Looking for a delightful new documentary series to watch?
Allow us to put The Assembly on your radar.
What is The Assembly about?
The Assembly follows a team of autistic journalism students, mentored by Leigh Sales, as they interview prominent Australians.
Guests include Sam Neill, Hamish Blake, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, Delta Goodrem, Adam Goodes, and Amanda Keller.
The Australian series was inspired by the BBC’s The Assembly; a 30 minute special in which autistic journalism students interviewed Michael Sheen.
Where can I watch BBC’s The Assembly?
Sadly, BBC version is currently unavailable to stream anywhere in Australia.
However, the Australian The Assembly released all six of its episodes on August 20 on ABC iView.
You can also tune into ABC TV on Tuesdays at 8.30pm to catch an episode.
Why should I watch The Assembly?
Each 45-minute episode of The Assembly features Leigh Sales guiding 15 autistic journalism students as they prepare, research and write questions for an interview.
The interviewee then enters; the first episode features Sam Neill in the hot seat.
It’s clear that the students are enthusiastic and passionate about journalism, infectiously so. And this leads to some really authentic answers from their guests.
At times though, some of the journalism students’ questions are bluntly personal – but this ultimately leads to some seriously entertaining television…
For instance, one journalism student asks Sam, who reportedly dated Australian journalist Laura Tingle in 2018:
“I understand currently that you are single and you have a liking for Australian journalists. We happen to have a single Australian journalist with us; would you consider [dating] Leigh Sales]?”
This is met with laughs from Sam, Leigh and other students.
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