Lana Coc-Kroft: danger on screen and in real life...

Interview – 2012

Lana Coc-Kroft first rose to prominence by being crowned Miss Universe New Zealand in 1988. After her TV debut as a model on Sale of the Century, she became co-host of Wheel of Fortune. Coc-Kroft established herself as an adrenaline junkie on shows like Mountain Dew On the Edge and Can You Hackett, and the equal of her male colleagues on SportsCafe. While filming reality TV show Celebrity Treasure Island, she developed a life-threatening illness after being cut by coral. She recovered and went on to co-host Who Dares Wins.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Coc-Kroft talks about:

How Phillip Leishman helped her overcome stage fright on Wheel of Fortune
Struggling with her role on the show
Jumping from a helicopter for the first episode of Mountain Dew On the Edge
Asking the "dumb' questions on SportsCafe
The truth behind giving her phone number out on air
Demanding to be fed on the set of Celebrity Treasure Island
How getting sick on the show changed the local TV industry
Feeling insecure on the set of Test the Nation
The real reason she thinks she was hired for Who Dares Wins
Being inspired by AJ Hackett on show Can You Hackett

This video was first uploaded on 14 August 2012, 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, Camera and Editing – Andrew Whiteside

...we could walk into a very public arena like Manukau city or wherever, and be recognised enough that people would talk to us and stop and communicate . . . if you'd had a complete unknown, I think you'd find it hard to stop people and get them to do anything, let alone jump in a car and come with you . . . 'look we're just heading out to Matamata, because we're gonna do something really extreme like stick you in a racing car and make you flip it over three times'.
– Lana Coc-Kroft on the value of having well known people fronting show Who Dares Wins

Lana's Full Profile