Paul Holmes

News and magazine show Holmes was a Kiwi television fixture for fifteen years, helping turn broadcaster Paul Holmes into one of the most recognisable faces - and voices - in New Zealand television.  

Holmes has described himself as a lifelong rebel against the side of New Zealand culture frightened of openness, colour, and "expressions of passion and individuality."  He intended the Holmes show to celebrate the flipside: the many New Zealanders who have the capacity to be expressive, emotional and eloquent.

Holmes was the first son of a mechanic who had little time for the pompous. Growing up in 50s Hawkes Bay, Paul fell in love with radio, from serials and songs to the voices of Parliament. By the sixth form he was practicing announcing into the family tape-recorder, auditioning at the local radio station, and acting in theatre productions. 

At Victoria University Holmes studied law, then switched to arts. He got his first professional acting job, on a radio production of Anthony and Cleopatra. In his second year Holmes was elected president of the University Drama Society. He acted alongside Sam Neill, Ginette McDonald and his friend John Clarke. For his part in theatre piece The Brian Edwards Travelling Road Show, actor/writer Roger Hall recalls Holmes got the best laughs of the night. 

On-screen, Holmes appeared in 1971 short film ARD, and played the boyfriend in award-winning Paul Maunder docu-drama Going up North for a While.

Between stints at a Hawkes Bay freezing works, he was accepted on an announcer training course at the New Zealand Broadcasting Corporation. In 1972 he began announcing on Christchurch radio station 3ZM. That year a freak car accident resulted in a brain haemorrhage, leaving him permanently blinded in one eye.

In 1974 Holmes won a major part in Buck House, New Zealand TV's first situation comedy. He played one of a group of university students living in a run down flat. Then he flew to Los Angeles, where the antics of a local radio DJ inspired him with a plan to ring famous people like Idi Amin and the Archbishop of Canterbury on air. The interview with the Archbishop would see Holmes being banned from Radio New Zealand the following year.

A tape of Holmes' most spectacular calls and radio hoaxes would become an overseas calling card, winning him radio work in Brisbane and Swansea. Holmes found himself presenting breakfast radio in Vienna, and working for the Dutch World Service. It was during his time in Holland that Holmes flirted once more with television, after being hired to narrate video highlights packages for the 1980 Olympiad for the Disabled (Holmes would later present two documentaries about Kiwi para-Olympians).

After eight years in Europe, Holmes began doing morning talkback at Wellington radio station 2ZB in 1985. Adding to his previous interview experience, the new job taught him about "the political interview and the confrontational interview, the serious interview where lawyers are listening and the subject will fight to the death".

Two years later Brent Harman invited Holmes to Auckland to replace broadcasting legend Merv Smith, and introduce a news and interview format to 1ZB. Holmes saw in the new Newstalk ZB format the chance to cross traditional broadcasting lines between information and entertainment. In three months, the station fell from the top of the Auckland ratings to ninth, before ratings edged upwards. By late 1988, the Paul Holmes Breakfast Show sat at second.

That year TVNZ and TV3 approached Holmes about the possibility of a nightly current affairs programme. After testing the market with summer show Midweek with Holmes the first nightly Holmes show went to air in April 1989. The show won instant fame thanks to a controversial interview with American sailor Dennis Conner, in which Conner departed early after Holmes accused him of cheating in the America's Cup.

By 10.30 the morning after the interview went to air, TVNZ's Auckland switchboard had received more than 1200 phone calls, only a minority of them supportive. But the show had achieved spectacular liftoff. Three months later Holmes was in a helicopter that crashed into the ocean near Gisborne, while reporting for the show. Cameraman Joe Von Dinklage died.

For the next fifteen years Holmes worked two jobs, one feeding into the other - starting at 4.45am to work at Newstalk ZB, and then preparing for the TV show, which initially screened at 6.30pm before moving to 7pm after the news was extended to an hour.

On TV, Holmes interviewed everybody: politicians, visiting celebrities, Kiri Te Kanawa, Jonah Lomu after his 1996 wedding, and many less famous Kiwis besides. He also took a financial stake in independent production house Communicado.

In September 2003 Holmes won controversy after labelling United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan a "cheeky darkie" on his radio show. An open letter calling for Holmes' resignation was signed by Ralph Hotere, Witi Ihimaera, and historian Anne Salmond. Holmes lost a sponsor of his television show in the process, and sent an apology letter to the UN.

The following year Holmes left TVNZ to begin a three-year contract with fledgling network Prime Television. Many viewers failed to switch channels. After changing to an earlier timeslot, the show was cancelled within six months after poor ratings. Paul Holmes returned to Prime in a weekly format in 2005, and fronted a chat show the following year. 

In 2007 Holmes was seen on TV screens in a very different role, as a contestant on Dancing with the Stars.

In December 2008 Holmes handed his daily radio talkback slot to Mike Hosking, and moved to Saturday mornings. At that point Holmes' show still had three times the listeners of its nearest competitor.

His autobiography was published in 1999. In 2004 Paul Homes received a CNZM for services to broadcasting. He has been awarded for his work in radio, television, newspapers  - and making olive oil.