“I’ve been reading Pedestrian articles for as long as I can remember, so it’s pretty darn cool!” Tony Armstrong — ever the charmer — tells me of his PEDESTRIAN TELEVISION Award win.
The Aussie icon has rightfully been crowned the Icon of the Year Award at the first-ever PEDESTRIAN Television Awards and he is absolutely chuffed.
Not just because this is a sweet accolade in itself, but because it comes off the back of his Gold Logie nomination. The man really is killing it right now!
“Oh man, it’s pretty humbling. I’m just the sum of everyone I work with,” he said. “So hopefully they feel pretty good too!”
What a sweet prince!
This is how I picture Tony Armstrong at all times. (Credit: The Project)
The footy star turned ABC presenter turned TV star has gone from strength to strength over the past few years. When I ask him to name some highlights from this last year alone, he rattles off the following huge wins: “Swans three games clear on the ladder is pretty dope! Also, Extraordinary Things coming out and the reception that it got along with opening an exhibition. Monday’s Experts starting and I shot another show that I can’t tell you about yet.”
Did yas hear that? A new telly project!
It follows his recently-released ABC series Monday’s Experts, a spicy sports panel show that he hosts alongside Catherine Murphy where each week they’re joined by sports journalists and comedians to discuss the latest in sports news.
Earlier this year, he also released another series on ABC called Tony Armstrong’s Extra-Ordinary Things which sees the strapping lad travel around Australia to find extra-ordinary items — like a novelty cheque that symbolises the lack of gender equality in sport, a firefighter’s signet ring and a shearing ribbon — and meet equally fascinating people and hear their stories.
“I guess my favourite thing was that EVERYONE has a story so to be able to get them out of people was pretty cool,” Tony tells me.
During our chat, I also took the opportunity to ask him about another major public moment that went down over the last year: the hard-launch of his girlfriend Rona Glynn-McDonald.
“Yeah Rona rules. It’s been great,” he says.
Tony’s achieved so bloody much, including scoring a PEDESTRIAN TELEVISION award and maybe soon a Gold Logie, so one must wonder: what does the multi-talented bloke have on the horizon?
“I wanna start acting!” he says. Uh, of course! Given his natural on-screen charisma and the success of his multiple telly shows, that answer shoulda been pretty obvious. Seriously, what can’t this man do?
