Tame Iti, LonelyGirl15, and kiwi films

Gidday one and all, just a couple of photos to start with. the one above is from last week when i finally received my trophy for "best player" from a year ago. I played my first ever season of soccer and was the goalie for the Western Springs Reefers!!! It took a year for me to get round to meeting up with these two guys, Martin (coach) and Michael (captain) to get my hands on the trophy, which I then had to hand back as they had to give it to this years winner!!!


In my continuing series of "..look who I/we met" here's my daughter with Lionel Ritchies daugther. Lionel and I did'nt get to hang out while our daughters got their photos taken, Nicole was on her own!

Each day... and each night.... at present are filled with a massive variety of stimulating, inspiring and totally ecclectic experiences, some to do with things film, and many have nothing at all to do with film.
I had a bloody classic experience the other day, we have a great documentary film festival called DOCNZ happening at present here in Auckland. I'm going to the awards night tonight in fact, and a couple of days ago I finally got a chance to go and see a doco called "Destiny In Motion", which is a local doco about a church leader and his followers who decided to form a political party to contest the last general elections here in NZ. Fortunately they did not get any representation in parliament (mind you our elected leaders are behaving like such a bunch of immature wankers at the moment that maybe we would be better off with Brian Tamakis god squad in there).
Anyway I turned up at the appointed time to the cinema, bought my ticket and went in, sat down and watched 2 docos,... neither of which was the one I had intended watching!!! Oppsss, wrong cinema, oh well that was all ok. I got to see a great short piece about a fanatstic NZ artist, Stanley Palmer, and the major bonus was I got to see a doco about a mate, John Howe, a stunningly talented canadian artist who lives in Switzerland. I got to meet and know John when he was working with Alan Lee as the conceptual artists for Lord Of The Rings.
So, random acts of life can serve up unexpected rewards, at least that's how I have decided to look at it. I was tempted to be pissed off with myself for not getting to the right film, but ended up with a deliciously unexpected serving anyway.
Two New Zealand films have just played to very receptive audiences at the Toronto Film Festival,.. apparently, I was not there so I can't really say. Black Sheep, a film by first time feature director Jonathan King sounds like it will have fans of early Peter Jackson films going nuts for it. It seems it is basically a splatter movie making the most of what we have here in abundance, sheep. It definitely sounds like it's worth a look, the sheep are the mutant killers in this one, so check it out.
Also at Toronto was Out Of The Blue, a feature film based on the true story of a massacre that took place here in NZ in 1990. This happened in a stunningly beautiful remote coastal town in the south island called Aramoana. Out Of The Blue was made by Robert Sarkies one of the Sarkies brothers ( in other places they have their Coen brothers, their Weinstein brothers, their Quay bothers...who/ i hear you say... go google them), well here in NZ we have our Sarkies Brothers. They are known primarily for making the NZ film Scarfies a few years ago.
A mate of mine, Steven O'Meagher is one of the producers for Out Of The Blue, which is very cool as it was a major undertaking to do a film about this event as your first. Bloody well done to all involved. Karl Urban who was my bosses nephew, Eomer in Lord Of The Rings, is one of the leads in Out Of The Blue.
A couple of nights back I had been having an early evening session with my film making partner Amarbir Singh, at a cafe on Karangahape Rd ( where we shot the film 1nite), when I spotted a friend I had not seen for many moons. Wai is his name and he is the son of one of the most outspoken and proactive Maori activists in NZ, Tame Iti. Wai invited me to go along to Tames art exhibition across the road which was opening that night. Being someone who loves hanging out at these sort of gigs, I was in. I am also a real fan of Tame and alot of what he stands for. He is often grossly prejudged and misrepresented, due I think mostly because he has a full facial moko (tattoo).
Anytime I get to go to these gatherings, of arty folk, celebrities etc, it's great as they are the places I get to catch up with some old friends. We all live our own lives going about our own journeys, so these soiries are perfect for a catch up. The great thing about this one was that Tame had done some bloody great art work also. I actually bought a couple of the smaller pieces, and feel really good about having done so.
Now to my final rant today, huge congratulations to "localish" girl Jessica Rose for being part of a team that seems to have pulled off cyberspaces latest major coup, by conning millions around the world to follow the online video diaries of "Bree". It turns out Jessica who lived in NZ for much of her life, trained as an actor here and is now living in LA, is the LonelyGirl15, on YouTube. essentially now that this news has broken, I would guess Jessica is going to be inundated with film offers, TV appearances etc. Bloody well done, to a cynical old hack like me, if you can get in through the side door the back door, or even the bloody roof,...why not. Go for it Jessica!!!
To finish off check out this article. It is about one of NZs most loved sons of all things music, Neil Finn, and his reaction to the thought of NZ Idol winners singing his songs. Good on him for taking a stand against exploitive television.
I'm outta here.
be cool, not only to yoursleves but to the rest of humanity. Actually, you haven't got rid of me yet, last bit of news it's so cool, my kids and I have sponsored a guy, Engeda, from Ethiopia, since he was about 10 yrs old. We just got word he has now graduated from University and is self supporting, so we are being asked to take on a beautifl young 4 yr old girl, Hayat, who also lives in Adis Ababa Ethiopia. If you want to make a small difference, get online and sponsor a child. Hayats father makes US$400 a friggin year as a labourer. Our money will help Hayat to receive an education and maybe break free of what will surely be the cycle of desperate poverty that she has been assigned to otherwise. Go on do it, it costs about a dollar a day.
ciao for now
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My love to Steve Irwins family...& things Radio

