In The Spotlight:
Celebrity chat with Ryan Bridge.
Newshub TV reporter, Magic Talk radio drive-time host and sometime fill-in on Three’s The AM Show, journalist-turned-broadcaster Ryan Bridge is not one to shy away from a good debate. He is also no stranger to being in the headlines himself. He is the man who was outed by Mark Richardson on national television – and the guy who dared to ask Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern if she had grey hair.
Why did you decide to become a journalist?
My grandmother is right into her politics and I remember staying at her place, sitting by the fire with a cup of tea and talking politics. Then, the more I got into it, the more I became interested in the interaction between politicians and journalists and how while one side is really making the decisions, the other side is there to protect, to question, to probe and that’s when I decided to become a journalist.
What has been your best reporting job ever?
I really enjoyed my time in the Press Gallery. I was 22 or 23, was totally in awe of politics, had just come out of journalism school and here I was surrounded by all these amazing characters and policy makers. I travelled the world in that job. I was very, very fortunate and went to about 17 countries following the then Prime Minister John Key around. That was a real eye-opener for me, going to APEC in Vladivostok, in Russia, to places I never thought I’d have the privilege of going to and reporting on stories that I think are important to people and people should know about.
And the worst?
It was Pike River. I got the name wrong of someone who was deceased and I just remember that person’s family getting in contact. I’ll never forget because I felt absolutely awful. I went home and cried about it. I was young. It was an awful experience but one that I think I learnt from.
What are you most passionate about?
One thing I am particularly passionate about is encouraging people to debate things, to think about things critically, to try to at least have an interest in
some things to do with government, to do with business, that are going to affect their lives. I really do relish the chance to perhaps probe, to encourage people to be interested, to have an opinion and not to be afraid to have an opinion.
Which reporting job has had the biggest impact on you?
The Christchurch terror attack. It happened about an hour before I went on air – maybe even less than that – and we did a three-hour show of live rolling coverage on what was happening. I remember one guy ringing in and pleading over the phone, ‘Please can you help me? We can’t find my niece’. When I went home that day I just had a big cry. As soon as you go off air, the human in you comes back and you start to process what’s just happened, the things you’ve just been told, the emotions people are feeling and the things they are telling you. I was spent by the end of that because you know that what’s just happened is so significant to people and to their lives and the families they’ve lost.
What was your first job?
I delivered the local paper on the Kapiti Coast and my goal was – Mum always wanted us to have goals – to deliver the Evening Post. I would go and pester Harold, the guy who used to do the deliveries, and finally I got the job.
You got flak for asking the Prime Minister about grey hair. Any regrets?
I don’t regret doing it because Clarke Gayford had tweeted about it publicly – about the fact he had dyed Jacinda’s hair or he’d bought the hair dye for $6 or something like that – so it was already in the public domain. I guess it was a little bit cheeky to ask if it was because she was going grey, but sometimes you just ask questions in the heat of the moment.
Mark Richardson accidentally outed you as gay on national television. How did you feel about that?
It was pretty intense. More than anything I felt sorry for Mark because we get along really well and it was totally absentminded of him. He didn’t mean to be rude. He didn’t mean to say anything that might have put me in a position I didn’t want to be in. However, I was quite blown away by the reception internationally, by the number of emails and messages I got from people all over the world who had been struggling with their sexuality or questioning themselves who had responded to it.