Nine sets screen date for Stan Walker health documentary

Nine Network, has announced the screen date for the fly-on-the-wall documentary on singer Stan Walker’s battle against cancer.

Stan Walker: To Hell And Back goes to air on Monday May 7, at 9:15pm on Nine and 9Now.

The network has been scoring strong ratings from music specials and shows following The Voice, including Elton John: I’m Still Standing and Lip Synch Battle.

The Walker documentary set a new record in his native New Zealand where it was funded by government funding body NZ On Air and screened in March over four nights on Three channel under the title Stan.

It drew a 32.5% in the all-important 25 to 54 demographic as well as the 18-49 age group.

Walker was diagnosed with cancer in 2017. Terrified at what the outcome could be, he allowed each step of his treatment  and recovery to be documented.

“I wanted to make the documentary to help people and also to help myself process this whole thing,” he said.

“It was my idea. I like to use the best and worst parts of my life and to turn them into something creative.”

It’s far from the post-Kardashian social media world where any celeb thinks the world needs to know what they had for breakfast.

This is compelling viewing, sensitively and intellectually handled.

As the cameras follow Walker as he is told he has cancer in his stomach and is advised to have his stomach removed, the close-knit family rallies around.

There are also feelings of guilt for some family members: it is the same rare cancer that killed 25 members of his extended family due to genetic problems.

Years before his grandfather, Rangi McLeod, had filmed an episode of BBC’s Tomorrow’s World about undergoing that cancer, and which also saw his stomach being removed.

His mother April fought breast cancer some years ago.

For Walker it could mean the end of a singing career for the Melbourne born Maori from the Tūhoe and Ngāti Tūwharetoa tribes who began singing in church.

He won the seventh season of Australian Idol, and became a household name in New Zealand as a judge on The X Factor NZ and starring in a number of movies.

Among the many emotional moments is when Stan starts to walk again and April is shattered to see him like that. He in turn is just as upset to see her go through that pain.

Earlier this year when Walker appeared at an event in Auckland looking gaunt, his co-host, the NZ prime minister, expressed her concern for his health on social media.

His illness went public, and Walker had to deal with telling his legion of fans, with whom he has had a strong relationship.

The broadcast of Stan Walker: To Hell and Back coincides with the release of a new six-track, self-titled EP.

The lead track, ‘Thank You’, is a heartfelt tribute written for April and is out now on http://smarturl.it/SW.TY.