{"id":76372,"date":"2025-08-18T02:10:08","date_gmt":"2025-08-18T02:10:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/76372\/"},"modified":"2025-08-18T02:10:08","modified_gmt":"2025-08-18T02:10:08","slug":"margaret-pomeranz-remembers-david-stratton-i-feel-as-though-one-half-of-me-has-gone-david-stratton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/76372\/","title":{"rendered":"Margaret Pomeranz remembers David Stratton: \u2018I feel as though one half of me has gone\u2019 | David Stratton"},"content":{"rendered":"

I know I have been reticent about commenting on David Stratton\u2019s death<\/a> (he didn\u2019t want to \u201cpass\u201d, he wanted to die \u2013 no euphemisms for him!). But apart from wanting to hug my grief to myself, I felt that it was his family who should be considered, not me. And if anyone should have a tribute it is Strats\u2019 wife, Susie, who was the most wonderful support to him over these difficult years. I told him he was lucky to have married a younger woman!<\/p>\n

David was a stoic, he never wallowed in his deteriorating health. He continued to watch a new movie every day and revisit old favourites. He would enthuse about a new Australian film<\/a> he\u2019d just seen \u2013 he never lost that absolute passion for cinema.<\/p>\n

So much has been written about David\u2019s and my partnership over the years that there\u2019s not much more to be said, but I have a few recollections that aren\u2019t so well known.<\/p>\n

When we met I was a cinema enthusiast, not a walking encyclopedia of film like David. When he first came into SBS and I tried to talk to him, he brushed me off unceremoniously. I imagine a few people have had that experience with him but over the years he became much more welcoming of people approaching him \u2013 especially young film enthusiasts, many of whom he mentored and promoted. He was unstintingly generous in that way.<\/p>\n

When Peter Barrett, the head of programming at SBS, told me I was to become David\u2019s producer, I said I didn\u2019t think it was a good idea; he didn\u2019t think that much of me. But David seemed to welcome someone, anyone, helping him.<\/p>\n

So I became the producer of his movie introductions, to Movie of the Week and his beloved Cinema Classics. I had to create new lead-ins to these, and David and I decided to use Nino Rota\u2019s music. I had such fun with the introduction to the Classics, with images of Polanski\u2019s Knife in the Water, Bergman\u2019s The Seventh Seal and from Eisenstein\u2019s Battleship Potemkin. Of course David had to approve everything, and we formed a good working relationship.<\/p>\n

\u2018It\u2019s extraordinary that, over all the time we worked together, we never had a falling out.\u2019 Photograph: SBS<\/p>\n

Our first film discussion, or vague disagreement, was about the Australian film The Empty Beach, directed by Chris Thomson, based on a novel by Peter Corris. I was dismissive but, as I listened to David\u2019s support for the film, I realised that my reaction had been too facile. It was the beginning of Strats\u2019 education of my film appreciation.<\/p>\n

David was renowned for giving people nicknames. He got the order of my maiden name, Jones-Owen, deliberately wrong and I became Moj to him and everyone who worked on the shows from then on. And I remained Moj to the end. I\u2019m glad I\u2019m still Moj to his family \u2013 and all our film show family.<\/p>\n

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I think it\u2019s extraordinary that, over all the time that David and I worked together, we never had a falling out. Minor disagreements maybe, and maybe more spirited ones on air, but it was a relationship of deep respect \u2013 certainly of me for him, maybe a little bit less of him for me \u2013 and of deep friendship.<\/p>\n

Once David took you into the fold you had someone whose loyalty was unquestioned. And it was reciprocal. During all those years we\u2019ve had family traumas and setbacks, and we always had each other\u2019s backs. I knew that if I was in trouble David would be one of the first people I\u2019d turn to.<\/p>\n

We went to the ABC because I had his back. And when my husband was in hospital with a life-threatening illness he had mine.<\/p>\n

So maybe you can understand the loss I feel, of this man with whom I had a conversation at least once every week, whom I loved, who was so fine, such a gentle man, who decided to give me credibility in insisting that I sit beside him in those chairs, week after week, discussing films.<\/p>\n

I woke up in the middle of the night in the immediate aftermath of his death and, in trying to work out how I felt, I decided that I felt amputated \u2013 as though one half of me has gone. There\u2019s no more Margaret and David. Just as there is no more David and Susie.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I know I have been reticent about commenting on David Stratton\u2019s death (he didn\u2019t want to \u201cpass\u201d, he…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":76373,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":["post-76372","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76372","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=76372"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/76372\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/76373"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=76372"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=76372"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=76372"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}