John Harris was the longtime owner of one of New Zealand’s biggest production companies: Greenstone TV. Harris began in state television as a reporter, and helped launch regional show Top Half. After leaving TVNZ he worked for Communicado, then launched Greenstone in 1994. There he was a producer on a huge range of TV shows, including The Zoo, Epitaph, Motorway Patrol and Neighbours at War. In 2010 Greenstone bought production company Cream Media; in 2013 Harris sold Greenstone to Australian company CJZ.
In this ScreenTalk interview, Harris talks about:
- "Marrying" presenters John Hawkesby and Judy Bailey on regional show Top Half
- How a pack of corgis ruined the Top Half set
- Producing That’s Fairly Interesting for Communicado
- An unforgettable rescue story which he covered on show Heroes
- Setting up his own company Greenstone Pictures (later renamed Greenstone TV) — "suddenly it was all on"
- How Epitaph showed a unique side of New Zealand history
- The reasons why he purchased Nigel Snowden's company Cream Media
- The "incredible privilege" of getting to tell other people’s stories on TV
Interview Credit
Copyright
This video was first uploaded on 26 April 2011, 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.
