August 31, 2024 • 45 mins
Paula's back for another season, and her first guest is SportsCafe-ish host, Ric Salizzo. They discuss his return to New Zealand and bringing the iconic sports comedy show back as a podcast, as well as his adventures in the US and in journalism. He then shares advice for turning ideas into action, how to identify talent, being ahead of the game, and the importance of backing yourself.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hello.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
I am Paula Bennett and welcome to season six of
my New Zealand Herald podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:07):
Asked me anything, It's so.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Good to be back, and one thing I've learned in
life is it's never too late to learn something new.
So on this podcast, I talked to people from all
walks of life to hear about how they got to
where they are and get some advice and guidance on
some of life's biggest questions. My first guest for this
season is a man who has a wonderfully varied CV
and a pioneer in our sports media. Starting us out
(00:41):
as a sports reporter, he went on to become the
first ever all Blacks media man. He's been a tally host, creator,
and producer. He created shows like nineties cult hit Sports
Cafe you already know it is now also sports news
show The Crowd Goes Wild. He's recently returned from the
US where he was CEO of New York's professional rugby
union team, and that is probably only touching the surface,
(01:03):
so let's talk more about it. For his latest project,
He's brought back Sports Cafe, this time in podcast form.
Was Sports Cafe ish Rick Salizo, Hi, how was that.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
That's good. There's a lot more impressive than I really am.
But that was sounding good.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Yeah, that's all right. That's what we do, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
You know?
Speaker 3 (01:21):
So thanks for writing that all out for me. I
just thought i'd read it out on you.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
There's a bit longer, but you've missed the page for
that school.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
Oh that's a right. You will get to it as
we sort of go in.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
So I'm going to ease in first some quickfire questions.
If you could go to the pub with any celebrity,
who would it be.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
That's a good question. My growing up, my hero is
Nadia kamen Each, the Romanian gymnast, and I mentioned not
be yes, she's about the same age. And so I
was a four en year old kid watching the seventy
six Montreal Olympics. So I mentioned that to Mark and
he's been giving me grief for the last year about it.
(02:01):
So so that would be my most steel beee.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Some young men out there now that in what forty
years time will say Simon, Yeah, well.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
I mean you know she was when you think about,
you know, the idea of a perfect ten, well she was.
She did several perfect tens. Yeah, yeah, And I think fascinating.
She had a fascinating life, you know, being brought up
in Romanire and then going over to the US and
stuff like that. She'ld be cool.
Speaker 3 (02:28):
Yeah, she would be really so unexpected that and.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
If we couldn't get in, she could sort of jump
and climb and stuff get into the top.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
She could somersault over.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
So she'd be ready handed in the pub.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Yeah, and then even somersault back with a drink probably
and not spill a drop exactly. Yeah, we presume she
can still do it at sixty. But you know, okay,
then what was the drink of choice?
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Bee?
Speaker 1 (02:51):
I'm styl like, I'm pretty.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
You're pretty easy. It's not that fancy, is.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
That I did. I lived in Austin, Texas for a year,
and I really started to appreciate mescal. And but not
like we drink tequila like you know, it's four o'clock
in the morning, we just have some shots. They'll just
put it a nice and sip it and it'll be nice.
And I really really enjoy a nice messcal. Actually, oh
(03:16):
there you go.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Yeah, I'm I'm on a currently on a hunt for
the perfect bloody mary right, because I think that with
all respect it's my podcast. People are bastardizing them, right,
they're getting too fancy, they're trying to modernize them. I
can't get to the drink through the freaking stupid garnish.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Then this idea is that they for garnish and a drink.
It's just like we actually want a drink another salad. Yeah,
I'll have a drink and a salad separately.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
One the other day it had three different types like
a gurk and a bloody olive, a something else ENSLAMI.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Oh, yeah, too much. We should report that person to
the police.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
We should really favorite bar pub restaurant in the world,
in the world.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
Yeah, you've been all over the World's.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
A good question. There's a One of my favorite restaurants
is a restaurant in New York called Beauty and Essex.
Speaker 3 (04:10):
And usually and Essex and.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
So it's on Essex Street. Okay, well, Beauty one of them.
The cool thing about it is it's in New York.
