Now you’re talking
The year’s most quotable quotes
Music Curious as to whether Scribe ever got any of his awards he flogged on Trade Me back?
"Don’t say anything about the awards. That little f...ing throwaway question, don’t say anything about that. This is about the play. That cool?’’
Arrested Development rapper Speech in the wake of the Orlando nightclub shooting:
‘‘I don’t feel like there’s a need for guns, and I wish we could make them illegal – but that’s not coming any time soon in this country. America is – or a lot of Americans at least are – ridiculously passionate about guns.’’
Paul Kelly on writing a song:
‘‘I go to the guitar or the piano and fool around until something happens. It’s not like making a pair of shoes where there are steps to follow. It happens quickly or not at all . . . then finishing off always takes longer. The part that’s surprising me, that’s got to be quick. Because it’s surprising me.’’
Passenger jokes about his new album:
‘‘It’s just worse, basically. I’m just getting progressively worse, as an artist.’’
Spanish singer Julio Iglesias on still singing at 73:
‘‘Other people might have decided I am too old to sing, but my dog, he loves it! When he stops wagging the tail, I will stop. But I always carry a treat for him in my pocket, so even if he does not like the song, I can get his tail moving again.’’
Phil Collins, on his public perception as ‘annoying’:
‘‘People just thought I was an unbearable show-off. I think looking back on it, I can safely say – I was pretty irritating.’’
Robin Pors, of veteran Dutch pop band The Vengaboys, on having the last laugh:
‘‘To be honest, this all started as a bit of a joke, really. We never thought-let’s form a band and conquer the world. But then we had some No 1 hits and now we’re still doing it, after 20 years. If you think about it, that’s actually a pretty long joke.’’
David Thomas, leader of longtime American cult band, Pere Ubu, on not being as famous as he deserves to be:
‘‘What you really mean to say is that Pere Ubu is the biggest commercial failure to ever exist. And you’re right! We should get some sorta special failure award from somebody. Considering our importance to history, culture, and how long we’ve been going at it, we should be bigger than U2!’’
Reclusive former Beach Boys singer/producer Brian Wilson on things he likes to do when he’s not making music:
‘‘I like to take walks in the park near where I live . . . When I’m not at the park, I watch television. My favourites are Wheel of Fortune and the news. I’m not really sure when I’ll retire. Prob’ly in a few years. I’m 74 now. Hey, thank you very much for the interview. I gotta go, but I think when you people hear Pet Sounds down there in New Zealand you’re gonna like it a lot.’’
Finn Andrews, of The Veils, on Mexican salamanders:
‘‘Axolotyls are my favourite creatures on the planet. I love these animals that feel unfinished, like mistakes of God. The platypus is another one. You can imagine if we found these sort of creatures on another planet, everyone would lose their minds over them, but they’re right here, all around us, all the time. Such strange delights … ’’
James frontman Tim Booth says their cleancut image wasn’t fair:
‘‘We were on a Lollapalooza tour with Korn, Tricky, the Prodigy, and Snoop Dogg, and the bulletins among the security crew was that we were the most difficult band to manage. Except when one of Snoop Dogg’s minder guys drew a gun on security, that is.’’
Postmodern Jukebox’s Scott Bradlee pitches his band:
‘‘I’ve always described it as like going to a party with Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack back in the 1940s. It’s that kinda party, and you know it’s going to be good.’’
Mexican-American guitarist Kid Congo Powers, former member of The Gun Club, The Cramps, and Nick Cave’s Bad Seeds:
‘‘To be honest, I think I kinda got those jobs because of how I looked, as much as how I played! You know your tribe when you see them, right? You can tell if you’re gonna get on with somebody sometimes by the way they dress. They may look like a sleazebag, but you know right away if they’re the right kind of sleazebag … ’’.
Mika’s financial policy:
‘‘There’s only so much money a bloody single gay man should have.’’
Film Don’t ask Goonies actor Martha Plimpton about the movie that made her famous:
‘‘It’s a subject I’ve talked about for so many years, that every time I talk about it now, I sort of feel like my brain’s shutting off. There’s just nothing more to add about it, you know what I mean?’’
Kerry Fox on the difference between ageing on screen for men and women:
‘‘I’m looking at the wonderful Mark Rylance doing his four films, one after the other, and thinking, pffft. I was on the plane watching films with all these men I’ve worked with – Timothy Spall, I think he popped up twice – and all these ugly old things. What about Bryan Cranston, you know, Jesus Christ! In my business it’s really disheartening and really difficult [for ageing women]. A number of roles I’ve read recently thinking, this is so dull. I’d rather slit my wrists than spend a few days of my life on this.’’
