Louise Bowes
Associate Script Producer: 2004
Script Producer: 2011
Supervising Script Producer: 2011-2014
Series Script Executive: 2014-2015; 2018-now
Network Script Executive: 2017-2018
Louise Bowes (née Crane) first came onto the television scene while she was studying nursing in her early 20s. After a brief stint filling in as a researcher on the Seven Network medical drama, A Country Practice, Louise was hired full time and completed a Bachelor of Arts at Macquarie University.
After training in the A Country Practice script department and writing an episode in 1989, she began working alongside Forrest Redlich, a long-time writer and script producer of A Country Practice, on his new show for Channel Ten, E Street. She worked on the series for the duration of its run. She completed a stint as storyliner and script editor on the short-lived Southern Star soap Echo Point before going freelance, writing episodes for Blue Heelers, All Saints, Above the Law, Always Greener and McLeod’s Daughters.
In 1999, Louise became a permanent member of the All Saints writing staff, as a storyliner under script producer, Susan Bower. She remained in this position until the end of 2000, when she left Seven to assist on the Nine Network’s new drama McLeod’s Daughters.
At the beginning of 2004, Louise returned to the Seven Network to assist Bevan Lee, who had taken over Home and Away. As the associate script producer, Louise was tasked to train up staff in the department. She then returned to the All Saints staff as the story consultant assisting the-then script producer, Sarah Walker. When Sarah moved to Home and Away, Louise was appointed script producer, with her first episodes airing at the end of season 7 – a capacity in which she stayed until the conclusion of the series in 2009.
Of the conclusion of the long-running medical series, and writing the final episode, Louise stated, “to have to wrap up a show that had been much loved for 12 years was a real privilege, a huge responsibility and also extremely sad. I remain incredibly proud of what we achieved, that last episode still brings me to tears.”
2008 also marked the year that the show that Louise had originally co-created with Nine’s in-house producer, Susan Bower and head of drama, Jo Horsburgh, Canal Road began airing on the Nine Network. However, the show was pulled from scheduling seven episodes into its thirteen episode run, and later cancelled.
After All Saints, Louise moved to Packed to the Rafters as a consultant for the third and fourth seasons, before returning to Home and Away script department. First as a consultant, she then joined Lily Taylor as the script producer, and six weeks later, she was promoted into the newly created role of supervising script producer (which was later retitled as “series script executive”), following Bevan’s decision to wind back his involvement in the series.
Louise’s first episode aired on 25th July 2011 (Ep#5346) and her final episode aired on 11th June 2015 (Ep#6215). Over her tenure, Louise was responsible for several storylines including the River Boys saga, the SIDS death of Heath and Bianca’s son, the Kyle/Tamara/Casey love triangle, Jett’s adoption, and the returns of Sally Fletcher, Celia Stewart and Charlie Buckton, as well as the development of the Brax/Ricky & John/Marilyn couplings and the introduction of 23 new main characters.
In September 2014, Louise was promoted to network script executive at Network Seven, responsible for the development of new drama alongside head of drama, Julie McGauran. Together, they commissioned Wanted, 800 Words and The Secret Daughter.
It was exclusively announced by BTTB in June 2017 that Louise had returned to the top job at Home and Away, credited as the network script executive. Her material began airing on 30th November 2017 (Ep#6781) and continues today.
Over her career, Louise has been nominated for 8 AWGIE awards, over both All Saints and Home and Away. She was successful in winning 2 of her nominations, both of which were for Home and Away. The first award she won was in 2005 for Ep#3806, which saw the funeral of Noah Lawson, and the second was in 2015 for Ep#6057, which saw the funeral of Casey Braxton.
Other Credits
A Country Practice
Story Consultant (1989)
E Street
Senior Script Editor (1992)
Echo Point
Storyliner (1995)
All Saints
Storyliner (1999-2001)
Story Consultant (2004)
Script Producer (2004-2009)
Packed to the Rafters
Script Consultant (2010-2011)
Picture with thanks to Louise Bowes