ScreenTalk

Rachel Jean has produced and/or directed over 40 documentaries, made award-winning drama and film, and set up and run production company Isola Productions. Jean has recently moved from producing and directing to the role of Head of Drama and Comedy at TV3 and C4.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Jean reveals:

• Details of her early work at Frame Up Films
• How feature film Memory and Desire was conceived
• Hilarious and embarrassing moments during filming of Love Mussel
• The joys of spending her pregnancy on the floor and laughing while helping write Secret Agent Men
• How The Market came about, and its intriguing production philosophy
• An insight into the making of her documentary Life, Death and a Lung Transplant about her husband’s Cystic Fibrosis and lung transplant
• Her most satisfying achievements so far as Head of Drama and Comedy at TV3 and C4

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

Drama producer Chris Hampson has worked in film and television for nearly 30 years. During that time, he has seen many commissioners, programmers, policies and Governments come and go, while negotiating the sometimes treacherous landscape of TV and film production, along the way delivering films and TV shows such as Illustrious Energy, Marlin Bay, Doves of War and Kaitangata Twitch.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Hampson reveals:

• How he started out in television
• Some of the processes involved in making Footrot Flats: The Dog’s (Tail) Tale
• The joys and challenges of making feature film Illustrious Energy
• Details of the creation of South Pacific Pictures, and making Marlin Bay
• Camera techniques used on Cover Story
• An insight into the way Street Legal was shot
• The guerilla tactics used to shoot some of Doves of War
• The story behind the rise and fall of Orange Roughies
• How feature film Under the Mountain came about
• Behind-the-scenes details on the making of Kaitangata Twitch

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

With more than 30 years in the television industry under his belt, veteran drama producer and director Chris Bailey has made a significant contribution to New Zealand’s screen heritage. His many TV credits include Gloss, Mortimer’s Patch, Under the Mountain, Burying Brian, Marlin Bay, City Life, and Greenstone. He was also the first executive producer on Shortland Street. Bailey was a co-founder of production company ScreenWorks which made the popular legal drama Street Legal.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Bailey talks about:

• The fun and challenges of making the kidult TV series Under the Mountain
• Creating a mechanical means of teleportation before the use of CGI technology
• Directing the ‘bitchy’ women on uber-soap Gloss
• Having to be careful casting characters in the historical mini-series Fallout
• Getting the soap Shortland Street up and running
• Casting Jay Laga’aia in the gritty legal drama Street Legal
• The challenge of making sure Go Girls stood up against overseas shows on TV2
• Feeling lucky to have had a challenging yet rewarding and fun career

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

John Clarke is one of New Zealand’s best-loved comic performers. His 1970s TV character Fred Dagg has become an icon of Kiwi comedy. Clarke has worked as a comedian, actor, writer and director in television and film and on both sides of the Tasman.

In Australia, his satirical television series The Games was an Australian Film Institute award-winner, and he also won Best Personality at the 1976 NZ Feltex Awards. Clarke has been based in Australia since the late 1970s, but has recently lent his unmistakeable comic voice to New Zealand television productions bro’Town and Radiradirah.

In a departure from our usual ScreenTalk format, this audio interview with John Clarke was produced and recorded by Andrew Johnstone and Richard Swainson with the assistance of Hamilton Community Radio and The Film School.

Clarke talks about his early days in New Zealand, the development of the Fred Dagg character, his work in pioneering NZ films Wild Man and Dagg Day Afternoon, and his long television and film career in Australia.

Frank Torley is a Kiwi television legend. Forever known as that Country Calendar guy – he has variously narrated, directed, produced, and reported for the show, over a period of more than 40 years. But Torley hasn’t always been Mr Rural. He has also spent time as a newsreader, Top Town presenter, documentary maker (including an early doco on Aids), and spent time in religious programmes.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Torley talks about:

• breaking into radio as a rural broadcaster, during his Mark III Zephyr/slouch hat period
• the joys of producing Country Calendar (starting in 1982), and offering a front window into farming for the common man
• the origins of Country Calendar’s spoofs, and contributions by cartoonist Burton Silver
• the early Country Calendar producer who kept offending those being interviewed
• the nail-biting dog versus sheep tension that was A Dog’s Show, thanks to host John Gordon – plus the show’s premature death
• being compared to a startled rabbit, while newsreading for the newly reborn TV One
• handling birth scenes for documentary From Here to Maternity
• the days when ratings weren’t so important
• to retire – or not to retire

