Tributes have started to pour out of the Australian television, film and theatre industries for actor Mark Priestley, who was found dead on Wednesday afternoon. The show that enjoyed a ratings spike on Tuesday, with 1.7 million tuning in to see Priestley's character Dan get married, All Saints stopped filming yesterday for at least 24 hours, and members of the cast have offered their thoughts about their co-star's tragic death.

John Howard, who plays Dr Frank Campion, said Priestley was a fine actor: "He had the most extraordinary combination of very deft comic touch and great emotional depth."

John Waters, who plays Dr Mike Vlasek, was stunned. "I worked with him on stage and on screen and will miss him more than I can say right now," Waters said. "Mark the actor was intuitive, and graced every scene in which he appeared with a touch of whimsical genius that only he could apply."

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Extremely sad news this afternoon: All Saints star and talented theatre actor Mark Priestley has died. He was found later yesterday in Sydney's CBD near the hotel he was staying in; ambulance officers initially thought he'd suffered a heart attack but later indicated they believed his death was a suicide. Priestley had apparently been struggling with depression; he was only 32 years old. Channel Seven has released the following statement:

Mark Priestley was a tremendous young person - loved and respected by his fellow All Saints cast members and crew.

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While All Saints is one of Defamer Australia's favourite topics of comedy, we were shocked to read that All Saints castmember, It Takes Two star and all 'round tops chick Virginia Gay had been assaulted in Sydney by two men thought to be responsible for the bashing death of a man not much later that same evening.

Police reports suggest Gay was lucky not to have also died from the blows dealt by the assailants.

It is understood that Ms Gay was attacked while walking back to her home after a late night stroll to the local shops to buy some groceries.

Fifteen minutes later, police believe, the men bashed and robbed a 30-year-old chef, Daniel Owen, who died as ambulance officers tried to save him.

Gay was attacked at 11.50pm on Saturday as she walked along Illawarra Road, Marrickville. It is understood she was admitted to a hospital casualty but was released the same night, nursing bruises but no broken bones.

The suspects are still at large and anyone with information is asked to phone Marrickville police on 9568 9299 or Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.

However, I was about to sign off on the story before this passage decided to make my blood boil:

There was no answer at Ms Gay's Summer Hill address when smh.com.au knocked on the door this morning but her mother reportedly answered the door to journalists earlier and said the actor would not speak about the attack.

Oh gee, you think, guys? She's just been violently assaulted by men who - according to the rest of their night's activities - could've killed her and she's spending some down time being looked after by her mum. Are you really surprised that she didn't want to talk to you?

Defamer Australia sends its most heartfelt well wishes to Virginia and will not be knocking on her door any time soon.

After Channel Seven's "exciting" medical drama All Saints decided to take medicine into its own hands and insist that Down syndrome babies, like, totally always come from incestuous relationships, understandably they were howled down across the country.

However, the station's apology was deemed inadequate by Down Syndrome Australia, who are now demanding an on-air retraction, otherwise they will pursue legal action against the station.

"Without reservation, to any members of the audience who have found an element of a recent story offensive, Channel Seven apologises," the network said in a statement to The Age.

However, Down Syndrome Australia said Seven had not contacted the organisation and blasted their apology as insufficient.

"We're not going to accept a wishy-washy attempt at an apology that's come second-hand through a newspaper," Down Syndrome Victoria's Catherine McAlpine told ninemsn.

"They must say once and for all that there is categorically no link between Down syndrome and incest.

"We'll give them the opportunity to make a retraction during tonight's episode before we formally pursue legal advice and write official letters of complaint to the show's advertisers."

Fair enough, really. You can never overestimate the intelligence of viewers of shows like All Saints; last time they did a Census it found 83% of All Saints viewers thought they were watching a hospital documentary.

Next thing you know, All Saints will be featuring storylines about how this woman who lived down the street got a scratch on her arm, and it swelled up, and it was really itchy, and it got bigger and bigger, and she went to the doctor and said "Look at this scratch on my arm", and the doctor said "Let me have a look at it", and then he put a scalpel on it, and then all these baby spiders came out, and then she died The End.

It's hard to imagine that a hospital drama with such high standards of dramatic and technical excellence as All Saints could ever stuff up their material, but it looks as though just that has happened: the "popular" Channel Seven medical drama has managed to offend just about everyone by essentially taking genetics and obstetric medicine into their own hands and inventing some new material!

To wit, that babies with Down Syndrome are pretty much all the result of incestuous relationships.

Awesome, All Saints, ten thumbs up!

In the "highly offensive" episode, which aired on May 27, a brother and sister who were having an incestuous relationship were told their unborn child was likely to have Down syndrome as a consequence.

"All Saints has stigmatised every person with Down syndrome and their families," said Dr Peter Sloan of Down Syndrome Australia.

"We already know of one instance where a child has been victimised because of this episode."

Producers of All Saints deny any wrongdoing.

But leading geneticist Dr David Amor at Murdoch Children's Research Institute said: "There is absolutely no increase in the risk of Down syndrome for the offspring of incestuous relationships."

Exactly, team All Saints, did the captivating story of John and Jenny Deaves teach you nothing?

It's not the children of incestuous relationships who are the problem, it's the parents!

I look forward to more advances in All Saints' medical research wing, such as babies being born through the belly button, and the red thing being connected to my wrist-watch. Uh oh!