Mark II was the third film in a loose trilogy written by Mike Walker. It was originally written for the big screen but finance was difficult to come by. In the meantime Mike wrote and directed two other films ‘Kingi’s Story’ (1981) and ‘Kingpin’ (1985) both of which were quite well received.
In 1985 Mike approached John McRae Head of Drama at TVNZ and offered to sell the MarkII script with a view to having it produced in house at TVNZ.
Mike was having some health problem at that time and was not able to take on the grind of financing, producing and directing a feature film. It was a project close to his heart and he was prepared (reluctantly) to hand it over to someone else, the alternative being that it would probably never come to fruition given his health prognosis at the time.
Unfortunately he was turned down by John, the main excuse being that the Drama Dept. had no producers to spare for a new project.
Let’s cut to the chase.
I ended up being the producer who put up his hand after an approach by Gary Ryan who was a mutual friend of Mike and myself. I had met Mike when Kingi’s Story was being produced through Avalon. He had come across as a very amiable person and a passionate film maker and visual artist with great skill in film animation.
Gary sent me a script/screenplay which had been meant for the cinema. It was a longish script being about 140 minutes duration.
I quite liked the story, not least because the three main protagonists were not too much older than my own three sons at the time. I could relate to their emotional problems I guess. But I did not want to get involved. After doing five years of soaps I was looking forward to a break. However, I decided to give my wife Teresa a look at the script. She loved it! “Do it” she commanded. Mother of three sons I guess.
So it was off to see The Head of Drama to attempt a change of heart on his part.
John was not keen to proceed with the script. He never expressed much interest in scripts that leaned towards ‘worthiness’ or reality. More of a show biz person, his long career had largely been in middle of the road drama at which he was admittedly very proficient. At The BBC he had a very successful career over a period of twenty years or more. Charles Dickens appealed to John but if you look at his versions of Dickens you wont see any horse shit in the streets. Instead you might see what looks like a painting on a Mackintosh’s Quality Street lollie tin.
Also he was of the opinion that “this Māori thing” was a passing phase and would soon blow over.(!). I was moved to express the opposite view and cautioned him that rather than blow over it would soon become a tidal wave that would engulf us in great social disruption and force change on all of us and our institutions particularily Broadcasting.
To his credit he did listen and responded to my show of passionate committment. (At the same time that all this was going on I was also thinking “WTF am I doing, I don’t really want this. Why don’t I let him talk me out of it and I can say I did my best and that’s it.”).
But as usual my rational mind was overcome by my over talkative one and I convinced myself that I had to win. One of my great weaknesses was that I tended to believe my own bullshit to the point that I could often convince others of the rightness of my cause. Not a deliberate ploy, but more a rush of blood to the head. I did however genuinely like the idea of MarkII and wanted to see it succeed. In my favour was the fact that a complete film crew had been sidelined due to the cancellation of the latest season of a major drama. So there was crew lying idle. I had a sum of money in my head which would cover costs. (At this point I acknowledge that the money amount had been calculated by Jill Wilson who would be the production manager if we got the go ahead. Jill was one of a number of women who worked in drama as production managers (largely unheralded) and who had exact expertise in the art of budgeting).
Ok! After a while John relented and I had my money.
Oh dear! What have I wrought? I wondered.
I soon found out.
We were somewhere near the end of July 1985 and really had to be ready to shoot by mid September at the latest.
And so started a crazy mad rush to find a director, get the script edited to TV movie length, cast the main leads and supporting cast, find locations, book laboratory time for rushes and editing, and printing, all overseen by our wonderful film editor Paul Sutorious, talk to every crew member individually and establish that there were no hidden agendas (political or cultural). Glad to report that everyone was totally supportive and sympathetic to the Kaupapa. The story of three boys from the other side of the tracks resonated with everyone. That support remained throughout the shoot. I have never worked on any other project that had such feeling of solidarity between the crew and cast. It was that solidarity that saw us through to the end of shoot.
You can’t buy that sort of loyalty. It just happens.
And now we had our Director, John Anderson, (sadly no longer with us). And our script editor, actor and Writer Rachel Lang who would later be the brains behind Outrageous Fortune and other fine dramas coming out of South Pacific Pictures.
