Bennett: bad boy to Bad Seed

It seems that what goes around, comes around for Vinnie Bennett. Having dreamed of being a cop, he now gets to live out the fantasy on screen, writes James Croot.

Vinnie Bennett is finally achieving his teenage dream of being a police officer, something he thought was scuppered after he had his own run-in with the law. The 25-year-old Kiwi actor plays Detective Richard Bennett in the five-part crime drama

The Bad Seed, which will debut on TVNZ1 next month. Based on the books by award-winning New Zealand author Charlotte Grimshaw, the story revolves around two brothers whose dysfunctional, dark past comes to light when one of their neighbours is murdered. As well as Bennett, the cast also includes Madeleine Sami.

Speaking to Stuff from his current base in

Los Angeles, Christchurch-born Bennett (whose previous work has included New Zealand movie Human Traces, small parts in Ghost in the Shell and The Shannara Chronicles and a regular role on much-maligned TVNZ drama Filthy Rich) says that before he decided to pursue acting fulltime, he had harboured thoughts of joining the force.

‘‘When I was 16 or 17, it felt like a job where every day was different, and I remember some friends and I did a week-long Blue Light course through school.

‘‘But then I got into a bit of trouble with the police myself, and that kind of held me back from applying. Thankfully that was when I was getting into acting, because otherwise I would have been in a ‘s…, what am I going to do now?’ state.’’

He admits that wasn’t the first time he’d found himself in trouble, either.

Desperate to try to straighten her eldest boy out, his mother-of-seven Sahni, who had Bennett when she was just 15, transferred him from Christchurch’s Aranui High School to Shirley Boys’ High School.

As well as reining him in, Shirley Boys’ was where he discovered his love of drama.

Fortunately, a good friend, Teone Kahu, was facing a similar dilemma across town at St Thomas of Canterbury College, and had already come up with a potential solution – the Aranui Theatre Academy.

‘‘He said, ‘I’m going to go and try out for this’ and I was like, ‘you know what, I think I might do that as well’.

‘‘So I kind of showed up a few days later, did a cold read audition for this Shakespeare show and got cast as one of the major supporting roles. That was kind of a big thing for me.’’

After competing in the annual Sheilah Winn Shakespeare Festival, the pair were asked by academy teacher Robert Gilbert to join the theatre company.

‘‘We travelled around schools all over

New Zealand performing Macbeth and a Ma¯ oriinspired version of Rumpelstiltskin [instead of spinning straw into gold, this version had harekeke being woven into pounamu],’’ Bennett recalls, ‘‘and while we were in Auckland, Robert got in touch with us and said there was an agent who wanted to meet us’’.

Bennett admits he was reluctant, but was persuaded to meet Imogen Johnson from Johnson & Laird.

‘‘I initially went back to Christchurch, but quickly discovered that apart from Whitebait [Productions] and The Court Theatre, there wasn’t much of an industry in a city just emerging from the devastation of the 2010-11 earthquakes.

‘‘I didn’t really want to get into construction, so I threw myself in my little Ford Laser, blasted off up the country to set up base in Auckland, and I guess the rest is history.’’

Gilbert, now a deputy principal with Tauranga Boys’ College, recalls Bennett as ‘‘really likeable, incredibly talented, responsible and caring’’.

‘‘He’s tall and he has a great stage presence. He reminds me of a young Cliff Curtis.’’

‘‘I really admire his tenacity to go overseas and back himself.’’

Another who has watched Bennett’s career closely is his mother, who is now a Lyttelton restaurant owner. She says she believes he had the acting bug from as early as the age of 2.

‘‘As soon as he could verbalise, he’d be in full character for who he was going to be that day. He had this purple Phantom suit that I think he rocked out from age 2 to around 4 when it had become way too small,’’ Sahni Bennett says.

‘‘He’d go right into role and character. I actually think he’s been playing with superheroes and being a superhero for half his life.’’

Having encouraged all her children ‘‘to be exactly who they are’’, she admits Vinnie ‘‘definitely went down some roads that weren’t so great’’.

‘‘I think raising teens is almost like a waiting game – sometimes they choose paths that are a little shaky, but they always come back around. Often with youth, they just have to find their thing and, for Vinnie, it was acting.’’

Back in Los Angeles, Bennett says he and partner, fellow Kiwi actor Frankie Adams (Shortland Street, One Thousand Ropes) are enjoying a little downtime after the whirlwind of the past 18 months.

While Adams has been busy filming cult sci-fi series The Expanse in Toronto, Bennett also had a major breakthrough moment in the same Canadian city. Named as one of four international rising stars ahead of the Toronto International Film Festival in 2017, Bennett spent a week walking red carpets, speed dating producers and directors, and chatting with casting directors.

But the moment that stuck out for him was being introduced to his hero, Cuba Gooding Jnr.

‘‘I was hanging out the back of the InStyle party, which was so exclusive it had 2.5-metre-high hedges around it.

‘‘A guy walks past wearing a red jacket and I say ‘hey, nice jacket – oh, that is Cuba Gooding Jnr!’ One of my managers hears me and says, ‘would you like to meet him?’

‘‘And so he introduces me and Cuba says, ‘Hey Vinnie, how’s it going? It’s good to meet you. You know we’re going to another party and I guess we’re going to go – now’. And he turns around, scales the hedge and flips himself over it.

‘‘His manager is kind of left there with us and then just kind of follows him over the hedge. It was pretty awesome.’’

During the festival, Stuff caught up with

Bennett in an abandoned Toronto bar where he described the ‘‘rising star’’ experience as ‘‘kind of defogging the Hollywood illusion for me’’.

‘‘In New Zealand, the whole North American industry seems kind of intimidating. People kind of put it on a pedestal because the people involved are so powerful, but it was really good just to kind of chat with them and just have open and honest, straightforward, person-to-person conversations.’’ He says the week has helped him in many ways. ‘‘I hadn’t realised what a kind of recognisable award it would be seen as – particularly in

New Zealand.’’ It also helped land him American representation.

‘‘And that’s what you need in this town, someone to have your back. My reps here have a

‘I think raising teens is almost like a waiting game – sometimes they choose paths that are a little shaky, but they always come back around. Often with youth, they just have to find their thing and, for Vinnie, it was acting.’ SAHNI BENNETT