Matchless teller of television stories
Michael Scott-Smith, who died in March, aged 85, made a huge contribution to New Zealand television. Recruited from the BBC in 1966 when the NZBC was flat out building transmitters but unsure how to meet the demand for local television, he led the way and showed his tyro colleagues about TV production.
He was knowledgeable and supportive; a matchless appraiser of a ‘‘rough-cut’’. He’d look through the footage, then tell the director or editor: ‘‘Cut the man with the beard, push the hospital sequence higher, trim the closer to 30 seconds and you’ve got it.’’
Throughout his almost 50-year career he taught, led, innovated, encouraged and backed workmates. He headed NZBC, TV-1 and TVNZ drama, documentary and information divisions, and produced series such as Compass,
and Close to our founding soap opera, which kicked off the top of the ratings.
He was executive producer of series telling the nation’s stories –
.He helped establish the Natural History Unit and won awards for election coverage and a range of documentaries. Media historian Roger Horrocks lauded his support for private producers, whose work helped to turn out, in Michael’s first year as head of department, more TV drama than had been broadcast in the previous 10 years.
Born in Lancashire, northwest England, to Peggy Moffat, a talented singer, and scientist father Jack Scott-Smith, he boarded at Bloxham School in Oxfordshire and was commissioned in the infantry for his two years of national service. By his account, he spent most of it playing cricket, and showed enough slow left-arm bowling skill to suggest he could have played professionally. He postponed that option when offered a place at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, where fellow students included Peter O’Toole and Albert Finney.
In 1956, while pondering the choice between stage and cricket pitch, he was recalled to active army service for the misguided campaign to retain control of the Suez Canal. After release from the army, he opened the sealed orders issued when he’d left for Suez. They were completely contrary to the public assurances given by the British government. He became a pacifist and was always healthily sceptical about political promises.
His career dilemma was resolved when the BBC offered him a production job on
which soon reinforced its innovative reputation when theatre critic Kenneth Tynan infamously used the ‘‘F’’ word on air for the first time. With BBC aplomb, the next news bulletin reported: ‘‘For the first time, the ‘F’ word has been uttered on television. It was spoken in the course of a discussion about the staging of a play . . .’’
Coming with wife Shirley to the NZBC Christchurch appointment, he brought strong production skills, and a commitment to the responsibilities evidenced by leaders such as David Attenborough, Hugh CarltonGreen and New Zealander Alan Morris, who all believed public television’s duty is to excite, entertain and inform audiences with competitive programming that aims for excellence. He would not tolerate shoddy and unimaginative productions and was dismayed when politicians chose in the 1980s to make New Zealand the only developed democracy without an independent national public-interest TV system.
But nothing could diminish his love for his adopted country. He delighted in its openness, the lack of class and wealth divisions, and the opportunities it offered for work and play, friendship and collegiality, with a family flourishing around him.
His twin passions – theatre and sport – stayed. He directed plays for Wellington Repertory, composed screenplays, wrote a novel and strutted his stuff at play readings with friends. He followed children’s and grandchildren’s rugby games and played squash and wily cricket for Collegians until dodgy knees led to dropped catches; he took up golf, walking the New Judgeford fairways until the knees gave out.
As he faced declining health, his consolations were music (Beethoven and Mozart); the love and care of his children Michelle, Mark and Samantha and his partner Janey Taylor, and delight in seven grandchildren and nine great-grandchildren, who farewelled him at his funeral with a resounding, heartfelt Nga¯ ti Toa haka, .–