They have a lot of speakeasy, so they're hidden behind
something else the restaurant. So you walk in and there's
a second hand porn shop. And you walk in there
and there's all this old stuff on the and it's tiny,
and you sort of go o, where's the restaurant And
they open the door and ban there's this massive restaurant
(04:35):
and behind it and the food's unbelievable. One of the
things that they make is a ferris wheel dessert, so
they put all these different desserts in the restrold you
spin it around. But I told him, mate, that we
meet them there. And he was a key week coming
up to New York, and he walked up and down
the road for about half an hour trying to find
the place. Because it's not a restaurant. It was a
porn shop.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
But did you say secondhand porn shop?
Speaker 1 (04:59):
When I say porn sho, I don't mean sort of
like the sort of place that Mark Alice. I'm talking
about a second hand shop where you can buy old stuff,
and they call them porn shops.
Speaker 3 (05:08):
Porn is in w Yeah, but I can't.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
I can't say porn something wrong.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
That he was absolutely and then I'm like, I want that's.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
The whole idea of the restaurant going to the wrong place.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
So you know, because I think the porn was an
r is entirely people's choices, But I think I would
be judging on the second hand part of that.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Yeah, yeah, second hand porne. I'm not sure if it's
a big market. I don't know. I've never been to
a second hand porn shop, you know, no, no, but
they have been to a secondand porn shop, as in
like chest Pea's.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
Well, all porn porn shops are second here, aren't they.
Speaker 3 (05:47):
Have we gone down a rabbit hold?
Speaker 2 (05:48):
Yeah yeah, yeah, okay, varied career.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
That's what we've talked.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
About, and so we're can talk about that but later on.
But let's talk about sports. Cafe is back kind of right,
So why podcast? Why did you bring it back?
Speaker 1 (06:03):
I caught up with Mark during the Rugby World Cup
in Paris. I caught up with with them. He was
over there and I hadn't been home for a while,
and I already enjoyed talking to him. We had a
lot of fun. We were in hysterics. And then when
I got back to New Zealand, I caught up with
Lee Lee Harp the same thing, you know, Lana as well,
and I just really enjoyed their company and I said, well,
(06:25):
want we do something, you know, and originally it was
going to be called that has been cafe but then
we thought, why don't we just do it use our
old name, you know, because that will help us get
an audience. And it's just fun. It's just for us.
It's just an opportunity to get to get and have fun.
(06:47):
And that's what we miss.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
And I mean like Sports Cafe itself was what nineteen
ninety six, so about twenty eleven.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
Yeah, we stopped in two thousand and five. I put
it enough and then and then I got a call
one night at three four o'clock in the morning and
it was Mark and he was out in Ponsonby Road
and he's like, I've got the lady from TVNZ. She's
just bumped her in the bar and she wants us
to bring Sports Cafa back. And I told her you
(07:15):
won't do it, so.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
You know, you tell her.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
And then she got on the phone and she's like,
why don't you bring it back? And I said, oh,
just you know, had its time and blah blah blahah oh,
I bring it back, bring it back, come and see me,
you know. And so so he brought it back in
two thousand and eight.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
These decisions yeah morning, right.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
Yeah, yeah, And it was fun. But we did it
for a long time and it just got to the
point where it was time to stop. Yeah, but now
it feels really but it.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
Was hugely successful.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
And you mentioned when you were talking about bumping into
the old crow and then deciding you'll get back together again.
