Hollywood veteran Christopher Lloyd is not kidding when he says he loves New Zealand. The star of the blockbuster Back to the Future movies and the television series Taxi is set to be beamed on to screens throughout the country this weekend when the New Zealand-made film Kids' World opens.
The bearded 63-year-old plays the central character Leo in the film, in which children live out their ultimate fantasies by wishing away all the adults in the world.
Leo is the only adult who escapes being wished away by Ryan Mitchell and his magical wishing glass. Lloyd's Leo is mentally challenged so he still has the mind of a child.
At first the kids think he is scary, but Ryan eventually contacts the lonely man and Leo becomes an important part of the realisation that you can't live without adults after all.
"I loved every minute of my time in New Zealand," says Lloyd, who also linked with New Zealand supermodel Rachel Hunter to star in the American adventure movie Haunted Lighthouse.
Kids' World was mostly filmed around the Coromandel coast and Lloyd said working with the New Zealand children and director Dale Bradley was "as good as it gets".
"The kids were full of fun and games. It was refreshing to make good quality movies without all the bullshit of Hollywood. In the end, the camera department was stuffing eggs down everyone's pants. It was kids' stuff, literally, and that brought a great element to the film-making."
Lloyd describes his character as a soulful sort of guy. "Retarded characters are kind of a popular type in film. When I first read the script I saw in my head all the cliches of a retarded type, but I wanted to bring something different to Leo."
The youngest of seven children brought up in Connecticut, Lloyd discovered his passion for drama early and from 14 never pursued anything else. After drama school, he spent nearly a decade jobbing outside New York before landing a play in the Big Apple that set him on his feet and brought him to the attention of the people casting One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.
"It was very good to have as a first film," he says modestly of the Oscar-winning movie. "Jack Nicholson was kind of an idol of mine before that with Five Easy Pieces and Easy Rider."
Soon after followed the TV show Taxi and the part of zonked-out Reverend Jim Ignatowski. "I liked Jim a lot," he says. "He was a lot of fun. There are a lot of people like him everywhere. Everybody somewhere has known someone like Reverend Jim."
What started out as a one-episode job ended up a five-year gig, with two Emmys for best supporting actor picked up along the way.
Despite the extraordinary success of the Back to the Future movies, it is obvious that Lloyd has a soft spot for another favourite character, that of Uncle Fester in The Addams Family and its sequel, Addams Family Values.
"When I was growing up I used to get magazines. I loved those cartoons," he says. "Then decades later I'm asked to do that role. So strange."
He and his wife, Jane Walker Wood, a scriptwriter, lead a very un-Hollywood lifestyle in Santa Barbara.
He drives a stationwagon. He walks on the beach. He orders takeaways.
"I spend a lot of time at home," he says.
"I have a group of friends that I see, some in the business, some not. Mostly my wife and I live out of the loop. Just hanging out. I spend a lot of time on the couch."
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