Jemaine Clement in Time Bandits. Photo / Matt Grace
The Conchords star has pulled the ‘80s fantasy adventure film Time Bandits into the present. He tells us why.
Jemaine Clement doesn’t remember the first time he saw Terry Gilliam’s absurdist fantasy adventure film Time Bandits. But the 1981 film, in which a lad named Kevin stumbles into a comic adventure through time with a hapless band of thieves, left a strong impression on the young boy from Masterton.
“I related to Kevin because I had interests that weren’t shared by everyone,” he says. “You know, I’d be making puppets or whatever and all the kids wanted to talk about Richard Hadlee.”
He chuckles and then says, “I just loved the imagination in it. That’s what appealed to me about doing this”.
Alongside long-term collaborators Taika Waititi and British TV writer Iain Morris, Clement has pulled Gilliam’s classic movie from the past into the present, reimagining it as a premium series for AppleTV.
It was Waititi who tagged Clement in, after he was approached by Apple to helm the series. At the time Clement was deep in work on the second season of What We Do in the Shadows. But the opportunity to work on a show with such personal meaning was too high to pass up.
“I just put Shadows down and walked away.
“I haven’t had anything to do with it since season two. I’ve just deleted a couple of emails from them now without reading them.”
While the original was their north star, the trio felt it necessary to put their own stamp on the series, especially given the storytelling potential unlocked by the more luxurious series format over the limited running time of a feature film.
“We felt like we’d be plagiarising if we were to do it in a Gilliam-style,” Clement says of the former Monthy Python member’s idiosyncratic directing technique. “We took parts where we felt it was alright to do it, but we didn’t want to ruin the memory by trying to create it exactly the same and failing. Better to do our own thing.”
Creatively, Clement appears to favour working collaboratively as opposed to shepherding his own solo projects to fruition. He hit the big time with Bret McKenzie as the comedy duo Flight of the Conchords but has also regularly teamed up with Waititi.
The pair were behind the 2014 mockumentary feature What We Do in the Shadows, HBO’s 2019 spin-off series of the same name, its other local spin-off Wellington Paranormal, and now, Time Bandits.
“Well, I definitely make sure it’s my vision for the thing.
“You can’t make a TV show or film without collaboration. There’s always hundreds of people involved.”
He thinks for a second and says, “But I did do the Shadows show by myself, created it by myself, but because it was a thing that Taika and I made originally, it felt like he was there because we’d had a lot of discussions earlier. But, yeah, I don’t know why. It’s social and fun. I like working with other people. For the most part.”
He pauses, then adds, “With one or two exceptions”.
Which sounds juicy, but any hope of some TMZ-style, insider-Hollywood - heck, even Wellywood - goss, quickly vanishes, with Clement politely declining to name and shame.
“I’ve probably worked with about 300 people I’ve liked,” he says, before grinning and adding, “And about two pricks”.
With Clement and Waititi steering Time Bandits it’s not too surprising the series was filmed here. The pair imported Friends superstar Lisa Kudrow to lead the show as Penelope, the unofficial boss of the ragtag bandits, as well as a bunch of other comedy stars including Matt King (Peep Show’s drugged-up Super Hans), Charlyne Yi (House’s angry neurologist Dr. Chi Park) and the show’s young star, 12-year-old Kal-El Tuck, who plays Kevin.
Waititi was the driving force behind that decision, with Clement saying his pal was “determined” to spend more time in Aotearoa, with the in-demand director/writer/actor spinning up several projects.
“He gets here, directs the first episode, puts on his robe and then he goes off and does his other projects around the country while I’m here with the baby,” Clement says with mock indignation. “No, I’m glad, because I live in Wellington. I just bike to work and it’s great. Usually, I’d be off to Vancouver or somewhere to do something like this. It was a nice change. I’m really happy. I love being here.”
Not content with merely creating, writing and directing the series, Clement and Waititi also star as the show’s villains. It’d be disappointing if they didn’t appear, for us and for them, considering their mutual love of the movie was one of the foundations of their early friendship. Clement stars as the scheming, delightfully sinister Pure Evil, a baddie who wants to take over the world and make it as horrid and spiky as possible, while Waititi plays his evil boss The Supreme Being, a gargantuan, multi-sided square head.
“Me and Taika were talking about how it reflects our jobs on the show. I spend all my time in this room trying to plot. Being an evil guy and being a head writer, it’s all about plotting. He just comes in, people ask him a few questions and then they make what he wants. It reflects our jobs on the show.”
“I always like being a bad guy.”
Before our interview, I watched the first couple of episodes with my 6-year-old during the school holidays. From the get-go, he was thoroughly invested, his imagination fired up by the motley crew of thieves plundering and blundering their way through historic events and the grotesque-yet-family-friendly creatures and demons in Pure Evil’s hellish throne room. The lighthearted romp of an adventure matched with Clement’s signature playful wit and dry humour and the heavy ladling of 80s awesomeness suckered me in as well, with both of us keen to hit play on the next episode.
“I’m really hoping that it takes us back to the 1980s way of watching something with your family,” Clement says. “That’s what Taika and I dreamed when we were doing it. That it would be a family event. But you can watch it by yourself. It should still work.”
THE LOWDOWN
Who: Jemaine Clement
What: Co-creator, writer and star of new series Time Bandits
When: Streaming from Wednesday on AppleTV
Karl Puschmann is an entertainment columnist for the New Zealand Herald. His fascination lies in finding out what drives and inspires creative people.
The Kiwi actor has been part of the Star Wars universe for more than 20 years.