I drove John and Rachel to Levin where Mike Walker lived and was glad to see them hitting it off right from the start. John and his then spouse Ali Webber were prominent in the battle for gay rights and they both became life long friends of Mike who had experienced the pains of being gay as a teenager in the 1940’s and later in the fifties when we were a very repressive society in such personal and private matters.
Then we had a script. Now it was 90 minutes long but would eventually be reduced even further to 72 minutes due to Network requirements. Sigh!
You take what you can get. (The dollar rules).
And now we had our cast.
John had done the bulk of casting. My contribution was to start the process of finding our three leads. We used studio four at Avalon (The Network News studio which was often not used in the am between 9 and noon.) John Bach an old mate from Close To Home days came in to read with the actors. It was an unusual auditioning process. Very informal and relaxed with the actors not feeling unnecessary stress. John kept it all casual and calm.
All other parts were cast by John Anderson who had a track record in theatre and had many friends and contacts in the acting sphere.
Among the supporting cast were Tama(Tom) Poata and Jim Moriarty, two stalwarts in the struggle for Māori participation in film and television. Tom was a founder member of Nga Tamatoa. His political acumen was invaluable in keeping the film on track politically and culturally.
John the director was unusual among others I had worked with. He often would cast people who were not actors for smaller roles and sometimes found real gold. It all helped in giving the film a more naturalistic look and feel.
We were meant to shoot the whole thing around Wellington and the Hutt but it soon became clear that the feel of a road movie could only be achieved on the road.
I had been given a certain sum of money by The Head of Drama to fund the ‘above the line costs’ of the movie and some leeway on how I could use it. So after consultation with key crew members we decided to send the show on the road without telling the boss.
Sometimes when you are dealing with large cumbersome beasts like public service TV you have to be a bit subversive to achieve your ends and that’s what we did.
The crew went off to Auckland and worked their way down SH1 and occasional byways all the way back to Wellington. The results were well worth it and the film looks better for it.
We filmed through most of September and the first two weeks of October.
So just a bit over three months after I got that first phone call from Gary Ryan asking me to intervene on behalf of Mike Walker, we had the film in the can.
Not bad, not too bad mate. Bloody good I reckon.
But it was all down to the solidarity and work ethic of the crew who had become like a family during the shoot. And we had help from the Weather Gods. I can only recall one day of rain during the whole shoot. The sun just kept on shining.
Kia ora for all the friendly spirits and ghosts who came along for the ride. Ka mau te pai!
And that’s it really (but I should mention that shortly , after the crew started filming in Auckland, John McRae The H.O.D. was on a visit to Avalon and he looked into my office and drawled “Dan, I was walking down Karangahape Road and I thought I saw the MarkII crew filming there. “What really?” I said and we both laughed. He deserves credit for thinking outside the box when it was required.
And that’s about it really, apart from heaps of film editing and sound mixing over the next four months or so finishing in 1986.
In 1987 MarkII won the best single drama award at the (now infamous) Gofta Awards.
John Anderson accepted the award for all of us.
A few weeks afterwards John Reid delivered the award to me at Avalon. He had it in a brown paper bag. Perfect!
Sometime later I travelled up to Levin and had a cup of tea with Mike Walker and gave him the award still in it’s little bag. After all it was Mike’s film which he had always wanted to make and we did it for him as best we could.
R.I.P Mike.
Many thanks to Alison Langdon and Shirley Langdon, Jill Wilson and Gary Ryan for their unwavering support during that time.
My apologies for my tardiness in getting this post published. It’s a long story.
Particular apologies to Murray Hutchinson my only paying subscriber. Murray I would be not at all dismayed or miffed if you wanted to cease your subscription. Thank you for supporting my meagre efforts.
Next time I will tell you about 1986. The Year of Living Stressfully. We had a new Director General specially imported from Mother England and the clock started ticking for many of us.
I was there at Avalon around the edges of all this. It’s a remarkable story - thanks, Dan. xxx
It's a pity things like this aren't available on-line:
https://www.ngataonga.org.nz/search-use-collection/search/F5076/
Sounds interesting!