Cliff Curtis on playing every ethnicity he’s ever been offered:
When I was in theatre, I played a Ghanaian. Physically there are some roles I shouldn’t play. I think it would be terrible to pass me off as a Chinese man from the northern provinces, for example. But I don’t think there’s a role I wouldn’t want to try. I wouldn’t turn down the role of the King of Siam on Broadway . . . I don’t know if I’d be any good at it, but I wouldn’t turn it down.’’
Chasing Great director Justin Pemberton on how he approached making a documentary on Richie McCaw:
"Strangely, the In Bed With Madonna documentary that came out in the 1990s [was my inspiration] in the sense that here is a film largely told by the character that in some ways is a celebration, but is also not sycophantic and feels like a film.’’
Anthony LaPaglia on playing a real estate agent in A Month of
Sundays (his father was a car dealer and one of his brothers is a car wholesaler):
‘‘I’m not very fond of real estate agents. They’re one below car salesmen in my book.’’
Director Shane Meadows on trying to impress a girl at art college:
"She was a fine arts student and she used to wear headbands, so I started wearing a beret, trying to be dead trendy, but it actually made me look like a big, massive knob,’’
Karl Urban reflects on the disappointing Star Trek: Into Darkness:
‘‘There definitely was a bit of a backlash from the audience and, quite frankly, I agreed with them.’’
Michelle Yeoh on filming the Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon sequel in New Zealand:
‘‘What is an ancient Chinese period drama doing filming there? What if we run out of lamps? You can’t just run out to the corner store and get one.’’
Hunt for the Wilder-people’s Julian Dennison on being paired with Sam Neill:
‘‘I’d never met Sam before. Mum was like ‘you’re working with Sam Neill!’’ and I was like ‘who’s Sam Neill?’ All his movies came out before I was born.’’
TV Mastermind finalist David Barnes:
"I guess like anybody who goes on the show, it’s the opportunity to let my inner-smartarse come to the fore.’’
Norm Hewitt, former All Black and former schoolyard bully of actor Manu Bennett, wants to change the script:
‘‘We need to stop telling our boys, ‘Don’t cry, don’t be girls, harden up you pussy’. That language I heard
when I was growing up, how do we change it so our boys can feel that they can find their heart and their presence and still be great at what they do?’’
The Simpsons is often credited with predicting the future and did an episode with President Trump. Executive producer Al Jean said on The Donald:
‘‘No one dreamt he would be a frontrunner. It’s just bizarre – it’s like the cartoon Mr Magoo where everything he does wrong somehow turns out right.’’
British actor Christopher Eccleston’s work ethic:
‘‘I need work, I need to work. I need to think that I’m earning, not just for the practical reasons, but it’s just very much part of a working-class identity, the importance of work. I’ll always work.’’
Ex-NFL player Terry Crews on cracking Hollywood:
‘‘It’s like if you’ve ever been homeless, and you not only get a house, but the biggest, nicest house you could imagine living in? That’s my experience. I grew up with people who said ‘you can be anything you want to be,’ but they weren’t doing what they wanted to do. I tell my kids ‘you can do whatever you want to do’: and I know, because I do it.’’
Ray Meagher on creating Home and Away’s Alf Stewart:
‘‘I fought for Alf to drink VB. I think he’s a VB beer man. The art department would do various deals with different grog companies, so a different grog would show up every now and again . . . but any bloke Alf’s age, if they drink a brand of beer, it becomes sacrosanct.’’
BBC doco maker Louis Theroux on getting naked on the job:
‘‘I hung out with a couple called Gary and Margaret who hold swingers’ parties at the weekends. The limit of my participation was that I stripped off naked and jumped in the pool. I also visited the Group Room, but I didn’t have sex with anyone. I also played a supporting role one time in a gay porno film. I wanted to get more closely involved, so the director said I could play a park ranger. It was a speaking part, but not . . . you know . . . a performing part.’’ ‘‘People say to me, ‘oh you must have it made and you get girls, you’ve got money’. But when you pull the curtain back, like The Wizard of Oz analogy, you see that I’m just as insecure, scared, nervous, and unsure as anybody.’’
Once declared a risk to American national security, former hacker Kevin Mitnick on his infamous ‘FBI doughnuts’:
‘‘The FBI sent this undercover guy to see if he could coax me into doing some hacking. I used that guy’s phone number to find the numbers of the other FBI agents, then I built a device that would set off an alarm if any of those cellphone numbers came anywhere near my house. Then I went out and bought a dozen assorted doughnuts, and wrote ‘FBI doughnuts’ on the box, so when they came to search my house, all they found were the FBI doughnuts. They were pretty pissed about that, but I thought it was hilarious!’’
