Greig Pickhaver

Greig Pickhaver AM (born 1948) is an actor, comedian and writer, who forms one half of the Australian satirical sports comedy duo Roy and HG as the excitable sports announcer H.G Nelson. The award-winning duo teamed up in 1986 for the Triple J radio comedy program This Sporting Life, and were broadcast nationwide for 22 years, leading to several successful television spinoffs.[1]

Greig Pickhaver
Pickhaver in 2010
Born1948 (age 72–73)
Nuriootpa, South Australia, Australia
Other namesH.G Nelson
Occupation
  • Television host
  • writer
  • actor
  • radio host
  • theatre actor
  • author
Years active1986-present
Known forThis Sporting Life 1986–2008
Club Buggery 1996–1997
The Dream with Roy and HG 2000
Parent(s)Gordon Pickhaver, Beryl Skuce

Personal life

Pickhaver was born in Nuriootpa, South Australia to parents Gordon Pickhaver,[2] and Beryl Skuce. His father was a World War II veteran who saw action in the Middle East and on the Kokoda Trail and whose career was in the South Australian dairy industry. Pickhaver has three sisters Jane, Anne and Mary and a brother Mark. Pickhaver was raised in Brighton, South Australia up to the age of 15 then the family moved to the suburb of Prospect where he lived until the age of 22. He attended Oaklands Park Primary school, Brighton High School and for the last two years of high school Adelaide High. He graduated from Flinders University and describes himself as dyslexic and having always relied heavily on memory and recall to achieve any academic results.

Radio career

Pickhaver performed in plays at school and at university. After a stint as a roadie for Australian rocker Billy Thorpe in the early 1970s he became involved in the Melbourne theatre co-operative The Pram Factory. He moved into radio broadcasting on 3RRR in Melbourne and developed the HG Nelson character while performing in the Melbourne radio sports comedy show Punter To Punter in the early 1980s.

Pickhaver met John Doyle in 1985 while both were playing minor characters in an SBS TV show and they teamed up as Roy and HG in 1986. Their radio comedy program This Sporting Life was broadcast initially in Sydney and later nationally on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Triple J youth radio network. It was continuously on-air for a 22-year period till 2008. This Sporting Life was added to the National Film and Sound Archive's Sounds of Australia registry in 2013.[3]

Television and film career

With John Doyle as Rampaging Roy Slaven, has appeared on television shows such as The Dream with Roy and HG, This Sporting Life, Blah Blah Blah, Club Buggery, The Channel Nine Show, Planet Norwich, Win Roy and HG's Money, The Monday Dump, The Nation Dumps, The Ice Dream with Roy and HG, The Cream, The Dream in Athens, The Memphis Trousers Half Hour, and Roy and H.G’s Russian Revolution. Pickhaver hosted It's a Knockout from 2011 to 2012 alongside former Hi-5 star Charli Robinson and sports presenter Brad McEwan. Pickhaver joined Stephen Quartermain and Alisa Camplin for the Sochi Tonight show during the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics in February 2014, and was featured in the SBS series Who Do You Think You Are? in September 2015. Many of his television opportunities have been "alternative" sports presentation coverages of the Summer or Winter Olympics.

Pickhaver starred in the cult Australian comedy film This Won't Hurt a Bit[4] opposite Jacqueline McKenzie. In 2003 he appeared in the political comedy, The Honourable Wally Norman.

Published works
  • 1989: Pants off, this sporting life, by Roy Slaven and H.G. Nelson[5]
  • 1994: Where it all went wrong [sound recording] : address delivered by H.G. Nelson, anti-smoking activist, to the National Press Club, Canberra on World No Tobacco Day, 1 June 1994[6]
  • 1994: Boys and balls, by Brian Nankervis; in the press box: Roy Slaven and H.G. Nelson [7]
  • 1996: Petrol, bait, ammo & ice, by H.G. Nelson, with a foreword by Roy Slaven; illustrated by Reg Mombassa[8]
  • 1999: It's yours for a sawn-off! : Sameranch's Sydney, by H.G. Nelson; illustrations by James de Vries[9]
  • 2006: The really stuffed guide to good food 2006, edited by H.G. Nelson[10]
  • 2008: Sprays, by H. G. Nelson [11]
  • 2011: My life in SHORTS, by H. G. Nelson[12]

References
  1. "Biographical cuttings on Greig Pickhaver, broadcaster and entertainer". National Library of Australia. Retrieved 9 April 2009.
  2. "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 23 March 2016. Retrieved 30 March 2016.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  3. National Film and Sound Archive: Sounds of Australia.
  4. "This Won't Hurt a Bit". Internet Movie Database.
  5. Nelson, H. G.; Roy Slaven (1989). Pants off, this sporting life. Crows Nest, N.S.W.: ABC Enterprises for Australian Broadcasting Corporation. p. 143. ISBN 0-642-12888-X.
  6. Nelson, H. G.; Tobacco Interagency Committee of the A.C.T (1994). "Where it all went wrong (sound recording) : address delivered by H.G. Nelson, anti-smoking activist, to the National Press Club, Canberra on World No Tobacco Day, 1 June 1994". 1 digital audio tape (ca. 47 min.). Retrieved 9 April 2009.
  7. Nankervis, Brian; Slaven, R.; Nelson, H. G. (1994). Boys and balls. St. Leonards, N.S.W.: Allen & Unwin. p. 257. ISBN 1-86373-738-3.
  8. Nelson, H. G.; Roy Slaven; Reg Mombassa (1996). "Petrol, bait, ammo & ice". Book. Pan Macmillan. p. 220. Retrieved 9 April 2009.
  9. Nelson, H. G.; James de Vries (1999). "It's yours for a sawn-off! : Sameranch's Sydney". Book. Random House Australia. p. 92. Retrieved 9 April 2009.
  10. Nelson, H. G., ed. (2005). The really stuffed guide to good food 2006. Sydney: Pan Macmillam Australia. p. 233. ISBN 1-4050-3697-4.
  11. Nelson, H. G. (2008). Sprays. Sydney: Pan Macmillan Australia. p. 225. ISBN 978-1-4050-3883-6.
  12. Nelson,H.G., ed. (2011). My life in SHORTS. Sydney: Pan Macmillan Australia. ISBN 9781405039451.
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