What is the greatest New Zealand TV theme song ever written? Our search continues with a long forgotten Dave Dobbyn masterpiece from 1989. Previously in our search for New Zealand’s greatest TV theme song: Country Calendar Any major boomer will tell you: 1980s New Zealand was a different world. A world where you could smoke … Read more
With Police Ten 7 celebrating 500 episodes tonight, Professor Allan Blackman applies rigorous scientific analysis to the show’s most iconic moment. Can it really be seven years since the world was first introduced to the hilariously deadpan Sgt Guy Baldwin on Police Ten 7? His advice to Glen – a surly teen who supposedly had the 3am … Read more
Curious to see what life was like for young New Zealand women of a different era, Alex Casey turns to a 1969 special about beauty queens for a historical wake-up call. It’s hard yakka being a woman sometimes, with everyone screaming at us to hide our bra straps, contour our faces and clap for all … Read more
Janie Cameron details the horror of watching iconic New Zealand children’s television presenter Suzy Cato transform a kiwi favourite into the unthinkable. As a child of the ’90s, Suzy Cato taught me many things: the perils of headlice, how to water a person, and perhaps most importantly, that you’re never too old for a scrunchie. Despite … Read more
Before the Housewives, before the Bachelorettes, there were the Flatmates. Calum Henderson revisits one of New Zealand’s first gritty, no-frills attempts at reality television. Like everything else on this dying earth, reality television is subject to a slow and irreversible erosion. Over the years, the genre’s rough edges have been gradually worn down, leaving a … Read more
Sarah Robson reminisces with National MP Nikki Kaye about her time on Fish Out of Water, the reality show that was dumping people on an island years before Survivor. In 1996, before the term “reality TV” entered our everyday lexicon, TV3 decided to strand six Auckland teenagers on Rakitu Island in the Hauraki Gulf. They were … Read more
Mark Thomas was just 30 when, on the cusp of becoming a National MP, he was publicly knifed by his own Prime Minister and made history. He was our first sacrificial lamb under the MMP electoral system, ruthlessly cut by Jim Bolger two days before general election day in 1996, when National decided Act’s Richard … Read more
For Throwback Thursday this week, Claire Adamson arms herself with a bottle of wine and revisits the worst comedy series that New Zealand has ever made. In the early ’90s, a young and misguided television station called TV3 made a show so terrible that its name has become a byword for bad TV in this … Read more
Hayden Donnell looks back on one of New Zealand’s most iconic interviews. In December 1997, two teenage girls gave Paul Holmes the sternest test of his storied interviewing career. The Ingham twins, both 18, had gone to extraordinary lengths for love. Sarah had fallen for a sailor. Her sister Joanna decided to help her pursue … Read more
Katie Parker reopens the locker of her adolescence in Being Eve, the local teen series brimming with asymmetrical tank tops, IRL dating and fourth wall-breaking. Like all naive pre-teens, at the age of 10 all I wanted in the world was to hit adolescence. Whether I was trimming my non-existent leg hair with scissors or studying … Read more
One of New Zealand television’s longest running series Praise Be hits three decades on our screens on April 10. José Barbosa relives a lifetime of Sunday morning worship as archived on NZ On Screen. There are many things I find reassuring: ironed clothes, community libraries, that falsetto “eeeh?” sound John Key makes when he’s trying … Read more
Joseph Harper celebrates Taika Waititi’s ingenious early comedy gems on NZ On Screen. There’s lots of cool pre-Waititi era Taika – when he was better known as Taika Cohen – on the internet. There are a couple of really lo-fi vids of him and Jemaine Clement as The Humourbeasts hosting some kind of talent quest in … Read more
More than just a glimpse of what dating was like in bumbling, awkward, pre-internet New Zealand, this 1989 episode of Blind Date on NZ On Screen unwittingly introduced the nation to the woman who would go on to become our greatest ever TV saleswoman. Before she had dropped a single bowling ball onto a bamboo fiber … Read more
Alan Dale is a national treasure, acting legend and generally lovely man, who has for far too long flown under the radar. Katie Parker celebrates this humble kiwi great of the small screen. It was out of unconditional love that I joined my boyfriend to see the Entourage movie last year. As I should have … Read more
Alex Casey revisits clips from Miss Popularity on NZ On Screen, the reality competition where women were called “Boomerang Babes” and left at the mercy of the Australian Outback. 2005 was a strong year. I met Neville Longbottom at Armageddon whilst wearing a ‘Vote for Pedro’ badge, everyone at my school was either in love … Read more
