The cast of Hey Dad..! stage an emotional reunion to show their support for Sarah Monahan, who has revealed her long-held secret. Steve Jackson reports.
Sarah Monahan looks around the room at the cast of familiar faces. “I’m so sorry,” she offers meekly. She had always thought the hard part would be coming forward and laying her soul bare in public. She wasn’t prepared for this assault upon her emotions.
The former child star has been relentlessly bombarded with hate mail from doubters and fans of hit Aussie sitcom Hey Dad..! since revealing her allegations
of sexual abuse on the set of the popular show to Woman’s Day.
But as she touched down in Melbourne last week after a long, lonely, apprehensive flight from her home in Texas, the reception couldn’t have been more different.
Waiting to greet Sarah, 32, are five of her closest former cast mates – Simone Buchanan, Julie McGregor, Chris Truswell, Chris Mayer and Matthew Krok.
Also greeting Sarah is the news that, inspired by her public confession, several other women have come forward to claim they had also been child victims of the same man.
Robert Hughes, who played the title character of single dad Martin Kelly in Hey Dad..!, has denied allegations that he was the man responsible for the assaults on Sarah, who played his daughter, Jenny, from 1987 to 1993.
But as Sarah apologises to her former co-stars for inadvertently dragging them into this torrid dispute, she knows they’re not here to judge her.
They have come to offer their unconditional support, to let her know she is not alone – and never will be.
As they meet up in a tangle of embraces, there are huge smiles and animated recollections of how they brought their characters to life for a legion of fans. But deeper emotions simmer – the TV show that made them household names some two decades ago is now tainted.
United by Woman’s Day for the first time since Simone left the show in 1990, they travelled from all over Australia to welcome Sarah home.
“It’s been almost 20 years since we’ve all been together in one room,” she says. “The last time they saw me I was still a kid,” Sarah says. “I’m amazed that they all came together to be with me today.
“I was so scared coming back here without my husband Matt [Morris]. I was hyperventilating as we were landing, and was like, ‘I don’t want to get off the plane.’ I was terrified of the reaction.”
Read the full story in this week's Woman's Day, on sale March 29, 2010.
