Big Brother Australia 2003 was the third season of the Australian television series Big Brother Australia. The season lasted 87 days, starting on April 27 2003 and ending on July 21 2003.

This season was the most complicated series to date with housemates starting in two separate houses - a "round house" and a "square house". Housemate Benjamin Archbold was sent in first and spent the entire first day by himself. Other housemates were progressively admitted. On Night 22, all Housemates were locked into their respective bedrooms and a construction crew spent the night merging the two houses and revealing the hidden swimming pool and kitchen that had been in between the two smaller houses. Housemates were released into their new combined house on the morning of Day 23. Later in the day, a bathroom linking the two bedrooms was revealed.

In the Square house (which was on the right of the compound) were Belinda, Jaime, Irena, Carlo and Claire with Vincent and Saxon joining later in the week. After Ben entered the Round house on Day 1, Joanne, Regina, Chrissie, Daniel, Patrick and Leah were progressively admitted over the first week.

The cameras were completely hidden for the first time in this series. Previously some cameras were visible to housemates and at times housemates were aware of the camera tracking their movements.

Late in the series saw a visit from Anouska Golebiewski who was the first to be evicted from Big Brother UK 4 series showing at the time. She was brought in for a little over a week.

The biggest star and eventual winner of Series 3 was Regina Bird. Reggie earned public admiration with her unique down-to-earth charm, strong work ethic and naivety. Chrissie and Daniel came second and third respectively.

New programs

Two new shows were introduced:

• UpLate hosted by Mike Goldman. Mike Goldman was best known for doing the voiceovers in the daily show. UpLate was broadcast late at night showing live vision from the house with minimal editing. Often the footage was simply of the housemates sleeping.
• The Insider hosted by Tim Ferguson was a panel-type show with additional gossip and discussion about the show. Frequently that week's evicted housemate would be one of the show's guests.

Incidents

A noteworthy incident of Big Brother 2003 involved housemate Belinda Thorpe in what was later dubbed "Belindagate". After a night of drinking, an intoxicated Belinda confided in housemate Carlo that her younger sibling had been involved in the murder of a homosexual man The information was not immediately revealed by Belinda as she whispered it to Carlo and house microphones did not pick it up, however after she left the room Carlo passed the information on to the other housemates.

The incident sparked a legal crisis for Endemol Southern Star and Network Ten as the identification of a minor involved in a court trial is illegal in Queensland, the state where Big Brother is produced. Within seconds of this information being revealed the live Internet feeds were cut and left blank for several hours. Users watching the feeds began discussing the incident on the official website discussion boards. Moderators began deleting these messages but could not keep up with the large amount being posted and eventually the messages boards were closed down. They were re-opened for a short period before being closed again permanently. As a result there were no official message boards during the following 2004 series. The closure of the boards led to the title "Belindagate".

The information spread out to unofficial Big Brother websites and several days later the show producers acknowledged the incident. An edited version of the nights events was shown on Big Brother Uncut, except in Queensland where it was cut entirely.

Brett Jensen, the fifteenth original housemate (a policeman) left lockdown before BB3 began. Tamara - a travel agent, the sixteenth housemate, appeared on the Launch show but did not enter the house. Both were from Queensland.

Housemates

Regina

Regina Bird, known to her housemates as Reggie, from Cambridge, Tasmania, entered the House on Day 3 as part of the housemate introduction week. Reggie emerged as the winner of Big Brother 2003.

She was known for saying "Bugger".

Chrissie

Chrissie Swan, from Melbourne, Victoria, was the runner up of Big Brother 2003. Employed after leaving the BB house by DMG Radio to start a new breakfast radio show at HOT91.1 on the Sunshine Coast, Queensland, but moved back to Melbourne end of 2006 quoting, I miss home, I miss my mums cooking and I miss the cold. She now works the breakfast shift at Vega 91.5 FM. She is expecting her first child with her partner of one year in December 2008.

Daniel

Daniel McInness is from Adelaide, South Australia. Now works at Intencity Adelaide, South Australia.

Patrick

Patrick Flanagan, from Sydney, New South Wales. Works for Dolby Labs in Business Development, wrote articles on Big Brother 2004 for the Canberra Times. Lives in Bondi, Sydney with his wife Amanda, and son Toby.

Vincent

Vincent Amato is from Melbourne, Victoria. Working at an engineering company in Melbourne.

Jamie

Jamie O'Brien, from Melbourne, Victoria. Travelled the country as a judge for a Mr Gay Oz competition, before finishing a law degree. Is currently working as an entertainment lawyer.

Kim

Kim-Marie Drury, from Armidale, NSW, was evicted on Day 57 in a double eviction with Saxon. Kim was involved in a small scandal as result of a joke she told in the house about Aborigines, and was forced to leave her home town to escape the fallout.

Saxon

Daniel Small is from Central Coast, New South Wales. Evicted in a double eviction. Saxon is remembered for crying "I want my Mum" when the pressure of being nominated got too much and for dating host Gretel Killeen after being evicted. He currently works for Bank West in Hornsby.

Joanne

Joanne Hams (nee Ashton) is from Adelaide, South Australia. Regularly poses in Ralph magazine. Was evicted with an Australian record 86% of total votes. Which was the largest eviction percentage at that time. Is now married to Mr. Ross Hams and is expecting her first child towards the end of 2008.

Claire

Claire Bellis is from Queensland. Continued with PhD studies at Griffith University, Gold Coast. Is expected to have completed doctorate by end of 2006. Claire will commence post-doctorate research with Professor Lyn Griffiths in the Genomics Research Centre, Griffith University following the completion of her PhD. Lives in the Wild Wild world of Texas and misses her fiance Camille very much...

