ScreenTalk

Jon Bridges was born in America. Since moving to New Zealand at the age of three, he has made hundreds of hours of television for NZers – not only from in front of the camera, but also behind it.

Bridges’ comic dexterity came to light on our screens in the early 90s with TV shows like A Bit After Ten and Away Laughing, but his first big TV role was as co-presenter of the long-running TV3 series Ice TV, which debuted in 1995.

Since Ice TV, Bridges has written, directed, produced and starred in numerous documentaries, dramas, game shows and films. He is currently producing TV3’s well-received comedy panel show 7 Days.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Bridges shares his experiences on:

• Working with the fledgling TV3
• The evolution of TV skit comedy in NZ
• How back room reservations meant a change from Ice TV’s original name
• Working with director Mike Huddleston on the documentary Who Ate All the Pies?
• The perils of being cast twice on Shortland Street
• Writing for the youth dramas S.A.M. and Amazing Extraordinary Friends
• Regretful moments in NZ television
• Producing the TV panel show 7 Days

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

Credits:  Interview, Camera & Editing – James Coleman

Veteran documentary producer/director George Andrews is a vocal supporter of public service broadcasting, and was the main creative force behind the iconic early 1980s documentary series Landmarks.

Andrews began his career as a broadcast journalist, later moving to producing and directing.

In this ScreenTalk interview he talks about:

• the story of his rather short-lived career presenting the early TV current affairs show Gallery
• producing the ground-breaking documentary series Landmarks in the early 1980s
• his involvement in the start-up of TV3, and how the network’s direction changed over time, moving it away from the public service style programming that he had hoped for
• his independent production company George Andrews Productions, and some of the programmes he has enjoyed making over the years
• how his 2006 documentary Made in Taiwan – starring Oscar Kightley and Nathan Rarere – came about
• and finally he tells the story of how Made in Taiwan led to his 2008 documentary Allan Wilson – Evolutionary, about the pioneering and controversial New Zealand-born biologist. The programme was funded by the University of California, Berkeley, where Wilson spent much of his career.

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

Credits: Direction and interview by Clare O’Leary, Camera and Editing by Leo Guerchmann.

Tainui Stephens (Te Rarawa) is one of our foremost Māori broadcasters. He has worked as a reporter, writer, director, producer and executive producer. His credits include Maori Battalion March to Victory and The New Zealand Wars.

Stephens was a stalwart of TVNZ’s Māori Programmes department in the 1980s and 90s, working on the regular series Koha, Waka Huia, Marae and Mai Time.

In this interview Tainui Stephens discusses:

• being raised by his Pākehā mother, and his own personal journey “into my Māoridom”
• beginning work at TVNZ Māori Programmes in 1984, and how much he enjoyed his work there
• how he loves all the programmes he has worked on over the years
• the good that Māori broadcasting can do
• the Maori Television Service, its success, and the important role it plays in New Zealand life.

This interview is available on YouTube for distribution via a Creative Commons licence.

Credits: Interview by Monika Ahuriri, camera and direction by Clare O’Leary. Editing by Leo Guerchmann.

John A Givins (Johnny) is an actor, director and producer.  His independent production company Livingstone Productions is best known for the long-running TV2 gay series Queer Nation, and the award-winning TV ONE documentary series Captain’s Log.

Givins talks about starting out as a TV actor in Children of Fire Mountain, with director Peter Sharp.  He also tells the story of how Sharp helped him get a break into TV drama directing a few years later.

Givins discusses his drama directing days with TVNZ in the 1980s, working on series such as Country GP, The Seekers, and Peppermint Twist.

He talks about working on Shortland Street in its early days, and how he was also developing his own independent production ideas at that time.

Givins explains where the name for Livingstone Productions came from, and its connection to his Scottish heritage.

Givins also talks about being gay and making gay television, starting with the TV productions of the Hero Parade, and moving on to long-running TVNZ series Queer Nation.

He outlines how he developed Livingstone Productions, and talks about the creation of the Captain’s Log documentary series.

To close, Givins talks about the end of Queer Nation – saying its demise was the result of an “assault” by TVNZ.

This video is also available on YouTube for distribution via a Creative Commons licence.

Credits: Interview by Clare O’Leary. Camera and editing by Leo Guerchmann.

Producer Elizabeth Mitchell set up Firehorse Films to produce the popular TV3 animated comedy series bro’Town.

Mitchell was a print journalist turned television promotions director, and she explains that her only experience in animation prior to bro’Town was a TV ad on the white spotted tussock moth.

Mitchell outlines how the original idea for bro’Town came about, and talks about her long friendship with Naked Samoans and bro’Town star Oscar Kightley.

She also talks about the early development for the series, how she got the animation team together, and what the production process for bro’Town is.

Mitchell discusses audience reaction to the series – thinking it would be watched by “young brown people” only to find that it was also enjoyed by “old white people”.

Lastly, Mitchell discusses the future for bro’Town now that the last TV series is on air – a future that includes television specials and a bro’Town movie.

This interview is also available on YouTube.

Credits: Interview by Clare O’Leary, Camera and Editing by Leo Guerchmann.

