Ali Moore is leaving the ABC – but where is she going, and who will replace her?
ABC radio’s Ali Moore is shifting her shift on Drive to the Italian countryside and her final show will be on May 29.
He will be replaced by ABC TV presenter Charlie Pickering. Weekly and nationally syndicated radio comedy panel show since late 2024 Thank God it’s Friday.
Moore and her husband, who have business interests in Germany, are in the process of purchasing a farmhouse in Umbria, the realization of a dream that has been simmering for a decade.
“I will be splitting my time between Italy and Australia,” Moore said. “I want to learn Italian, I want to learn to cook, and I really want a different life than the one I’ve lived for the last 40 years.”
Moore began his journalism career in 1987 as a graduate student at the ABC, starting at 3LO (then known as ABC Melbourne 774). He continued to work in radio and television, including presenting. lateline And Lateline Businessand as ABC’s Beijing-based China correspondent. He also held long-term positions at Nine and the Singapore-based BBC.
Even though he plans to continue working for some time, this move signals that the journey is coming to an end. The final chapter began at the end of 2023 when Rafael Epstein took over the Drive seat, moving to Mornings.
“It was amazing and I loved it, I really mean it,” Moore said. “But I think a dozen broadcast roles and three employers are enough for a career, and it’s time to do something else.”
Moore explained to ABC management in December that he was unlikely to stick around for the entire year, and on Friday he revealed to viewers that he was leaving and that Pickering, a regular guest on the program ahead of the 5pm panel show, would replace him starting in June. He will also have a job ahead of him in rebuilding his audience share from a low 2.5 percent of listeners in the last survey.
How does Moore think his audience will react to Pickering?
“I really think he’s great and I think he’ll be great for the show, he’ll be great for the station.”
Although familiar to ABC viewers and especially Drive Friday listeners, Pickering is a very different personality to Moore.
“My husband and I once wandered around a market in Pakistan for a few hours trying to get me to have a sense of humor, because I don’t have much humor,” Moore admits. “I’m very serious, and I came into this job from the background and perspective of a news reporter, and maybe that hurt me sometimes because of the amount of topics we had to cover.
“And now management has gone from someone with no sense of humor to a comedian who is also one of the brightest people I know. It’s going to be really different and it’s going to be really good.”
For Pickering, this is a job he’s been waiting to do his whole life.
“This is the best change in the best radio station in the best city in the world,” he says. “I feel that way too.”
He lists a long list of Drive hosts he admires, including Moore, his predecessor Epstein, and Virginia Trioli. But what burns most is the memory of listening to Doug Aiton and Terry Lane with his mother after school.
“It’s cold outside but it’s cozy in the car, we’re in the garage at home and tears are running down my mom’s cheeks because of something we’re listening to and laughing at and we’re not getting out of the car because we want to hear the end of this thing.”
Pickering plans to continue his television appearances. Weeklywon’t be back until late next year and AnnualAnd he has no intention of giving up TGIF Both admit that it could come as news to station management.
“I may be out here talking outside of school, but as far as I’m concerned, I’m going to go to the 5 o’clock news and run to the studio where there’s a waiting audience because there’s been so many times where that one hour has been the absolute highlight of my week.”
He had plenty of experience in radio, having hosted the Breakfast show on Fridays in 2023 on Triple J in the early 2000s (with Sammy J in the chair). However, he knows that he must increase this experience in order to reach the level of those who inspire him so much.
“This is a once-in-a-lifetime job,” he says. “I have a lot to learn, but I’m really looking forward to the challenge of trying to make a radio show that you can listen to in the driveway after you get home.”
Karl Quinn talks about movies every Friday on his Drive show.
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