Books Stephen Daisley, winner of the fiction section of the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards, on telling his wife he had quit his job to write:
‘‘I said, ‘I’ve left my well-paying job, Syl, and I am going back to delivering papers so I can write’. And she said, ‘What?’ I said, ‘If you leap, the net will appear’. She said, ‘F..., is that another metaphor? Is that another one?’ ’’
Miranda July, writer and filmmaker, on Juan, the guy who tends her yard:
‘‘Interesting figure in my life, he kind of came with the house. When you drive up to my house it looks like maybe a Mexican family lives here, because he is charge of the outside of it. We shake hands by touching elbows for some reason. I think it’s because his hands are often dirty.’’
Miranda Hart on dog names:
‘‘Never get your young children to choose the dog name. Funny around the kitchen table but you will end up with a dog called Ketchup or Felt Tip.’’
Miss Peregrine author Ransom Riggs on growing up in Florida:
"I didn’t know a lot of kids in my neighbourhood, and I didn’t feel like I quite fitted in there. When you live in a place that is relentlessly sunny, cheerful, and beachy, and you spend your spare time reading Stephen King stories and novels about Gothic castles, perhaps that’s not surprising.’’
British comedian, X Factor judge, and children’s author David Walliams on swimming long distance for charity:
‘‘Did I enjoy having wetsuit rash and being attacked by swans? Not at all. But there’s a real sense of achievement in these things, and it was to raise money for charity. I also love the peace that comes when you’re uncontactable. No one can text you while you’re in the water, so you’re just alone with your thoughts. And I don’t mind the water being cold, because I’ve got quite a lot of blubber to insulate me.’’
Comedy Chatty Man Alan Carr on crap jobs:
‘‘Before this, I did a drama studies degree, which is the best possible way to end up in McDonald’s saying ‘Do you want fries with that?’ I worked in call centres, a supermarket, a factory. I wiped grease off car parts with meths. I packed shampoo. I cleaned up in a place where they made CDs. It was my job to sweep up the tiny bits of crushed-up plastic from under all the machinery. Someone had to hold on to my legs and swing me underneath these huge cogs with a broom in my hand to get it all out! So when people say to me ‘Alan, why are you always so happy?’ I tell them that any job is better than spending a whole summer being swung by your ankles under a machine. It was ’orrible!’’
Jerry Seinfeld, the highest paid comedian in the world, on his chosen career:
‘‘I’m a big fan of stupid. It gives me great pleasure to spend a coupla years of my life perfecting a joke that might last two minutes. To spend so long on something so many other people might see as worthless – this is a source of great pride to me.’’
Irish comic Tommy Tiernan’s flagging libido:
‘‘I’m nearly 50, and my sexual energy is on the decrease. Now, you wouldn’t know it, given that I have six children, but I welcome that decrease. I’m excited about where that energy that used to go into sex might now go instead. Men in particular get more unpredictable as they get older, because the energy that used to go towards their groin is now diverted towards making other sorts of mischief. Now, I welcome that. People who make Viagra want us to be ashamed about the decrease in our libido, but I think it’s a great thing.’’
Last Week Tonight comic John Oliver on our (former) Prime Minister:
‘‘I am deeply fascinated with John Key, and there are two reasons for that. The first is that New Zealand’s a genuinely interesting country; the second is that John Key is a very odd human being. It’s like a clown car in a circus parade. The car itself is fascinating, but the clown is really the thing that draws your eye. And John Key is nothing if not a gigantic clown. The thing about John Key for someone who doesn’t live in New Zealand is that you can enjoy all the funniest things about him- he’s semantically erratic, he has no internal monologue, he just vocalises every thought that comes into his mind with varying degrees of difficulty – without being on the receiving end of his political policies. For us, it’s just a really entertaining sideshow.’’
Guy Wiliams on fellow comedian Jesse Griffin:
‘‘He’s a normal, well-adjusted human, which is unusual for a comedian. He showed me that a comedian could have their s..t together.’’
Stage Stanley Reedy of Westport, 14, on being chosen to play Michael in Billy Elliot:
‘‘You wouldn’t think a little old Westport person would get it."
Flashdance stage show star Julia Macchio (daughter of The Karate Kid, Ralph Macchio):
‘‘The family joke is that we just can’t seem to get out of the 1980s.’’
As told to Steve Kilgallon, Grant Smithies, Eleanor Black, James Croot, Shaun Bamber, Jack van Beynen, Michael Donaldson