Producer Larry Parr talks to NZ On Screen about the business and art of film and TV production. Parr discusses:

• His unconventional path into the industry: “I wasn’t like Geoff [Murphy], Ian [Mune], or Bruno [Lawrence] …” Parr had started out as a lawyer in a bank.
• Early days working to raise the money for, and market, the iconic Roger Donaldson-directed films, Smash Palace and Sleeping Dogs.
• Raising the finance for a slew of eighties features (Bridge to Nowhere, Starlight Hotel, Queen City Rocker, Constance, Came a Hot Friday, Pallet on the Floor).
• The landmark 1989 Māori drama series E Tipu E Rea which he produced and which launched the careers of a remarkable number of Māori filmmakers (Lee Tamahori, Riwia Brown, Rawiri Paratene, Anzac Wallace, Wi Kuki Kaa and more). “The series was all Māori crew and cast except for three DoPs”.
• His time as head of production at TVNZ’s Avalon studios.
• The failure of Kahukura Productions and the “time in purgatory” he served between its collapse, and joining Māori Television in 2005 as Head of Programming.
• Finishing his directorial debut Fracture and helping Taika Waititi complete his Oscar-nominated short film Two Cars, One Night.
• The achievement of Māori Televsion: “creating a receptive audience [for Māori stories].”
• His new role at Te Māngai Pāho and his vision for a bi-lingual Aotearoa and the promotion of te reo on our screens: “just imagine what sort of country New Zealand would be if everybody had grown up since 1840 speaking both languages … we’d be unstoppable!”

Through the ups and downs of a colourful career in independent and network filmmaking Parr reflects on his most satisfying moments, ultimately settling on the 2006 ANZAC Day broadcast on Māori Television, which changed the “social and political landscape and ensured MTS’s place in the broadcasting landscape.”

This interview is available to download or distribute on YouTube.

Also see: Maori Television and Te Māngai Pāho

Credits: Direction and Interview – Clare O’Leary, Camera and Editing – Leo Guerchmann

American producer Rob Tapert talks to NZ On Screen about hearing that New Zealand was “an undiscovered production treasure” in a studio carpark and he discusses the internationally popular syndicated TV programmes that he’s brought here (Xena: Warrior Princess and Hercules) that have helped realise that vision.

These productions were instrumental in building the skill base of the NZ cast and crew. Many NZ actors found fame through their characters, particularly Lucy Lawless (now married to Tapert) and Michael Hurst (Iolas in Hercules).

Tapert talks about his beginnings in the industry: dropping out of grad school in Michigan (where, “Hollywood might as well have been as far away as New Zealand”) to make films with long time business partner and Hollywood director, Sam – Evil Dead, Spider-Man – Raimi. Tapert also discusses:

• Making blood mixture on their first feature, Evil Dead.
• The inherent difference between feature films and television.
• His involvement in Hercules and the challenges of juggling global productions.
• His commitment to local cast and crew and the unlikely inspiration for Hercules’ cast (Desperate Remedies).
• His inspirations for Hercules’ spin-off Xena and the internet’s influence on Xena becoming a pop culture icon.
• Why local actors and directors have succeeded on these productions, but NZ writers haven’t managed the crossover and why post-production effects were done in the US.

Tapert continues to bring new productions to NZ, and is about to cast a new R-rated series for US Cable TV based on the Roman slave story, Spartacus. He has recently finished producing another major TV series in Auckland, Legend of the Seeker.

This video is available for distribution on YouTube as Part One and Part Two.

Credits: Direction and Interview – Clare O’Leary, Camera and Editing – Leo Guerchmann

It is hard to imagine a credit roll for the New Zealand film and television industry without the name John Barnett being high on the titles.

Since the 1970’s John Barnett has been key in bringing a host of uniquely Kiwi stories to local and international screens, from Fred Dagg to Footrot Flats, from Whale Rider to Sione’s Wedding and What Becomes Of The Broken Hearted?, from iconic soap Shortland Street to the wildly successful Westie family drama, Outrageous Fortune.

Barnett talks to NZ On Screen’s Clare O’Leary about his 30+ years as a driving force in New Zealand television and film:

• his beginnings in the television and film industry in the seventies, from working on children’s series The Games Affair, and the Endeavour Productions’ documentary series on Janet Frame, Ngaio Marsh and Sylvia Aston-Warner, to managing John Clarke (aka Fred Dagg)
• branching out into feature film production with Dagg Day Afternoon, Middle Aged Spread and Beyond Reasonable Doubt
• on his motivation: making films that “people understand immediately” and telling universal stories (Whale Rider, Sione’s Wedding)
• being involved in lobbying for the formation of the New Zealand Film Commission.
• heading South Pacific Pictures, New Zealand’s largest film and television production company and developing programmes (Shortland Street, Outrageous Fortune) that “reflect the way we [New Zealanders] see ourselves.”
• on his favourite production: “They’re all my children … I love everything we’ve made … we have a kind of mantra here [at SPP] : we’re not going to get involved unless we love it … I like stories in which people challenge the system and win: beating the odds is something that everybody understands.”

For more clips and background information, and profiles of cast and crew from the film and television titles produced by Barnett and South Pacific Pictures, see NZ On Screen.

This interview is available for download and distribution on YouTube as Part 1 and Part 2.

Credits: Direction and Interview – Clare O’Leary, Camera and Editing – Leo Guerchmann

Gibson Group Producer Dave Gibson reflects on his long career in the television and film industry, from early days filming student films on a borrowed Bolex camera to making shows for mobile phones and interactive walls for museums.

Find out more about Dave Gibson on NZ On Screen.

This interview is available on YouTube for distribution and sharing: Part One and Part Two.

Credits: Direction and Interview – Clare O’Leary, Camera and Editing – Leo Guerchmann