50 Years of New Zealand Television: 6 - A Sense of Identity

Television (Full Length Episode) – 2010

When TV began in New Zealand in 1960, posh English accents on screen were de rigueur. As veteran broadcaster Judy Callingham recalls in this sixth episode of Kiwi TV history: "every trace of a New Zealand vowel was knocked out of you." But as ties to Mother England weakened, Kiwis began to feel proud of their identity and culture. John Clarke invented farming comedy legend Fred Dagg, while Karyn Hay showed a Kiwi accent could be cool on Radio with Pictures. Sam Neill and director Geoff Murphy add their thoughts on the changing ways that Kiwis saw themselves.

We were suffering from terrible colonial cringe, we just didn't want to be New Zealanders. There was no sense in those days, except on the sporting field perhaps and in war, that New Zealanders were proud of being New Zealanders.
– Broadcaster Judy Callingham on Kiwi attitudes in the 1960s