Jeremy Wells: Worth The Wait?

Worth the wait? We think so.

This week we published our episode with Jeremy Wells - a guest who had been on our 'hit list' since we started this podcast four years ago.

He was elusive, but for good reason. He has two of the biggest gigs in NZ media (plus hosts Taskmaster in his spare time), so we were incredibly grateful for the 90 minutes he gave us.

He doesn't often do interviews like this, and the response has been fantastic. It's on track to be our second most popular ep (good luck catching Marc Ellis!) and was another real milestone moment for us. But more importantly, it was just an epic chat. His openness, storytelling, creativity and lack of ego make him such a likeable character. His success is no accident.

Broadcaster Jeremy Wells sits down with Steve Holloway and Seamus Marten from the Between Two Beers podcast to discuss life, family, the difficult teenage years, Hilary Barry, Mikey Havoc and the irony of replacing Mike Hosking.

There are two versions of broadcaster Jeremy Wells - and the two are not easily reconciled.

Most prominent these days is the straight-faced, deadpan, almost Stepford Wives-version of the multi-media personality who beams into 500,000 living rooms at prime time every weeknight (yes, there is still a significant chunk of the population yet to discover podcasts) as co-host of TVNZ's Seven Sharp, alongside Hilary Barry.

Here Wells can be found unironically presenting what - at least to anyone not addicted to terrestrial TV - is an often a brain-numbing catalogue of trite, banal infotainment pitched primarily at an audience of middle-class Karens, but pitched perfectly all the same.

Then there is the savagely funny, sardonic, smirking and faintly subversive Wells, who has a back catalogue of some of the most jaw-dropping, controversial and outrageous segments in the history of New Zealand television. Even today this offbeat version of Wells can be found on the Alternative Commentary Collective broadcasts and podcasts discussing issues such as the preferred order in which you might want to bed the Black Caps' seam bowling attack (Lovely Trenty is first, by the way).

It's the biggest switch since Dylan went electric. And real Jekyll-and-Hyde territory for anyone scrutinising both iterations of Wells.

On Seven Sharp you'll find Dr Jekyll-Wells doing soothing introductions to mindless tosh about how cold winter is feeling this year, the cost of dating, how some people look like other people, whether it’s time to ditch open office spaces, or perhaps a discussion about the most used emojis.

Meanwhile the darker Mr. Hyde-Wells can be found on-line satirically parodying exactly this sort of TV puffery in historic out-takes from his former Eating Media Lunch series, with infamous spoof reports, such as of Shrek being slaughtered.

Or the even more notorious detailed satirical report on the production of "Anal Mana", the world's first indigenous, historically-accurate, culturally-specific porn film, featuring "Māori actors, Maori dialogue and traditional Māori costumes" set in 1850, if the Media Lunch intros could be believed.

Here Wells earnestly explained with his deadly serious voice-over, that the film's “climax” is “a metaphor for the incipient biculturalism that was later to define the emergent New Zealand”.

This was so realistically done that years later, in his book The Hollow Men, investigative reporter Nicky Hager revealed from sourcing internal emails, that former Prime Minister John Key was among those who thought Anal Mana was a real film, funded by the New Zealand taxpayer.

Today this version of the more eyebrow-raising Wells can also be found weekdays on The Matt & Jerry Show, 6-9am on Radio Hauraki.

On the latest edition of the Between Two Beers podcast, co-host Seamus Marten and I chatted with Wells for a couple of hours. Near the end of proceedings Wells spoke about his role in yet another broadcasting niche, the Alternative Commentary Collective, and how their ball-by-ball cricket commentary here was originally a parody - and that led to a wider, deeper reflection.

“I mean, it's like most of the things I do, including what I do on Seven Sharp now,” Wells said. “It is a parody of someone doing it. You know, I'm pretending to be someone. And that's kind of how I have to do it...  I'm not really a cricket commentator. I'm not really a television host - I'm just someone pretending to be a television host. I'm not really a radio host. It's just all a parody of it of those people.”

Wells is very, very good at pretending. Essentially he is now a TV personality who can even parody a parody.

This parody genius hit peak form well in advance of taking on his role at Seven Sharp, Wells had already gained a huge cult following for his keen sense of satire, which included the “Like Mike” radio segments on Hauraki, in which he pitch-perfectly aped right-wing broadcaster Mike Hosking, both in vocal tone and nuttiness of content.

It became so hard to tell the real Hosking apart from Wells that the Broadcasting Standards Authority started getting complaints about Like Mike.

So was it odd to have life imitate art and end up replacing Hosking in real life on Seven Sharp?

“Hundred per cent, strangest thing in the world,” Wells said. “I took over his car park, I took over his computer, I took over his desk.

“This is the weirdest thing. I took over his locker in the TVNZ changing room and it still had his name on it. They hadn't printed my name at this stage.

“And so I had Mike Hosking's locker, doing his old job, definitely not driving his car, or his type of car, and inside his locker was a Kenny Rogers album on vinyl and a Bible. 