Inspired by more recent NZ On Air funding controversies, Gareth Shute revisits the 1976 historical epic The Governor, and argues why it remains our finest example of a funding furore. Julie Christie recently made headlines for complaining in an email to NZ On Air head, Miriam Dean, that her integrity had been questioned by managers at the funding body. … Read more
This week saw the glamorous debut of Filthy Rich, New Zealand’s most expensive television show. But is it merely standing on the shoulder pads of giants? Gloss creator Rosemary McLeod looks back at the 80s Kiwi drama that had a wealth of big hair, high heels and old money. I walked into Sue Crockford’s Auckland art gallery one … Read more
This year New Zealand television seems to be returning to yonder year of traditional family-oriented game shows such as Family Feud and Mastermind. So what other game shows could we see back on our screens? With the help of NZ On Screen, we revisit some of our old favourites. Hayden Donnell on Tux Wonder Dogs … Read more
Alex Casey revisits the 1998 Hero parade coverage on NZ On Screen with a little help from parade highlight, international model and TV legend Colin Mathura-Jeffree. It’s no secret that most parades are pretty terrible. The Santa parade is a hot mess of Farmers flyers, sticky children and begrudging Shortland Street cast members. The All Blacks … Read more
Once Were Warriors, released in 1994, shocked the world with brutal scenes of domestic violence, suicide and rape. As director Lee Tamahori prepares for the release of his first New Zealand film since that break-out hit, Elizabeth Beattie looks back at the New Zealand it depicted and asks, how much has really changed? Trigger Warning: … Read more
This week a “technical glitch” affected the usual smooth running of TVNZ’s One News, delaying the broadcast by several minutes. It might be rare for TV news to go off the rails and head in unexpected directions, but it has happened before. José Barbosa unpacks some of New Zealand’s most notable TV disruptions with help … Read more
The history of New Zealand television features plenty of lowlights, but few as low as the drunken and chaotic 1987 Listener Gofta Awards. Comedian Michele A’Court was there. It is possible that I am one of the few people who has fond memories of the 1987 Gofta Awards. It’s also possible that I am one … Read more
Earlier this year Alex Casey watched Putting Our Town on the Map, a 1995 documentary on NZ On Screen that unearthed the bizarre origins and rituals around Paeroa’s L&P bottle and Ohakune’s giant carrot. Our host Miranda Harcourt is taking us around New Zealand, looking at what different small towns have done to put themselves on … Read more
This year Pam Corkery had a crack at reality television – but she is by no means the first politician to dive in front of the camera. With the help of the internet and genius archivists NZ On Screen, Sarah Robson takes a look at five of the best appearances. In a time before she donned … Read more
With a bit of spare time on your hands this summer, you might want to revisit some old family-friendly classics. José Barbosa suggests the legendary Kiwi canine caper A Dog’s Show on NZ On Screen, arguing a strong case for why it is the best television show New Zealand has ever seen. It’s become part of … Read more
Think this year’s Shortland Street cliffhanger was dramatic? The 1995 festive special was even more heartrending. Tara Ward remembers the Christmas episode that shocked a nation. Christmas Day television is notoriously bad. You can guarantee a Royal Variety Performance and a Vicar of Dibley special, and Jamie Oliver is bound to chuck a litre of olive … Read more
How do we remember Rob Muldoon? Hardly at all, if the paucity of coverage around the 40th anniversary of his first election victory as leader of the National Party is a guide. And yet he’s surely the least forgettable Prime Minister New Zealand has seen. Everyone knows about the Great Counterpuncher On November 29, 1975, … Read more
In 1999 Spinoff Editor Duncan Greive featured in a music documentary called Sweet As. 16 years later it was innocently suggested by Throwback Thursday’s new sponsors NZ On Screen for post, with the newsy hook being that we headed into festival season. Against his better judgement, he agreed to re-examine what is without doubt most publicly embarrassing thing he’s … Read more
The medium is now the message, even more than it has ever been. Gay writer and documentary maker David Herkt examines the tragedies and triumphs of homosexual life as reflected in the TV media culture of mid-20th century New Zealand. There was Peter Sinclair, Lew Pryme – and then there was Hudson & Halls… At … Read more