"I just did it for the money, man - it was all about the cash," National Leader Simon Bridges said, of his first acting job
Jason Walls discovers the weird and wacky former jobs of politicians.
Before the thrills and spills that come with the life of a politician, most Members of Parliament lived quite different lives.
From actors to aerobics instructors, burger flippers to private investigators, the halls of power are chock-full of politicians who have experienced very different paths to Parliament.
Arguably, no more so than National Leader Simon Bridges.
Before he was leader of the Opposition, before he was a Minister, an MP or a Crown Prosecutor, Bridges had a very different career path – acting.
In his early 20s, Bridges was a shirtless extra in a couple of TV shows filmed in New Zealand.
"I just did it for the money, man – it was all about the cash," he said.
His first acting gig was in Xena Warrior Princess.
"I was an Asian warrior running through the fields. My memory might be somewhat inaccurate but I remember horses and bombs going off as we ran in our Asian armor."
Later, he was featured in the background of a shot in Young Hercules as a shirtless extra "practicing my fighting moves".
"What I liked about it was even though they were long days there was plenty of food and drinks all day."
Although he has a fair bit on his plate at the moment, he would not rule out a return to the world of acting.
"You just never know what the future holds. But I doubt I would be going into such active roles – and I also doubt they would have me.
"I don't think Lucy Lawless wants the National Party Leader in her shots," Bridges said.
He admits he never saw the footage and has no idea if it even made it into the final cut.
But Bridges is not the only party leader who once had acting ambitions.
Labour Leader, and Prime Minister, Jacinda Ardern once auditioned to be an extra in The Lord of the Rings.
She did not, however, get a call back for the role – she claims it was because she was "slightly over the height limit".
Ardern was not picky about the role she got – be in an elf, human or even a Hobbit – she just wanted to be "any kind of extra".
There were only two conditions an extra had to meet. The first was being able to ride a horse bareback – this, she said she had no issues with.
But the second was the ability to be able to joust and this, she could not do.
"There was literally jousting going on as I walked in, so you knew if you lied, you would be tested on your jousting."
But Ardern was disappointed to see no jousting in the final cut of the films.
"I felt like I had been really ripped off," she laughed.
Aside from her aspirations as an actress – albeit just an extra – Ardern did manage to score a number of summer jobs growing up.
By now, her job at a Morrinsville fish and chip shop is widely known – but what a lot of people don't know is the Prime Minister was also a Tefal cookware demonstrator at Farmers in Hamilton for one summer.
"Tefal – T E F A L," she spelt it out when asked what that was –it's the company that makes the non-stick frying pans, steamers, food processors and irons.
"I know because I heard it on rotate in the infomercial for that frying pan about 1000 times."
Ardern and Bridges weren't the only ones to start their voyage into the working world in a somewhat weird or wacky place.
Both Green Party co-leaders had unique employment situations as young people.
James Shaw had a part-time job at a store called Mind Games in Wellington, selling Dungeons and Dragons games and accessories while he was at university.
Marama Davidson was an aerobics instructor while she was at university, teaching classes at Les Mills.
"It was very exciting at the time," she said.
She had done some classes herself and loved it so much she wanted to teach it – and make a bit of extra money too.
Davidson would take her daughter along to the classes and pop her in the pram while she was teaching.
But she said she's not the aerobics master she once was and is "much too uncoordinated" to get back into it now.
Labour MPs had some interesting jobs as youngsters too.
While at Teachers' College, list MP Jan Tinetti worked at a restaurant called Panda where she dressed up as a Panda to welcome customers.
Clare Curran, when she was 15, had a cleaning job at a medical museum and Greg O'Connor worked for the council spraying ragwort on the Buller River.
Northland National MP Matt King spent a few of his earlier years as a private investigator.
King – a former policeman – said the job was "doing a lot of work the cops don't want to".
In the movies, private investigators are often hired to catch a cheating spouse – but King said in real life, that sort of job is very rare.
"What people think private investigators do is hide in bushes and take photos to catch people cheating, but that makes up a very small percentage of the work private investigators do."
Instead, a lot of the work he did was for ACC and insurance companies.
For example, if an insurance claim looked suspicious a private investigator could be contacted to check it out.
Once, an insurance company was suspicious of a $100,000 boat that had been sunk. King was contracted to investigate.
As it turned out, King found out that the boat's owner paid some local boys to sink it.
"What happened was they [the boys] didn't get paid, as they guy [boat owner] didn't get his insurance pay out and–" he stopped himself before finishing, saying he actually was not able to go into more detail.
From one Nat to another, Clutha Southland MP Hamish Walker dipped his toe in many lines of work.
"Gold miner, commercial fisherman, police jailer – you name it."
He said at the age of 22 he decided to give University a crack but didn't want to get a sizable student loan.
"So I decided to go gold mining in the West in Australia for six months to save up so I didn't have to get such a big loan."
The work was gruelling; 12 hour days in 40-degree heat. He said it was incredibly demanding, tough and hot conditions.
Although his work conditions were not quite as demanding, but maybe still hot, Green Party MP Gareth Hughes used to flip patties at Burger King in another life.
But Hughes – who was once arrested at a McDonald's protest dressed as Ronald McDonald – quit because his boss would not give him leave to watch an All Blacks game.
"I was refused, so I walked out of the shift – which I guess I am a bit embarrassed about in hindsight that I was that desperate to watch the match."
He does not remember if the All Blacks won the game.
Interestingly, Hughes was working at the same Burger King as his now wife – but they didn't actually know each other at the time.
"It's interesting that I was working so close to my wife of now 15 years, without even knowing it."
Hughes, now a vegetarian, said his time a Burger King taught him "how to flip a burger" and he was now "pretty mean on a vegetarian barbie".