Watching a TV cookery show 40 times in order to capture the voices and mannerisms of New Zealand's Hudson and Halls was a labour of love for two young Kiwi actors.
Chris Parker and Todd Emerson have been transforming themselves into the outrageously camp couple whose cookery show enthralled New Zealand TV audiences for 10 years from the mid-1970s.
And now it's Tauranga's turn to enjoy a heart-warming comedy that will have the audience reaching for their packets of tissues - mostly to wipe away tears of laughter.
Hudson and Halls Live will feature in the 10th Tauranga Arts Festival running from October 19 to 29. The festival was launched last night by festival trust chairwoman Kathryn Lellman, with Parker and Emerson turning up in character as Hudson and Halls to add a special panache to the evening.
Parker, who played David Halls, said it was a joy to be in character for a show that was both a heart-warmer and tear-jerker.
"Hudson and Halls were really well-known figures on New Zealand's landscape."
Emerson, aka Peter Hudson, said the show was a farce in which everything goes wrong. "There are big slapstick moments."
Baycourt Theatre will be transformed into a TV cookery studio for the two-night and one matinee season, with the audience primed in the same way as audiences were prepared for Hudson and Halls shows.
The two actors prided themselves that the many people in the audience who remembered Hudson and Halls from the TV series totally related to their stage characters, right down to how Hudson used to push up his glasses.
And while modern audiences were surprised at just how much Parker and Emerson camped it up on set, people who knew Hudson and Halls told them they were not camp enough.
Hudson died in 1992 and Halls died in 1993.
Last night's launch party featured Ms Lellman welcoming Ria Hall as the festival patron after Hall sang the festival waiata.
''We look forward to her growing the festival waiata for the massed choir opening on the morning of October 18, and to her own show.''
Ms Lellman said they could not wait to bring the city alive and the community together by featuring a world-class programme of leading artists and performers, including music, theatre, dance and thought-provoking talks.
Festival gold sponsor Carrus had gone to a new level by enabling the trust to buy a share of the Pacific Crystal Palace, now called the Carrus Crystal Palace.
''The generosity of Cheryl and Paul Adams and the Carrus team has secured for the festival this iconic venue. This year will see it in its new base on the waterfront.''
Mayor Greg Brownless told the Bay of Plenty Times that the festival introduced a whole new element of interest to the arts in Tauranga and was a testament to festival founder, the late Peter Wyatt.
Festival major and gold sponsors
Major sponsor: TECT
Major grants: Tauranga City Council & Creative NZ
Gold Sponsors: Carrus, Hollister-Jones Lellman, Port of Tauranga
Gold medal media sponsors: Bay of Plenty Times, Mediaworks
Twenty-six festival shows include
- That Bloody Women (rock musical about Kate Sheppard)
- Pss Pss (clowning, circus and theatre)
- The Floating Theatre (transformative world of performance)
- Don Juan (story of the world's greatest lover)
- Miss Jean Batten (one woman show)
- Bush Gothic (darker, stranger Australian folk)