ScreenTalk: Judy Callingham
16 August 2011
Judy Callingham has had a long and varied television career as a reporter, presenter and writer for many NZ classics.
In this ScreenTalk interview Callingham reflects on her career and how she became a writer because she was "appalling" as an actress.
She first appeared on our screens as a continuity announcer, but then moved on to reporting on the 1960s regional programme Town and Around. Callingham then developed her skills as a television drama writer on shows such as Close to Home, Gloss, Shark in the Park and Shortland Street.
In this interview, Callingham also talks about:
- How a friendly rivalry with a co-reporter on Town and Around forced her to confront a fear of heights
- Loving being a show runner on Close to Home
- How the show led to complaints that it didn’t represent real New Zealanders
- Why writing for Gloss made her a better person to live with
- That the superb cast of the show made the scripts better
- Basing the lead character of her TV play Casualties of Peace on her father
- The ‘organic’ process of writing the scripts for The Billy T James Show
- Doing a writing experiment while creating scene breakdowns for Shortland Street
This video is available on YouTube to embed and distribute via a Creative Commons licence.
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