Offspring.  It’s one of Australia’s most popular dramas.  In fact, its lead star Asher Keddie won the 2013 Gold Logie for her portrayal of Nina Proudman.

With Nina’s hilariously entertaining self-talk and sexual fantasies of a thirty something suburban woman, it’s a no brainer that this show would make brilliant television.

But it turns out that every Australian television network turned down Offspring writer Debra Oswald’s pitch in 2006, four years before the show finally hit our screens.

Umm, excuse me what?

What on earth could have been more worthy of prime screen time than Dr Patrick Reid in a towel?

Highly exaggerated crime shows and some reality TV apparently.

Debra recently spoke at the Sydney Writer’s Festival, revealing, “we pitched it four years before it was wanted. We pitched it to all of the networks and everyone said no.”

Firstly it looks like those TV executives were all highly ambitious men aiming to forge a life in unison with the sexy cops and lawyers on the crime shows they commissioned.  How about giving the modern day middle aged woman some screen time?

Finally, TV producer John Edwards agreed to produce ‘Offspring’ and voila, the sexual fantasies of Australia’s female population have never been the same.

The overwhelmingly positive response that ‘Offspring’ has generated amongst female viewers is astounding.  We all actually think we’re Nina, to the extent that we casually slip into daily conversation that we’re in a relationship with Dr Patrick Reid.  Name any other locally produced show that’s made you feel like that recently, I bet you can’t (and if you can, please leave a comment below).

The show’s fashion is one of the most celebrated since Sex and the City.  How Nina manages to pull off the hippie chic style in a hospital is beyond me, but hey she does it!

Every week Twitter goes into overdrive with the #Offspring hashtag and there’s hundreds of Facebook pages dedicated to the sex on legs Dr Patrick.

“Audiences being more savvy about television does make the job sometimes more difficult… now there’s a million blogs and Facebook pages with people saying what they think is going to happen,” Debra said.

Hey no pressure Deb…

You know why Offspring is a massive hit?  It’s REAL!

Debra said herself, “I think that’s like real life and it’s fun to watch.”

We want to watch captivating content about the beautiful truths of pregnancies, the harsh realities of infertility and the inescapable breakups that happen because we overanalysed our partner’s innocent smile to the waitress.

That’s what we want to see, because we get it and it reminds us that we’re not crazy… and if we are, so is Nina Proudman so it’s ok.

So thankyou to the television gods out there that finally brought ‘Offspring’ into our lives.  It’s even been commissioned for a fifth season – hooray, celebratory season 1 marathon party at mine!

As Oswald says, “When you sit and watch Offspring, you’ll be likely to laugh, likely to be moved and more likely to have sex with your partner.”

Amen to that.