Marama Davidson on FIRST – The business of hip hop – Trolley King
...and other recs this week!
Kia ora, welcome to this week’s newsletter.
Do you ever hear about a politician who had a life before politics and think, “wow, that’s amazing”? From John Key making heaps of money as a wolf of Wall Street to Louisa Wall winning the Rugby World Cup with the Black Ferns, the Beehive seems to be full of buzzy backstories. Here’s another one.
Years before she became the co-leader of the Green Party, Marama Davidson was an aerobics instructor at Les Mills. But wait, that’s not even the best part – years before that, when she was a little kid, she met and played with the cast of Playschool. We’re talking Jemima, we’re talking Humpty. Manu! Big Ted AND Little Ted.
Davidson got to live the dream of a generation of New Zealand children thanks to her dad, the famous Whale Rider actor, activist and one-time Playschool host Rawiri Paratene. She talks about it on this week’s episode of FIRST – have a listen and/or a watch below.
–Cal
This week’s new podcasts
On When the Facts Change [Apple | Spotify] this week, Bernard Hickey came to us straight from parliament where he spent Thursday up to his elbows in Budget 2021.Gone By Lunchtime [Apple | Spotify] also weighed in on the budget, while The Real Pod [Apple | Spotify] stuck to reality television – UNLESS… one of the Masked Singers is Grant Robertson? On Business is Boring [Apple | Spotify], Simon Pound spoke to Rush CEO Pavan Vyas about how they built the NZ Covid Tracer app, and Remember When… [Apple | Spotify] went back to church camp before returning home and watching a bit of Jackass. Subscribe and listen now wherever you get your podcasts!
Koro’s Hangi
Making a hangi the proper way takes hours, and pretty much anybody who wants to eat will have a job to do. In the Doc Edge short Koro’s Hangi we get to be a fly on the wall of a well-oiled whanau operation and hear why the ritual remains so important. This year’s Doc Edge Film Festival runs from June 3 to July 11 in Auckland, Wellington and online – if you want to check out what’s showing, visit docedge.nz.
Trapital
Duncan says: “Trapital is a newsletter about the business of hip hop which is rapidly becoming one of my favourite things to read each week. It goes way beyond hip hop, encompassing Black entrepreneurship in culture – getting into things like Beyoncé's streaming strategy and how Will Smith rescued his career. Author Dan Runcie is at his best when going deep into an artist's strategy, especially those who started pre-streaming and have had to adapt. Recent highlights have included DJ Khaled and J Cole, and even if you don't love their music, the decisions that have guided their strategy are fascinating.”
How To with John Wilson
Josie says: “As Eddy Fifield once said, "I tried to put How To with John Wilson in Rec Room and was widely ignored."* John Wilson is also widely ignored as he walks around New York secretly filming slices of life, then edits them into long explorations into the human psyche. Covering furniture in plastic becomes a discussion on circumcision. Creating a "mind palace" leads to meeting people who believe in alternate timelines. It's executive produced by funny normie Nathan Fielder and is similarly quietly crack up.” (*I was waiting for this show to become available here before reccing it, but it’s been months and still no one has it so I reckon all bets are off.)
Working Class Characters by Middle Class Filmmakers
Sam says: “I would like to recommend the video Working Class Characters by Middle Class Filmmakers, by twitter user and Scotsman @TadgHickey. It’s essentially a parody of how filmmakers write the working class, including lines like: “Chrissy, it’s only midday, you should still be in bed” and “What’s wrong Chrissy, you’ve hardly touched your drugs!” I’ve watched it about 50 times since running into it last night, and sent an equal amount of voice messages to friends mimicking his accent (poorly).”
Trolley King
The VF48Hours grand final was on Saturday night, with Wellington team Traces of Nut taking out the big prize for Good Girl, their splatter film full of exploding dogs. But how differently might the night have gone differently had Christchurch team Blood and Bone managed to hand Trolley King in on time? It’s a highlight of this year’s competition – even if it was disqualified.
Arts and/or crafts
Alice N says: “I recently took up wooden spoon carving (OK, I did one class) and cross stitch and I find their meditative nature soothing for my frazzled brain. They also force me to put my phone down. I want to get really good at cross stitching so I can stitch rude words and frame them to go on my wall.”
Jigsaw puzzles
Alice WL says: “I took home a puzzle from the office collection to complete over the weekend and finished it before the Highlanders game ended on Friday night. It was a lovely 500-piecer of a Camaro parked in front of a dairy next to a beach. At some point my boyfriend arrived home with about eight drunk people and I refused to cede the coffee table for their beers or pizza until my puzzle was finished. It was a real downer on the party, but I’m just living my life man. I’m 23. Somebody help me.”
That’s all for this week! Please reply to get in touch and share with anyone else who might like to subscribe too. See you next Wednesday 👋