Whens the baby?

Ben

Ben Archbold is a former undercover police officer.

Belinda

Belinda Thorpe is from Queensland. Left the house voluntarily. She has a daughter, born in 2005, named Nicole. She went to Park Ridge State High School, Park Ridge QLD, and worked at Luppinos (Hairdresser) in Browns Plains, Grand Plaza Shopping Centre.

Leah

Leah White was known for being one of the louder housemates, which caused her nomination and then eviction. She currently spends her time drinking, partying and carrying on.

A highly respectable member of society...

Carlo

Carlo Melino received a lot of bad press during the series as one of the most disgusting Australian Big Brother housemate of all time. This was a result of many incidents including urinating in the outside garden, bathing in the outdoors laundry trough and attaching a dish cleaning brush to his penis.

Jaime

Jaime Cerda, from Melbourne, is a keen skateboarder. He is now an Actor/Improvisor with many short film and theatre credits..... but still wishes he was married to Leah

Irena

Irena Bukhshtaber was the first housemate evicted from the House.

Nominations table

The first housemate in each box was nominated for two points, and the second housemate was nominated for one point.

(S) refers to housemates that were in the Square House. (R) refers to housemates that were in the Round House.

	Week 2	Week 3	Week 4	Week 5	Week 6	Week 7	Week 8	Week 9	Week 10	Week 11	Week 12
											Day 86
Regina (R)	Patrick Daniel	Leah Daniel	Vincent Leah	Vincent Joanne	Joanne Vincent	Joanne Daniel	No nominations	Jamie Patrick	Vincent Patrick	Daniel Patrick	No nominations	Winner
Chrissie (R)	Regina Daniel	Leah Ben	Leah Patrick	Ben Saxon	Claire Saxon	Regina Saxon	No nominations	Vincent Patrick	Vincent Patrick	Patrick Regina	No nominations	2nd
Daniel (R)	Chrissie Ben	Ben Leah	Leah Saxon	Ben Vincent	Saxon Vincent	Joanne Patrick	No nominations	Patrick Vincent	Patrick Vincent	Patrick Regina	No nominations	Evicted Day 85
Patrick (R)	Joanne Regina	Leah Chrissie	Leah Daniel	Ben Belinda	Saxon Chrissie	Saxon Chrissie	No nominations	Chrissie Jamie	Chrissie Regina	Chrissie Regina	Evicted Day 78
Vincent (S)	Carlo Belinda	Belinda Carlo	Belinda Daniel	Ben Regina	Daniel Saxon	Chrissie Regina	No nominations	Jamie Patrick	Regina Chrissie	Evicted Day 71
Jamie	Not in the house					Exempt	No nominations	Daniel Vincent	Evicted Day 64
Saxon (S)	Carlo Claire	Jaime Belinda	Belinda Daniel	Belinda Chrissie	Patrick Daniel	Daniel Regina	No nominations	Evicted Day 57
Kim	Not in the house					Exempt	No nominations	Evicted Day 57
Joanne (R)	Patrick Chrissie	Leah Daniel	Leah Daniel	Ben Daniel	Daniel Claire	Daniel Regina	Evicted Day 50
Claire (S)	Carlo Vincent	Belinda Jaime	Belinda Daniel	Belinda Ben	Daniel Saxon	Evicted Day 43
Ben(R)	Patrick Regina	Daniel Chrissie	Daniel Belinda	Chrissie Belinda	Evicted Day 36
Belinda (S)	Jaime Claire	Carlo Vincent	Saxon Leah	Saxon Ben	Walked Day 31
Leah (R)	Patrick Daniel	Daniel Ben	Daniel Joanne	Evicted Day 29
Carlo (S)	Claire Irena	Belinda Jaime	Evicted Day 22
Jaime (S)	Vincent Claire	Carlo Belinda	Evicted Day 19
Irena (S)	Carlo Claire	Evicted Day 15
Twists	See Note 1	See Note 2	None	None	None	None	None	None	None	None	None	None
Against public vote	Belinda Ben Irena Leah Saxon	Belinda Carlo Daniel Leah	Belinda Daniel Leah	Belinda Ben Chrissie Saxon Vincent	Claire Daniel Saxon	Daniel Joanne Regina	All Housemates	Jamie Patrick Vincent	Chrissie Patrick Regina Vincent	Chrissie Daniel Patrick Regina	Regina Chrissie Daniel	Regina Chrissie
Evicted (% of public vote)	Irena 33% to evict	Carlo 66% to evict	Leah 41% to evict	Ben 73% to evict	Claire 60% to evict	Joanne 86% to evict	Kim 29% to evict	Jamie 50% to evict	Vincent 62% to evict	Patrick 50% to evict	Daniel 51% to evict	Chrissie 72% to evict
							Saxon 19% to evict					Regina 28% to evict

(S) Square House: Belinda, Carlo, Claire, Irena, Jaime, Saxon, Vincent

(R) Round House: Ben, Chrissie, Daniel, Joanne, Leah, Patrick, Regina The top five housemates with the highest votes were up for eviction. Belinda, Irena, and Saxon from the Square House, and Ben and Leah from the Round House. Belinda and Carlo from the Square House were up for Eviction, and Daniel and Leah from the Round House were up for Eviction. In a special round of Nominations, Ben, Claire, Jaime and Regina were not permitted to vote. The other housemates had to vote for a housemate to evict, and Jamie received the most votes.

External links

• Behind Big Brother Archive - Season 3; Updates, Daily Shows and Diary Room Visits

Sources

• Big brother 2003