Spy: Greenstone TV’s glittery milestone celebration draws big Kiwi names

Rachel Antony, CEO of Greenstone TV. Photo / Amanda Billing

Celebrating 30 years in the industry with a glittering party and a who’s who of local programming, the milestone calls for a walk down memory lane, looking at some of New Zealand television’s most popular shows, and Ricardo Simich talks to CEO Rachel Antony about the company’s rich history, role shaping our nation’s TV culture, and the future of Kiwi screens.

Powerhouses from the entertainment industry attended the 30th-birthday bash of one of New Zealand’s most successful television production houses, Greenstone TV, on Friday night at La Zeppa in Drake St in Auckland’s Victoria Park.

More than 300 guests toasted champagne to the 2500-plus episodes of TV created over the years.

Amongst Greenstone’s celebrations and video flashbacks was a sneak peek at its brand-new musical show Happiness, set to start production soon.

While the Happiness cast is not yet announced, guests were treated to a preview performance of one of the songs, created by celebrated Kiwi composer Luke Di Somma, who has written the original music for the series, and sung by actress Jessie Lawrence.

CEOs from TVNZ, NZ On Air and the New Zealand Film Commission, Jodi O’Donnell, Cameron Harland and Annie Murray were in attendance, as were hosts, actors, writers and producers from the past and present of Greenstone. Among them were Leigh Hart, Suzanne Paul, Hannah Marshall, Paul Gittins, Richard Driver, Jeff Szusterman and Kip Chapman.

Greenstone CEO Rachel Antony, who has worked for the company for 10 years and been in her present role for seven, tells Spy that celebrating with her incredibly talented peers, colleagues and friends is a delight.

“It’s a challenging time for the screen industry, so we did think twice about having a party — but really, when times are tough, it’s all the more reason to celebrate the good stuff,” says Antony. “Thirty is a milestone worth celebrating, made possible by the combined skills, passion and hard work of everyone in that room on Friday, and many others.”

New Zealand Police Highway Patrol were the key characters in Highway Cops. Photo / Greenstone TV

Speaking to Spy before the party, Antony took pleasure in going down memory lane, reflecting on some of the country’s most successful shows from documentaries, reality and scripted. Kiwis couldn’t get enough of juggernauts from the unscripted genre including Renters, Neighbours at War, Border Patrol, Highway Cops and Motorway Patrol, which is in its 22nd season.

“Motorway Patrol was such a pioneering show for Aotearoa, both in its production process and in the way it puts ‘ordinary New Zealanders’ on screen.” she says. “What we discovered, talking to audiences, is that people tune into shows like Border Patrol and Highway Cops because they want to be entertained, obviously, and they love seeing people getting busted. The weirder the stuff hidden in a suitcase, or the sillier the excuse for speeding, the better.”

New Zealand Customs officer as seen in Border Patrol. Photo / Greenstone TV

Greenstone has worked with an array of household names. A throwback to the late 90s is the Suzanne Paul co-hosted Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, which screened from 1998-2004 and had a raft of Kiwi stars as surprise hosts — including Temuera Morrison, Mike King and the late Kevin Smith. A more recent production, The Cul de Sac, was a launchpad for two actors who are now big names overseas, KJ Apa and Beulah Koale.

Greenstone was founded in 1994 by journalist John Harris. The first show produced was Godzone Sheep, and other big shows from the company’s early days were Epitaph and Shipwreck presented by Paul Gittins.

Its biggest success from that era was The Zoo, which ran for 12 seasons. Beloved by New Zealand audiences, it screened all over the world. Antony says The Zoo’s success really laid the foundations for the business.

Greenstone’s many documentary productions have given the company prestige. Some of Antony’s standouts include The Women Of Pike River; Artefact, with Dame Professor Anne Salmond; and, she says, the wonderful experience of crowd-sourcing Aotearoa’s visual history for Decades In Colour, which Judy Bailey fronted.

A colony of penguins as seen in Go Further South's trip to Antarctica. Photo / Greenstone TV

Antony also points out its “slow TV” projects have also really captured audiences, and helped shape this surprisingly popular genre. Go South, a train journey the length of Aotearoa, screened over 12 hours, and was followed by Go Further South, which followed a boat to Antarctica.

Her personal career highlight was producing Serious Crash Unit, which she describes as really intense. She learned to tell tough stories about how quickly and violently life can change, so much so that she never speeds.

“It’s such a privilege to have people agree to talk with you, to sit in their living rooms at such a tragic time in their lives and I’m grateful to all the survivors, families of victims and to the specialist Crash Unit police who shared their experiences.”

Eight years ago, Greenstone made a conscious decision to start diversifying more into drama, which she says takes a long time and a lot of investment.

Lucy Lawless and Ebony Vagulans star in My Life is Murder. Photo / Greenstone TV

The Lucy Lawless whodunit TVNZ show My Life is Murder is a standout. Antony credits Lawless — who stars and is an executive producer — for getting the show “greenlit” in 2020 during the pandemic. “Lucy calls it her ‘love letter to Tāmaki Makaurau’ and it really is; the city looks amazing in our show,” says Antony.

Future-proofing the business has Greenstone expanding on its experience of co-producing locally, and exploring a lot more opportunities to collaborate internationally.

With audiences streaming more and more than scheduled viewing, Antony says great stories remain great stories and Greenstone will always find homes for its shows that are a best audience fit for that content.

“We’re pretty platform agnostic. My Life Is Murder, for example, is for both TVNZ1 and TVNZ+ and internationally is commissioned by the global streamer Acorn TV,” explains Antony. “My real wish with the global streamers like Netflix and Amazon and Apple is that they’d invest a lot more in original New Zealand content; there are very few New Zealand shows on their platforms.”

Many of Greenstone’s observational documentaries have found homes on international channels over the years. Border Patrol screens in about 40 countries.

Antony is of course in support of the SPADA (the Screen Production and Development Association) campaign with guilds internationally, which is pushing for local quotas on multinational streamers, and to get them to contribute more culturally and economically to the countries they operate in.

“As well as the global streamers, Kiwis watch huge amounts of YouTube and Facebook video; those companies pay comparatively very, very little tax here; how are our companies like TVNZ or Sky supposed to compete on such an uneven playing field?”

Antony points out that, in this area, Australia is being more proactive than NZ and says the new government says it wants to see increased productivity and more export income.

“Investment in screen and the wider creative industries is a great way to help achieve that,” she says.

“There’s a huge opportunity to grow the creation and licensing of original NZ IP and creative tech.

“And digital exports are really environmentally friendly!”