9News host in stitches over 'seasoned' guest's Zoom background fail

A Channel Nine host has been left in stitches after a guest struggled to find an appropriate Zoom background for a pre-recorded interview, at one stage accidentally adding a party hat to his head.

9News presenter Alice Monfries was preparing to speak with Mark Borlace from the RAA about electric cars when he began struggling with the platform.

"Mark can you hear us," Monfries asked a blank screen. "Yes I just had my camera off," Borlace answered, before he appeared with an appropriately blurred background.

Watch the video above

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He indicated to Monfries that he wanted to change his background and began fiddling around with his screen.

After about 30 seconds of waiting, Monfries chatted to Borlace as a background featuring a car wash pops up.

"This one is a bit busy," Borlace commented, before attempting to change it once again.

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"You may as well get the right one," Monfries said, before his background changed to a photo of turtles and divers underwater, their placement making Borlace appear to have the head of a turtle and the legs of a person.

"Nah, that's just... I'll just go to blur," he said, as Monfries begins to struggle to contain her laughter.

"Sorry," he said, to which Monfries added, "No, it's great. It took me a while to work out what that was, a scuba diver."

By this stage they are both laughing, as Borlace continued to try to change his background once again.

"Video filters, video effects," he mumbled to himself as he attempted to find an appropriate background.

"I don't mind this one," Monfries commented, as she took a breath and tried to compose herself in readiness for their interview.

But when she looked up, he had a yellow party hat on his head and at this stage, she completely lost her composure.

"You've given yourself a party hat," she laughed. "What have I done now?" he wondered aloud.

Borlace managed to blur his background once again which only served to make his party hat more prominent.

"I'm gonna log out and come straight back to you," he said.

Monfries tells 9Honey the interview was able to go ahead as planned, but it took some time for her to collect herself.

"It was very funny. We were pre-recording the interview for our 5 o'clock afternoon news for Adelaide, we were meant to be talking about petrol prices," she explains.

"That preamble took a full five minutes before he logged off and came back ready to go, with no party hat."

She says trying to maintain her composure became more difficult as his technological struggles continued.

"The harder you try not to laugh the more you get the giggles," she continues. "By the end he and I both had the giggles."

Monfries says his swearing as he struggled to correct his background was even more hilarious, although those moments have been edited out of the version that has been shared online.

She describes Borlace as a "seasoned media professional" who is "highly recognised in Adelaide as a spokesperson" with Monfries explaining she had interviewed him many times before.

The video of Borlace's Zoom struggle has been shared with his permission on the 9News TikTok account and Instagram page.

"The virtual world can be a difficult place to navigate, as this #9News guest found out today while struggling for several minutes to get the right Zoom background," the description reads. "Mark Borlace from the RAA left presenter Alice Monfries in stitches after he unknowingly placed a party hat filter on his head during the interview."

The video has quickly gone viral, with amused social media followers clearly enjoying the hilarity of the situation.

"This has made my week," one commented. "Bless his cotton socks," another said.

"Boomer life," another added.

The RAA is the South Australian-equivalent of the NRMA, with the segment about saving money on petrol using the RAA successfully recorded later that afternoon, airing on the bulletin on Tuesday.