Speaker 3 (07:50):
Is part of its.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
Success that it is good mates that did have got
to share a sense of humor, that can have a
great laugh together.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
I think, you know, when you're the worst thing you
can do is try and be funny, and we're not
trying to be funny, we're just being ourselves and some
of them are really funny. So it's really And when
we started Sports Cafe, I mean it was a pretty
small show to start with, and it was just I'd
(08:18):
finished doing the All Black Job. I knew that that's
how sports people talk to each other. You know, it's
been a long time on the road with them, and
it wasn't quite the way that interviews were done. So
I thought one, you know, recreate life on the road
into into a chat show. And at that stage there'd
(08:38):
never been a successful New Zealand chat based show. I
think Bob Jones tried one. I mean there'd been a
futures Neil Roberts tried one, and they'd never quite worked,
and there was always this sort of perception that we
couldn't do humor and we couldn't do chat shows. And
I was like, oh, that's fine, we'll just we'll call
it something else and so yeah, and it's just I
(09:01):
think it's I think the beauty of sports Cafe is
it's just a group of mates talking to each other.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
So here you are back and like text changed, So
the way we get and watch and consume our entertainment
has changed traumatically. But equally what's changed is society's acceptability
of certain things as well.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Have you noticed.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
I mean it's we're in a very different world from
nineteen ninety six.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
People aren't that haven't changed that there's a layer above
them that's changed, a layer of rule setters. And someone
wrote a piece I can't even remember where it was
when we came back saying, oh, the last thing we
need is this sort of blokey crap, you know, back again,
and I was like, that's cool. If you don't like it,
don't watch it. Like it's really easy to be a
(09:51):
critic because if you don't like something, you have the
ability not to watch it. So it's really simple, like,
I don't know why people get offended by stuff that
they watch, because if they don't like it, they shouldn't
watch it or or listen to it. And there's stuff
that annoys me, lots of stuff that annoys me. I
don't I don't consume it.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
No, do you moderate at all?
Speaker 2 (10:14):
And do you think? Do you think you or if
you maybe? Well I was gonna say, maybe you've all
grown up. A. We had a conversation before we turn
the mics on, and you're still twenty four, aren't you?
Speaker 1 (10:24):
Yeah? Twenty five? Okay, I think I'm in horror a
lot of the things that have said during the show
every week, and you know, and they Mark in particular
love seeing me squirm. So he'll go to places that
he knows make me feel uncomfortable and he enjoys that,
and the audience enjoy because they always side with him.
(10:48):
But we're pretty I wouldn't say we're careful. It's not fair,
but we're aware. I mean, Maca's got a good and
Lee has got a good sense of you know, pushing
the boundaries, but being good people. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
I was going to say, they've got families and and
you know, even you're in Kids Team for you a
bit right, And I've got.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
Lana sitting next to me, and I can tell from
I can just tell from the look that she's searing
through my head that you know, we're going into the
wrong space. So but what's fun is what I really
enjoy about the show is when so two people are
going off into a into a direction and I might
feel uncomfortable, and then I get sucked into it, and
(11:32):
then I start going with them into that direction because
I get I start getting amused by where they're going,
and then Lana will pull me back, or or Lana
might get sucked into the conversation and I pulled her back.
So that's the fun. That's when it's So.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
Are we more easily offended these days?
Speaker 1 (11:50):
I think we. I think there's a group of people
that like the work on being offended. You know. Yeah,
they're sort of you know, finding things, you know, to
mock out age. You know, it's like, oh this is terrible.
How dare they?
Speaker 2 (12:04):
You know?
Speaker 1 (12:05):
And as I say, I mean, I don't really get
sort of annoyed by too much stuff because I just
don't watch the stuff that annoys me.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
Well, but then I get annoyed and I'm offended, but
I'm offended at how much everything's bloody watered down and
you can't say what you really think, and so you're right.
But then that means I pretty much don't. I can't
say don't watch news because there's only one now, but
I could get so irritated journalism, I mean.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
Do you yeah, because I was a journalist. I started
out as a journalist and I actually wasn't a sports journalist.
I was a police journal for a long time, and
then I was a foreign correspondent and stuff. I've still
come back and gone, don't I don't know if we
have an hour's news, like this is how long new show?
And like it's almost like a game whe year, So
when are they going to run out? You know, because
(12:52):
you know when then they're doing a story about the
pig that got out of the thing or something. Because
you know, we're a small country, don't have a lot
of people, we don't have a lot of big news.
Speaker 3 (13:01):
And take me, the weather's good, what do you.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Do for news as everyone's out at the beach? So
but yeah, I mean what I'm getting frustrated with a
little bit at the moment, and sports journalism is you
knows that sort of start acting like fans, you know,
or I suppose it's the same political journalism where people
(13:28):
are taking sides. You know. You know a lot of
a lot of journalists write opinion pieces and columns and
stuff like that, and half the time I don't even
know who they are. