ScreenTalk

Sam Pillsbury is a self-described American-Kiwi who has made films in both New Zealand and the US. He began his prolific career at the National Film Unit directing the notable documentaries Ralph Hotere and Men and Supermen. In 1975 he directed the award-winning Birth with R.D. Laing, which became a teaching aid in hospitals around the world. Pillsbury’s first feature film was The Scarecrow starring John Carradine, which was the first New Zealand film to be invited to the Cannes Film Festival.

Pillsbury co-wrote the script for The Quiet Earth, but “fired himself” from the director role on the movie. His next major film was Starlight Hotel which was received well overseas but flopped in New Zealand. Pillsbury has directed a number of American TV movies and feature films including Free Willy 3 and Endless Bummer. His most recent Kiwi film was Crooked Earth starring Temuera Morrison.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Pillsbury talks about:

• How his documentary on Ralph Hotere changed the way art films were made
• The fun, chaos and deprivation of making Goodbye Pork Pie
• Mixing necrophilia into a children’s film on The Scarecrow
• Making breakfast for screen legend John Carradine
• Thinking The Quiet Earth was a dog but then watching it go on to commercial success
• The disappointing reaction to Starlight Hotel in New Zealand
• Getting great reviews in America and negative ones in New Zealand for Crooked Earth
• Feeling frustrated by the process of making movies in Hollywood
• How funders in New Zealand need to talk to directors rather than producers

This video is available on YouTube to embed and distribute via a Creative Commons licence.

Credits: Interview, Camera & Editing – Andrew Whiteside

The star of TV ONE’s The Investigator, Bryan Bruce has made programmes on everything from Kiwi humour to mass murderers.

In this ScreenTalk interview, the director, writer and presenter talks about:

• making his television debut interviewing Katherine Mansfield and Chopin, after a lucky break while playing piano in a bar
• mortgaging his house to make a documentary on yachtsman Sir Peter Blake, then selling it around the world in the time it took Blake to sail into Auckland harbour
• Some similar features of the famous New Zealanders he has profiled for documentaries, including Whina Cooper, Howard Morrison and John O’Shea
• Discovering the common traits of mass murderers for the documentary In Cold Blood
• How he takes the unusual approach of offering his own opinion, on true-life crime series The Investigator
• How the secret drop box for The Investigator has received much worthwhile information

This video is available on YouTube to embed and distribute via a Creative Commons licence

Credits: Direction and Interview – Ian Pryor.  Camera and Editing – Alex Backhouse

Comedy legend David McPhail began making New Zealanders laugh in pioneering 1970s sketch show A Week of It, and then moved on to McPhail & Gadsby with his comedic mate Jon Gadsby. The two comedians also produced and starred in the sitcom Letter to Blanchy. In later years, McPhail starred in the mock documentary The Waimate Conspiracy, and played the appallingly politically incorrect teacher Gormsby in Seven Periods with Mr Gormsby. In 2007 McPhail donned a spandex super hero costume to fight crime in Amazing Extraordinary Friends, directed by his son Matt McPhail. As well as acting, McPhail has written many of the shows he has been involved in. His other writing credits include A Haunting We Will Go, and he has also worked as a comedy director on such shows as The Life and Times of Te Tutu.

In this ScreenTalk interview, McPhail discusses:

• The excitement of filming A Week of It an hour before it aired each week
• Using satire to prick the ego of former Prime Minister Rob Muldoon
• Why the concept behind the first season of McPhail & Gadsby was a mistake
• The real life stories behind Letter to Blanchy
• How Seven Periods with Mr Gormsby shocked the TV network but delighted fans
• Getting caught in public in a very revealing spandex costume while shooting The Amazing Extraordinary Friends

This video is available on YouTube to embed via a Creative Commons licence.

Credits:  Interview, Camera & Editing – Andrew Whiteside

Director Niki Caro has made movies in East Coast townships, French vineyards, and Minnesota coal mines. Caro’s latest feature The Vintner’s Luck has just been released, inspired by Elizabeth Knox’s tale of angels and winemakers. Although feature films Memory and Desire and the breakthrough hit Whale Rider made Caro’s international name, her early career was also rich, and much of it can be sampled on NZ On Screen.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Caro talks about:

• the question she asked winemakers prior to making The Vintner’s Luck; and the similarities between making wine, and making movies
• starting off in film
• discovering her love for working with actors, while directing offbeat TV drama The Summer the Queen Came (1992)
• reaching for “a potent visual storytelling” on Sure to Rise, a short film with hardly any dialogue
• the terrors of the Cannes Film Festival, after Sure to Rise was one of only eight short films in the world invited to compete
• the delights of making Footage (1996), an unusual documentary about the cult of the shoe
• how she bypassed the head-turning success of Whale Rider thanks to being pregnant with her first child
• a tale of toilets, trucks and self-doubt, from the first day of shooting North Country

This video is available on YouTube, to embed and distribute via a Creative Commons licence

Credits: Direction and Interview – Ian Pryor.  Camera and Editing – Alex Backhouse

Director Gaylene Preston has been stretching New Zealand film in new directions since her early short films and her first feature, the genre and gender-bending Mr Wrong (1985). Long devoted to “communicating local stories to local audiences”, Preston features in Deborah Shepard’s newly-released book Her Life’s Work: Conversations with Five New Zealand Women (AUP), and has a new film Home by Christmas due out next year.

In this ScreenTalk interview Preston talks about:

• how she started in film thanks to a job as an art therapist in an English asylum, and the elopement of a friend
• her longtime interest in “the stories that hold secrets, the things that you’re not allowed to talk about”
• working with producer Robin Laing, and discovering that when they went to meetings people kept looking nervously toward the door
• the challenges of pitching “comedy thriller ghost story” Mr Wrong
• being won over by Graeme Tetley’s script for comedy of manners Ruby and Rata
• making mini-series Bread and Roses, based on the life of the late activist/politician Sonja Davies
• the low number of New Zealand women directing film, then and now

This video is available on YouTube to embed and distribute via a Creative Commons licence

Credits: Direction and Interview – Ian Pryor.  Camera and Editing – Alex Backhouse

Taika Waititi [Te-Whānau-a-Apanui] discovered drama at secondary school. Having previously had aspirations for careers in deep sea diving, painting and hospitality, the lure of the entertainment industry led him towards acting, and a high school drama teacher – who he admits “changed my life”.

Waititi, aka Taika Cohen, appeared in feature films Scarfies (Alex), and Snakeskin (Nelson), the TV show The Strip, and on stage as a stand up comedian and one half of the comedy duo Humourbeasts, before turning his creative energies towards writing and directing.

His award-winning short film Tama Tū, based on the experiences of The Maori Battalion in WWII, was recognised at festivals in Berlin, Stockholm and at Sundance.

Waititi’s first short Two Cars, One Night was nominated for an Academy Award, and his debut feature film Eagle vs Shark was released in 2007 to critical acclaim.

He has directed several music videos, including two for Wellington band The Phoenix Foundation.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Waititi reveals:

• The trials of working with kids in Two Cars, One Night
• The story behind the now infamous “falling asleep” gag at the Oscars, and how he was left holding the baby
• Details on how the amazing, lifelike set for short film Tama Tū was realised
• The crazy story behind creation of the script for Eagle vs Shark
• How he approached writing and directing on Flight of the Conchords
• His general thoughts on choosing a career as a filmmaker
• An insight into the layout of his hill-top castle-themed mansion

This video is available on YouTube to embed and distribute via a Creative Commons licence

Credits:  Interview, Camera & Editing – James Coleman

For more than 20 years, actor Peter Elliott’s career has spanned theatre, film, television and radio. His most notable screen credits include playing Rex on Gloss, Dr David Kearney on Shortland Street, and more recently he was the TV ad face encouraging us to take civil defence seriously.

As well as TV drama, Elliott has fronted and narrated a range of documentary TV series such as Captain’s Log, Explorers, Frontier of Dreams and Secret New Zealand. He also wrote and presented Jungle Rain, a documentary about Agent Orange. Elliott was the first celebrity to appear in Intrepid Journeys. Now 50, Elliott has recently added a new skill to his repertoire – directing theatre.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Elliott discusses:

• The experience of being a ‘star’ in Gloss and why he had to pretend to be single
• How he got burned out and burned by his four years on Shortland Street
• Why he thinks male characters get a rough deal on the soap
• How being part of Captain’s Log was a dream come true and a boost to his morale
• What a confronting experience it was visiting Kenya in Intrepid Journeys
• The great experience of being in Until Proven Innocent and the talent of co-star Cohen Holloway
• And how he has finally become comfortable with himself and his transition into being a director

Musician, artist, writer and director Greg Page began his film career in Hamilton in the early 90s, making music videos for local bands. Since then the international award-winning filmmaker has written and directed several short films, including claymations Decaff and The New Zealand Centenary of Cinema, as well as Sarah’s Washing, and his full length feature film The Locals.

Page’s boundless energy and fanaticism has also given rise to some of NZ’s most memorable and spectacular music videos for top recording artists like Scribe, The D4 and Elemeno P.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Page reveals:

• how he shot his 1994 claymation short Decaff
• the story behind making the claymation short The New Zealand Centenary Of Cinema, along with John O’Shea
• behind-the-scenes details from his feature length horror The Locals, including the animation process, casting and soundtrack decisions
• how the D4’s Exit To the City music video came about and a behind-the-scenes insight
• what it was like shooting Elemeno P’s Verona in an icecream freezer in minus 20 degrees
• his views on the state of NZ’s film industry

This video is available on YouTube to embed and distribute via a Creative Commons licence.

Credits:  Interview, Camera & Editing – James Coleman

Actor/director Danny Mulheron has acted alongside drug-addicted frogs, haunted automobiles, and “force of nature” David Fane. After appearing in early Kiwi soap Close to Home, Mulheron went on to act on television, stage and film – including in the cult Peter Jackson puppet movie Meet the Feebles. In the late 80s he found himself working on both sides of the camera on a run of television sketch shows. Mulheron’s lengthy directorial CV now includes drama, comedy, and documentary.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Danny Mulheron talks about:

• working with a stuntman, while acting in Gaylene Preston’s haunted car movie Mr Wrong
• helping write the “outrageous script” for Peter Jackson puppet movie Meet the Feebles, then filming it in a freezing railways shed (Mulheron plays a homicidal hippo)
• working as a writer and actor on a run of sketch comedy shows for producer Dave Gibson, and beginning the move into directing
• directing “force of nature” David Fane on shortlived comedy show The Semisis, about a dysfunctional Samoan family
• moving into drama directing with The Strip, and The Hothouse
• co-creating un-PC TV series Seven Periods with Mr Gormsby, and finding an actor who could play Mr Gormsby, a racist, sexist schoolteacher at a low decile school
• showing films in a different way with personal documentary The Third Richard, made with wife Sara Stretton

This video is available on YouTube to embed and distribute via a Creative Commons licence.

Credits: Direction and Interview by Ian Pryor, Camera and Editing by Leo Guerchmann.