Underbelly's Victorian debut

Melbourne gangland dramaUnderbelly may soon air in Victoria. Speculation is mounting that an edited version of the series, which was banned in Victoria days before its national premiere due to a court order, is being prepared for broadcast by the Nine Network, with sources flagging a broadcast date for either late this month or early next month.

Despite the ban, bootleg copies of the program were sold in Victoria within weeks and it was also available on file-sharing computer networks. The ban expired in May but sources say Nine will edit the series to remove potential legal hurdles.

■Underbelly led the winners at the 41st annual Writer's Guild AWGIE awards, earning a gong for best TV miniseries adaptation by writers Peter Gawler, Greg Haddrick and Felicity Packard. (The series is based on Leadbelly: Inside Australia's Underworld, a book by Age journalists Andrew Rule and John Silvester.)

Other winners included SBS drama East West 101 for best original miniseries, Seven's All Saints for best series, Seven's Home And Away for best serial and Movie Extra's Chandon Pictures for best comedy (situation or narrative). SBS satire Newstopia won best comedy (sketch or light entertainment), while Nine's Dogstar won best children's program. The Informant, by Underbelly script editor Greg Haddrick, won best telemovie.

Spotlight on crash inquiries

Underbelly star Damian Walshe-Howling will host Seven's new factual series Crash Investigation Unit. The series follows the work of Sydney's Metropolitan Crash Investigation Unit.

Walshe-Howling won critical acclaim playing Andrew "Benji" Veniaman on Nine's underworld drama and will be familiar to older viewers as Constable Adam Cooper on Seven's long-running country cop drama Blue Heelers.

Crash Investigation Unit launches after the Beijing Olympics.

Hollowmen download frenzy

The ABC's satirical comedy The Hollowmen has become the top-rating TV program download at the Australian Apple iTunes store.

The series, starring Neil Melville, Rob Sitch, Lachy Hulme and Merrick Watts, returns to the ABC on Wednesday at the new time of 9pm. The ABC will air the final (sixth) episode of the first series and then go straight into a second series of six half-hour episodes.

The series is produced for the ABC by Working Dog, whose credits include Frontline, Thank God You're Here and The Panel.

TiVo surprises Harvey

It's official: Gerry Harvey giveth and Gerry Harvey taketh away. The owner of retailing giant Harvey Norman, which has the monopoly on Seven's TiVo for six weeks, has declared the set-top box a success.

"We sold more than three times what I would have expected," he told a newspaper last week. "I didn't think TiVo would be a big seller."

Harvey then gave TiVo's main competitor, Foxtel's IQ2, a free kick. "I'm watching more Foxtel than free-to-air," he said.

Farmer hit goes to Spain

FremantleMedia will make a Spanish version of its romance reality series The Farmer Wants A Wife for Spanish channel Cuatro. Fremantle has a production subsidiary in Spain, Grundy Producciones, which will make the series.

Despite initial hesitation from Nine, The Farmer Wants A Wife has become a resounding success in Australia and the format has been sold to Germany, Sweden, Norway, Estonia, the US and the Netherlands.

Mix FM Melbourne bound

Dancing with the Stars host Sonia Kruger and judge Todd McKenney may bring their Sydney Mix FM radio show to Melbourne, with industry talk that the Australian Radio Network is planning to syndicate the breakfast program here.

Insiders say the move would save the company $500,000. In other belt-tightening measures, ARN has announced it won't be renewing programming consultant Brad March's contract when it expires next month.

The former Austereo executive was hired three years ago with a brief to build new breakfast shows and lift the ratings but he has had little success.