australian television information archive

Executive Producers: Bob Campbell, Des Monaghan, Nick Witkowski
Producer: Anthony Buckley
Director: Peter Andrikidis
Writer: Bryce Courtenay
Screenplay: Peter Yeldham

Aired: July 18 & 19, 2004 (Ten)

Jessica is the dramatisation of one woman's extraordinary life. It is a sweeping saga of love, deceit, tragedy and sacrifice set during the early years of the 20th century in the farmlands around Narrandera, a small frontier town in rural New South Wales. Jessica Bergman and her elder sister Meg are as different as their parents, Joe and Hester. Jess belongs in overalls and works the unforgiving land with her father, while Meg is a lace and frills girl whom the scheming Hester is desperate to match with the area's most eligible bachelor, Jack Thomas. But it all falls apart at the seams when Jack falls for Jessica, setting in motion a string of events that leads to a triple murder, two pregnancies and an act of heroism from Jessica still legendary to the people of Narrandera today.