a giant of Brisbane radio — the comedic backbone of the B105 Morning Crew, which dominated the breakfast airwaves for more than a decade — and the mastermind behind Agro, the puppet whose cartoon show became a national hit.
I first encountered him in 1980 when he performed with his band at the University of Queensland Student Refectory, throwing a lot of energy into the Beach Boys hit Fun, Fun, Fun.
Dunn, who was born in England but came to Australia as a child, briefly worked as a record company rep, and had a deal of his own, before finding his true calling on radio and television. But “fun” remained a key word throughout his career.
He wasn’t Agro’s first handler, but after he injected his voice and personality into the puppet, the “talking bathmat” became an institution — on radio, television (through Agro’s Cartoon Connection and even as a guest host on Tonight Live with Steve Vizard) and in advertisements, most notably for Samboy chips.
But it didn’t start well. He happily shared the story of how a stage manager crawled on to the set during a live broadcast with a note saying: “Please make the puppet’s mouth move when you talk.”
Dunn was Brisbane radio’s first million-dollar man — thanks to an offer made just as he was about to jump ship from B105 to its then competitor, Triple M.
The trio of Dunn, Ian Skippen and Donna Lynch (who was later replaced by Robin Bailey) was unassailable in the ratings — reaching around a third of the total audience at one stage. That level of success would be unthinkable now.
Dunn also had a successful longtime collaboration with Mike and Carol Gibson and Ian Calder, who were writers on the radio show and appeared on some of his television projects.
His final show for B105, in late 2005, was a live broadcast from outside the Royal Children’s Hospital, for which he and his cohosts had raised huge sums of money over many years.
After that, Dunn and Calder worked together at Zinc 96 on the Sunshine Coast and, later, on 4BC.
In recent years, he has toured an R-rated late-night Agro show with various co-hosts, including former TV colleagues Jill Ray and Ranger Stacey Thomson.
Late last year, he teased the return of Agro, saying he had been in talks with Channel Seven for a television special. The news was met with enthusiasm from fans but no official station from the network.
Dunn had a tumultuous personal life, including a couple of failed marriages, but, in the past few years, he often took to social media to express his happiness, share family news and declare his love for his partner Maree.
*Dunn recently posted on social media that he was 76, but other sources put his age at 75.
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Disclosure: Brett Debritz once collaborated with Jamie Dunn on a biography, which didn’t see the light of day.
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