50 Years of New Zealand Television: 5 - Telling Stories

Television (Full Length Episode) – 2010

From early teleplay The Evening Paper to the edgy Outrageous Fortune, this episode of 50 Years of New Zealand Television talks drama and comedy. Key players, from actors to executives, recall a host of signposts in the development of storytelling on Kiwi TV screens. John Clarke recalls 1970s sitcom Buck's House; Paul Maunder remembers the drama that likely helped introduce the DPB; and TV executive John McRae recalls worries about the projected cost of global hit Hunter's Gold, and mentioning the word 'placenta' on the first episode of Shortland Street.

We spent $600,000, and when I went to the board of South Pacific Television to get the funds, they nearly fell over: 'No, we can't spend that sort of money on a children's programme', they called it. I was proved right, because it made a huge amount of money — in the end it did.
– South Pacific Television drama boss John McRae, on 1976 series Hunter's Gold