Mother and Son screenwriter Tristram Baumber teams up with Matt Okine and Denise Scott to reboot the iconic series

Words Erin Huckle @chucklecommunication

Images ABC

The family dynamic makes for fascinating viewing, and for those of us watching TV in the ‘80s and ‘90s, Mother and Son was an iconic representation of family life and love.

Starring Ruth Cracknell as the forgetful and slightly devious Maggie, and Gary McDonald as her long-suffering son Arthur, Mother and Son was a firm favourite on Aussie screens for ten years.

Fast-forward to 2023, and a Mother and Son reboot has just hit our screens, starring Matt Okine and Denise Scott, in a modern-day imagining of the mother-son relationship.

Homegrown Wollongong talent Tristram Baumber is one of the writers on the new series. He grew up locally and studied English and Creative Writing at the University of Wollongong, before setting out into the world to make his mark as a professional screenwriter. But as with most creative pursuits, the path to success was far from straightforward.

Creative adventures

After making short films with friends in Australia, Tristram moved to London in his twenties and spent a few years working in television transmission thinking his dream of being a screenwriter might be over. But the urge to create continued.

“After I’d married my Spanish wife, we decided to take what we would have spent on a honeymoon and use it to move to a quiet place in the south of Spain for a year. We challenged ourselves to write every day, and by the end of that year, I had three screenplays and a pilot script for a TV show,” says Tristram.

Tristram and his wife then moved back to Australia, settling in Newcastle where he still lives today, and the TV pilot he’d written on his Spanish writing ‘gap year’ was bought by the ABC.

This opened the door to new connections and opportunities that established Tristram on the Australian screenwriting scene, and led to him securing an on-staff writing position with Aquarius Films.

Making Mother and Son

At Aquarius Films, Tristram met Matt Okine in the writers’ room season 2 of The Other Guy. He’d also worked with Denise Scott when she starred in his TV pilot Timothy in 2014 (set in Wollongong). When Matt asked him to join the writing team for a reboot of comedy classic Mother and Son, it felt like a natural fit.

“Wollongong will always be home to me. It made me who I am today, and I’m forever grateful.”

For Tristram, it was exciting but also a little nerve-wracking: “The original is so beloved, so we knew we didn’t want to make the same show. Setting it with a different family in a different time freed us up to make something very much set in the modern day, with a more diverse representation of family life and humour specific to 2023.”

Geoffrey Atherden, the creator of the original Mother and Son series, was in the writers’ room throughout the whole process, and encouraged Tristram and the rest of the team to try new things with the series.

“He acknowledged that while the mother and son relationship dynamic is eternal, the things around it in society have changed in the last 40 years, so he encouraged us to make a different kind of show.”

The 2023 imagining of Mother and Son sees recently single Arthur (Matt Okine) move back in with his widowed mum Maggie (Denise Scott), after she accidentally sets fire to the kitchen. Arthur and his sister Robbie (Angela Nica Sullen) are worried about their mum and her mental capacity, and scheme to get her into an aged care facility and sell the family home.

The resulting antics include family tensions, conflict and moments of harmony, and a romantic storyline for Arthur, who struggles under the weight of his mother’s expectations for him to find a partner and have children.

The next chapter

Tristram’s lifelong fascination with storytelling means he continues to create and contribute to new projects, including ABC Me’s comedy drama The PM’s Daughter, with a number of feature scripts currently in development.

“Most of the projects I’ve worked on over the years have had comedy at their core. But now I’m also exploring new genres like horror and bringing elements of comedy to those scripts too. I’m excited to keep telling stories and entertaining people.”

But Tristram also acknowledges that the life of a screenwriter comes with a lot of uncertainty, alongside the reward of creative opportunities and partnerships.

“It’s definitely not been a straightforward journey, but it’s something I feel compelled to do.”

Tristram regularly visits family in Wollongong, and recently spent the weekend here for his Mum’s 80th birthday, enjoying his own version of mother-son energy.

“Wollongong will always be home to me. It made me who I am today, and I’m forever grateful.”

We can’t wait to see what Tristram does next.

All episodes of the new Mother and Son series are available to stream for free on ABC iView.