(Myself, Bruce/Les,on right, and my mate Joe/Des on left, in the studio at our weekly radio show)
Gidday, welcome to another posting, yet again created about a week or so after I thought I should do a new posting!!! how do you spel prokrastination agin....
First off my heart felt love goes to Steve Irwins family. To the world at large it seems like a misplaced act of nature that something like this could happen. However when someone so rich in life so in love with life, to be taken like this wipes the mist off the window of reality for me. by this I mean that as an actor sometimes you are called upon to create an emotion/response, a state of being. However it is just this kind of event that can give me a kick in the arse to know that I have no bloody idea what it must be like for Steves family at present, no acting could ever hope to penetrate the depths of feeling that they will be spinning through, so I send my love to them for what it may be worth. Steve you wrote a page in the history of mankind demonstrating the art of living life to the full while you have it.

So now I get on with my life and right now it is writing this blog!!! I am trying to teach myself how to type with more than 3 fingers. My normal styles seem to incorporate the index finger of my left hand and the index and middle fingers of my right hand. Right now as I type this I have to concentrate really really hard (you know the tongue out type concentration!!!)to get at least 4 fingers going.
I figured I would have a brief rave about the radio station scene here in New Zealand.
We actually have an absolute overload of radio stations, I remember reading a few years ago that here in Auckland we had the most stations per capita, in the world. The incredible thing is that much like television, in my humble opinion, most of it is absolute crap and could qualify for air pollution! However the photo above shows the two hosts of one of the true quality programmes on air, "The Dawn Patrol with Des & Les". Thats me(Les) on the right, and my bestest mate of 36 yrs, Joe Reid(Des) on the left. We have a had a comedy duo for 21 yrs and after many years of calling ourselves "The Golden Holdens" we just started calling each other Des and Les, and that's what we remain. If you are ever thinking of getting some sort of act together,... a word of advice... don't call yourself by a different name.
As an actor it would actually benefit me if various people knew that I was Les of "Des & Les", however they know of me as Bruce and so don't make the connection. This can lead to confusion, but Bruce and Joe don't ryhme, so what are you to do??? You are hereby commanded to tune into our show at some stage. It is on at a great time for those of you in the US or Europe. Saturday morning or there abouts. We are on 1am -6am Sunday mornings NZtime
(click the link to go to current NZ time)
As for the rest of the fare, there are a couple or real gems in amongst the mire. My number one choice and the station that is honestly one of the things I look forward to most when returning from a trip overseas, is 95bfm. This is a station based at the Auckland University campus and as with most independent stations anywhere has a great variety of niche shows, from absolute metal to jazz. However let me recommend you go to the link above and check out the breakfast show from 7am-10am weekdays NZ time. Your host if you listen in is the one and only Mickey
Havoc. The guy is bloody brilliant, he combines, a wicked humour, massive compassion and some of the best tunes you will ever hear (many of them you will probably never have heard previously). 95bfm has been repsonsible for breaking a number of artists who have gone on to become really big on the indie circuit around the world, including Ben Harper who had his first ever no.1 song here in NZ. Mickey is a true beacon and stands out so far above almost every other on air host on any station. I put him up there with Howard Stern, and if you have not heard of Howard Stern where the hell have you been!!!

One of the biggest buzzes out of going to LA for the Academy Award season each year when Lord Of The Rings was up, came when I finally got to tune into Howard Sterns show on air. This is of course before the idiots at the highest level dictated that he was too much of a threat to their conceited ideals and he had to leave the airwaves of america. That was a sad day for democracy in that country.
Many years ago, Des and I did our first ever radio talk back show and the station manager gave us a tape of Howard Stern to listen to. He became an immediate idol!!!, brilliantly irrevent.
Another show to catch is a guy called Graeme Hill who does 8am-noon saturdays and noon -4pm sundays on Radiolive, the station that I do my show with Des on. This guy is seriously talented, he has a great mind, from astronomy/mathematics to sport, he is well versed on it all, and he has some great guests on each week. Graeme is also a superb musician having been in a great bnad called The Able Tasmans many years ago. In fact my first meetings with Graeme came when I was a dancer in Limbs Dance Co here in Auckland way back ( if you go to the link you will see references to Limbs on a site about music from another of our amazingly talented musicians, Don McGlashin ). Graeme used to play music, improvising on the piano for our dance class.
I better get outta here, the Sopranos is on. I was hooked on the first season have not watched it since but this final season is a stunner, this is how the medium of television can be usefd when put in the hands and minds of real talent, thankyou so much all of you who make this programme.

My son Joe and I on a trip to LA a couple of years ago, hope Tony don't see dis!!!

Ciao