“Those were the two things that he had left nothing else, everything else had been cleaned out, no clothes, nothing else. But there was a Kenny Rogers album. Is that weird? Is that on-brand?  We don't even know, that's maybe why he left?”

In the 90s Wells rose to fame as “Newsboy”, reading the news on Mikey Havoc's breakfast show on student radio station 95bFM, and 1997 the pair made the shift to TV, launching the MTV (later TV2) show “Havoc”.

This show was boundary-pushing in the extreme.

Wells: "I think our show was a reaction to what else was on and... there were a lot of things that were very safe on New Zealand television in the in the late 90s."

Alternative culture was quite strong at the time, with a significant difference between alternative and mainstream.

“We were very much in the alternative camp, and you didn't see a lot of that on TV, where it was all pretty straight down the line, and heavily manufactured. So I think when we first started Havoc there was not a lot of weird stuff going on.

“And Mikey was a surrealist, you know, in the greatest sense of it. And so it was just really about Mike's surreal brain and putting pictures to it.”

Havoc and Newsboy already had great chemistry from their radio days, and that blossomed into television anarchy.

They then hit the road for more free-wheeling late-night slots on TV, where their antics included dancing at Waihopai spy base and visiting Gore for an even more controversial "Gay Man's Rock" episode.

“It just essentially evolved and it was allowed to evolve because there was no pressure. I mean, you could do whatever you want.”

I put it to Wells that he and Havoc really solidified their alternative status by broadcasting a clip where someone appeared to nail their penis to a crucifix.

Wells: “They lit it on fire... In those days what we were looking for was the worst thing possible. So the whole thing was like, ‘what is the worst thing that we could do?'‘ And that was right up there. But someone sent that into us, because they obviously got the sensibility of the show.

“But I just remember thinking my brain process was very much what has never been done on TV before?  We must do it. That was kind of where we were at.”

However his most embarrassing personal experience was wearing a television live eye - state-of- the-art technology at the time - and visiting a brothel for Havoc coverage of The Prostitution Law Reform Act.

“Prostitution had been decriminalised in New Zealand. And so that was a topic. Let's get our teeth into the topic du jour, which is this issue. Because nobody else would have been touching it...

“I remember Mikey and I sitting down and saying here, what do we do? And I remember saying, ‘Well, one of us has to have sex with a prostitute’...

“So we have a brothel... I went in with a cricket helmet with a handycam gaffer-taped to it. And Mikey was inside the live eye guiding me.

“We did a paper-rock-scissors before that, who was going to have sex with a prostitute? And I don't know whether I won or not, but it was me.

“And then Mikey was like, ‘Is it gonna be okay, mate?’ And it was me on the phone, the segment before was me on the phone to my partner at the time, saying ‘Ah, yeah. I’ve got to have sex with a prostitute’, explaining to her.

“Anyway, I ended up going in there and I didn't actually have sex with her - I was kind of pretending... So there I am doing that. And then I think I put up a picture of the Newstalk ZB radio line-up... And I've got a mic and the live eye who's directing me, just giving me tips on what I should be doing, what I shouldn't be doing.

“And then, in the end, I think I ended up zooming into Murray Deaker's face upon climax.”

But the greater embarrassment came from Wells' mother, Lady Sheryl (Duckie) Wells - manager of the New Zealand netball team at the time and in camp before going to the World Championships - being talked into watching this episode.

“She never watched that show. Thank God she never watched any of the Havoc shows. She knew that it was just best that she didn't watch it.

"But that night, the girls in the netball team - Bernice Mene was the person who said to my mum, come on Duckie, no, come on, Duckie, let's watch Jeremy's TV show.

“My mum's like, 'No, no, it's fine'. And the girls are like, 'Nah, come on'.  Well, all of a sudden the entire New Zealand netball team - of all the days that they would choose to watch the Havoc show with my mum was that episode - were sitting down and watching that.

“Now can you imagine my mum, she's watching me pretend to have sex with a sex worker... And then the Murray Deaker thing at the end. She has never ever mentioned to me that she ever watched it, never told me the story.

“Bernice Mene was the one that told me the story about 10 years later. I thought, 'Oh, my poor mum, having to watch me do that.”

So when he looks back, is he proud of these many and varied Havoc and Newsboy escapades?

“No. No, I'm not. I don't look back on things and go you know, 'I'm particularly proud of this' or 'particularly proud of that'. I can't think of anything that I'm particularly proud of.”

One of Wells' favourite broadcast moments came from yet another boundary-pushing show with a chaotic fun environment, The Late Night Big Breakfast, with Lee Hart and Jason Hoyte.

Here Mike The Mongolian Throat Singer gives a rendition of "We Are The World" which is so bad it forces everyone to break character and descend into tears of laughter.

“The reason that I'm laughing so hard, at that Mongolian throat thing is because I saw Leigh break - and he never breaks.