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

Bigger Better Faster Stronger host James Coleman trained as an actor and appeared in the acclaimed film Stickmen, but has mainly made his name as a broadcaster on radio and television. He hosted TV3’s morning show Sunrise, and blended his actor and broadcaster roles in the TV satire The Jaquie Brown Diairies.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Coleman talks about:

• The pleasure of pimping household appliances on Bigger Better Faster Stronger
• Why the show appeals to both men and women
• Unnerving his co-hosts on Sunrise with his ad-libbing
• His reasons for leaving the show
• The strange experience of playing ‘himself’ on The Jaquie Brown Diaries
• Playing a gay man in the short film Thinking About Sleep
• Learning how to act without much dialogue
• How the feature Stickmen was a big step up for him
• Why stylistically the film feels dated now

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

Playwright and screenwriter Roger Hall has made a significant contribution to New Zealand’s television landscape. Two of his highly successful stage comedies became TV hits – Gliding On and Neighbourhood Watch. Hall wrote three one-off TV plays for the Spotlight series:The Bach, The Reward, and Some People Get All the Luck. As well as his own creations, Hall has also written for Pukemanu and Spin Doctors.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Hall talks about:

• Rolling on the floor laughing while writing for the sitcom Buck House
• Why he took his name off the credits in series two
• How mega-hit Gliding On was initially rejected by TVNZ and why the show became so popular
• The genesis of Middle Age Spread and the complexity of the story
• The joy of writing for the very topical and fast turn-around satire Spin Doctors
• Trying to bribe his way out of a visit to Uganda in Intrepid Journeys
• Getting dumped in the Nile on a rafting trip

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

Pio Terei is an actor, singer and comedian, who has been involved in a wide range of TV shows such as: Issues, Pete and Pio, Big Night In and Tangaroa with Pio. He also had a small role in the feature film No. 2 and a dramatic role in Mataku. In 2009 Terei began hosting iconic quiz show It’s in the Bag for Maori Television.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Terei talks about:

• Being a little scared joining legends of comedy on Issues
• Adopting an arrogant persona to impersonate Winston Peters on the show
• Working with mentor Peter Rowley on the comedy show Pete and Pio
• How ‘taking the piss’ out of Pākehā in The Life and Times of Te Tutu raised hackles
• Being inspired by his co-stars in the feature film No. 2
• Loving the unique sense of New Zealand in game show It’s in the Bag
• How winning a booby prize meant so much to one contestant

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

Aussie import Gavin Strawhan is a screen writer who has had a hand in many of our recent TV drama successes. After assisting with the set up of Shortland Street, Strawhan then teamed with writing colleague Rachel Lang to create the drama series Jackson’s Wharf, Mercy Peak, Lawless, and This is Not My Life. Strawhan has worked on Burying Brian, Go Girls, and Outrageous Fortune; and co-created the kidult drama Being Eve. He also helped develop a number of feature films such as Crooked Earth, Whale Rider, and Jubilee, and in 2010 wrote the screenplay for Matariki.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Strawhan talks about:

• The difficulty in finding experienced writers at the beginning of Shortland Street
• How bringing on writer Rachel Lang made a huge difference to the soap
• How Shortland Street brought real kiwi accents and characters to the small screen
• Realising the impact writers have on a show while writing for Lawless
• Go Girls being a show about kindness and optimism
• How This is Not My Life was partly a critique of capitalism
• How the finished version of Matariki was a lot more serious than the script he worked on
• How a director’s vision differs from a writer’s vision
• Why being a writer involves ‘fraud’

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

David Fane failed comedy at drama school. But since leaving Toi Whakaari, Fane has delighted audiences with his comic performances in Skitz, The Semisis, Tongan Ninja, bro’Town, Sione’s Wedding, Outrageous Fortune, Eagle vs Shark and Radiradirah. Fane has also appeared in the drama series The Market and The Strip, and the feature film The Tattooist.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Fane discusses:

• His feelings about Toi Whakaari
• How he landed his first TV role on Skitz
• What it was like acting with his mates on The Semisis
• How his character’s name came about in Tongan Ninja
• Behind-the-scenes observations from The Strip
• How bro’Town began, and the important messages behind some of the silliness
• The joys of playing Falani in Outrageous Fortune
• Hilarious behind-the-scenes details from Eagle vs Shark
• How performances were worked up in Radiradirah
• An insight into upcoming feature film Love Birds

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