John A Givins: early days of drama, Queer Nation, and more...

Interview – 2009

John (Johnny) A Givins has been an actor, director and producer. His independent production company Livingstone Productions is best known for long-running LGBT series Queer Nation, and award-winning documentary show Captain's Log.

In this ScreenTalk, Givins talks about:

Starting out as a TV actor in Children of Fire Mountain, with director Peter Sharp
How Sharp helped him get a break into TV drama directing a few years later
Directing drama with TVNZ in the 1980s, including Country GP and Peppermint Twist
Working on Shortland Street in its early days, while developing his own ideas
The origins of the name for Livingstone Productions
Being gay and making gay television, from Hero Parade specials to long-running series Queer Nation
The birth of historical/travel show Captain's Log
His view that Queer Nation fell victim to an "assault" by TVNZ

This video was first uploaded on 11 May 2009, and is available under this Creative Commons licence. This licence is limited to use of ScreenTalk interview footage only and does not apply to any video content and photographs from films, television, music videos, web series and commercials used in the interview.

Interview - Clare O'Leary. Camera and Editing - Leo Guerchmann

So we set up our office, got the researchers in, and started making Queer Nation programmes. Queer people making queer stories about outselves, and it was great. It was just very adventurous.
– John A Givins on taking over production of long-running series Queer Nation in 1999

John's Full Profile