Talkback radio, a stalwart of Aotearoa's airwaves since the dawn of time is now making its way onto our screens.
Talkback is a new mockumentary series written and directed by Jason Hoyte and Mike Minogue.
Photo: supplied
Minogue gave Jesse Mulligan an overview of the show.
“It’s an examination of behind the scenes of New Zealand’s leading right-wing talkback host, he’s sort of found himself at the top of the mountain for many years but as time has progressed his views have become a bit more moderate and so he ends up swinging down the ratings little bit and he’s prompted by the owner of the country to sort of buck up his ideas and get a bit more psychotic.”
Basically, that meant he either needed to be more hardcore, move to the right, or he's out, Minogue says.
“That’s sort of the start of it and things go from bad to worse from there.”
Hoyte plays Malcolm White, the radio host.
“I think he’s one of those guys who, as Mike was saying, has been top of the tree for so long he gets complacent and gets lazy, as can happen in radio.”
He gets a wake-up call that requires him to go beyond where he’s gone before, Hoyte says.
“That’s always fun to play.”
Minogue’s character Steve seems to hold onto his job by doing “absolutely nothing at all”.
“The less you do, the more inclined you are to get promoted through the ranks because the higher-ups look at you and go ‘Well what’s he done wrong lately? Nothing, well he can be promoted’.”
Then there’s Ginette McDonald, who plays Malcolm’s producer.
“She’s been there and done that and is not afraid to call things how she sees them, which is certainly not too far away from Ginette McDonald, the human being. She’s fantastic in the show.”
The fascinating part of the show for the pair, Hoyte says, is that what they say and what they believe are two different things. Similarly, off air Malcolm is quite different to who he is on air, he says, changing what he thinks in order to appeal to the audience.
Minogue says there’s certainly some New Zealand talkback hosts who are like this, completely changing their political leanings on air.
What began as an idea for a show that goes behind the scenes of a radio station has morphed into an examination of what media is these days, Hoyte says.
He says media is getting more and more extreme and polarizing.
“It’s alarming. You have people who don’t believe in facts anymore, don’t believe in science. You might have your facts and they’ll say no, I'll don’t believe your facts, these are my facts.”
It’s all one big echo chamber, he says.
