Kiwianarama

You're not in Hollywood anymore, Jake The Muss

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away, known as Browns Bay, a pact was signed with the devil, or, at the very least, someone who looked a lot like him.

Until the afternoon of Monday, 25 May 1992,  the received wisdom said that it was simply impossible, both physically and financially, to produce a television show in New Zealand that would last beyond two seasons. But on that fateful date, standing at the mythical crossroads of Glenfield and Wairau Roads, hours before the broadcast of his new soap, Shortland Street, the head of South Pacific Pictures, John Barnett made a bargain with the evil gods of network television, that would guarantee the future of season, after season (after season) of low-rent, locally produced television.

What he didn’t, and couldn’t, realise at the time, was that, by doing so, he had unleashed a terrible curse upon every actor who would ever appear on the show.

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£28 in Topshop, $700 in Karen Walker

Located in an out-of-season timezone, with a population less than most other nations’ statistical margin of error, it’s a wonder the factories of China sell New Zealand any clothes at all. Lacking the substantial buying power of big countries, Kiwi retail chains are always last in the queue, squabbling over scraps of overpriced, end of the line, monochrome fashion that simply screams ‘THREE YEARS AGO!’.

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