NZ On Screen and New Zealand Book Month (October)

October is New Zealand book month – a time to celebrate and showcase our many fine writers. NZ On Screen has a strong selection of programmes on NZ writers on the website, including the classic 1970s interview series Three New Zealanders featuring Janet Frame, Ngaio Marsh, and Sylvia Ashton-Warner.

Janet Frame is also represented on the site by excerpts from the 2004 documentary Wrestling with the Angel, and the trailer for the feature film An Angel At My Table (1990).

Acclaimed children’s writer Margaret Mahy features on the site in the documentaries Made in New Zealand (2004) and A Tall, Long Faced Tale (2008).

Historian and author, the late Michael King features in the documentaries History Man (2004), and Michael King, A Moment in Time (2007).

Kiwi poets also feature prominently on the site with the Allen Curnow documentary Early Days Yet (2001); an episode of the arts series Mercury Lane (2003) featuring Alistair Te Ariki Campbell; the Hone Tuwhare documentary titles Review, Hone Tuwhare (1975), Hone Tuwhare (1996), and Tuwhare (2005); the Sam Hunt titles Artists Prepare, Sam Hunt and Gary McCormick (1980) and Catching the Tide – Sam Hunt’s Cook Strait (1988); the James K Baxter documentary The Road to Jerusalem (1997); and the Denis Glover documentary Between the Lines: Denis Glover 1912 – 1980 (made in 2005).

Take some time out from reading and do some viewing…

NZ On Screen Writers Workshop

Last week we had a gathering of all our freelance writers. The writers have been commissioned to write synopses and unique perspectives on each of the titles in the site.

It was an opportunity for some of them to meet each other for the first time and also to get acquainted with Paul, the new editor. We also welcomed a new writers to the group, Debbie Martin, Makerita Urale and Tony Hiles. Other writers who have worked with us since February are Costa Botes, Mary Jane Duffy, Karen Nobes, Rachel Davies, Monika Ahuriri, Mihi (Midge) Murray, Richard King, Annie Simon and Michelle Scullion.

Today we also spent more hours at The Dominion Post scanning photos from their archive. As an example of some of the fantastic material that is in there, here is a photo of the ‘mobile news’ trucks in 1976. The back ground to the photo is that Muldoon wouldn’t go out to Avalon studios to be interviewed for ‘Eye Witness’ a current affairs programme. According to one of Mr Muldoon’s Press officers “This would have taken two hours of the Prime Minister’s time and he is too busy for that”

So they took all the equipment to the Beehive to do the show instead.

Beehive with news trucks 1976