“And so when someone like that starts laughing, it's like, what a great joy... I'm not sure about other people broadcasting, but that is why I do what I do - for those moments that are elevated, that are magic moments.

“They come from somewhere and they're different. They're different than when you're hanging out with your friends because it's being filmed ... those are the best moments of your life as a broadcaster.”

It's tempting to suggest it might be nice to see more of such moments on the very straight-laced Seven Sharp.

But Wells acknowledges that while he reveals little of himself on Seven Sharp, he does bring a lot more personality to his breakfast radio gig with Hauraki.

“You've got to bring bits of yourself, because essentially, nobody can see anything.

“All they're hearing is what's coming out of your brain... So you are creating everything that comes out of your brain and someone else's brain and, and whatever is created from YouTube goes into people's ears.

“Television is about pictures. It's not about words, the words accompany the pictures, but it's mainly a visual thing. And you're stimulated by what you say.

“And took me ages to work this out. But I mean, Country Calendar is a great example. Absolutely. You know, why is Country Calendar is one of the most popular shows in New Zealand and has been for the last 50 years? It's pictures, the pictures are just stunning. I mean, yeah, I get the stories are interesting. But essentially, it's the same rural story.”

While chemistry is important on Seven Sharp, the detail can be far more exacting on radio.

“You can hide on television, whereas on radio, I don't think you can hide in the same way...  With the way that you respond, the time that it takes you to respond to some things, reveals so much more about yourself.”

Wells has established great rapport with both his broadcast partners, Barry on TV and Matt Heath, his brilliant foil on radio, despite them being quite diverse talents.

Wells: “Chemistry is pretty much everything. And what is chemistry? It's a magic. It is this magic thing that happens. And you know, when it happens, and it's actually if you really, if you're totally honest about it, it is the reason why you broadcast.

“The magic is what you're looking for all the time. And if you are open to the magic happening, then then these moments happen. And I feel so good when it happens.

“And you know, when it's not happening, you're quite aware of it. I reckon you get better over time of spotting when it when it occurs - and when it doesn't.”

But it was a different sort of chemistry that got Wells into serious trouble as a teenager.

After his parents found marijuana in his room, he was sent to board at Wanganui College - only to be expelled for a supplying a recovering patient at a drug addiction institution with cannabis oil at the end of the year.

Wells hadn't smoked pot all year, but at the end of the final school term did a community experience week at the NSAD drug treatment centre in Marton. And while there he thought he would treat himself with a cap of cannabis oil that he had acquired, having finished his exams.

But while waiting for an opportunity at night, one of the patients approached him saying he'd heard he had drugs, and Wells found himself in a difficult situation

“He was reasonably coercive. And I didn’t have the skills to negotiate my way through it, as well as I would have liked.

“I ended up giving it to him, which was a terrible idea and sounds like the worst thing in the world.

“In the end. I actually threw it on the ground and I said if you want to pick it up, that’s all good, because I felt like I didn't really have an option. And then he picked it up and swallowed it.”

The next day the patient was really stoned.

“Red eyes and a stoned person at a sober facility - boy, do they stand out.”

Wells soon found himself in solitary confinement at Wanganui Collegiate while they went through his study, looking for drugs, and his parents arrived.

“My parents in had said to me, before I left, 'this is your last chance', because before they sent me down to Wanganui, we'd been having some problems. And then they said, ‘if you muck this one up, that's it, you're not part of this family any more’...

“So at that point, when we walked out of the headmaster's office, my parents were like, ‘Oh well, we told you what we told you, and see you later’, and they just drove off.”

Wells was left in Wanganui by himself, returning to solitary confinement at the sanitorium where he had been placed, getting meals bought to him like a prisoner before being put on the Northerner train back to Auckland to stay with a friend.

“And so that was it. For me, that was my expulsion. My parents were practising I guess what they thought was tough love back in those days. Pretty, pretty brutal manoeuvre by them, but I've go to say, quite good.

“Because if that hadn't happened, I think a whole lot of other things would have happened and it worked out quite well in the end.”

Nevertheless Wells also recalls the stigma of being expelled and how it preyed on his mind, while waiting for the train at Marton.

“I remember thinking, what do you do in this situation? I thought, ‘yeah, I think you're meant to kill yourself’.

“And I just thought, I think that's what I'm meant to do. That would be the honourable thing to do in this situation. You know, you've brought such shame to your family.

“And luckily, luckily, I just didn't have the guts to do that. But I mean, looking back, there was a moment. I just wouldn't even have the guts to be able to do something like that, but it was definitely a thought that I had.”

Finally, we asked Wells, 46 this month, if he was a retire-early kind of guy?

“My feelings on that change every day. Sometimes they change three or four times within that day. I don't know, I think I'll just kind of keep going and see what happens.

“The idea of retiring would be quite nice. What would be nice would be to have a sabbatical for like two months a year or something. To have more holidays would be nice but I don't think that kind of works.

“If I wasn't broadcasting - I think it's kind of in me - I think I would be deeply unhappy.”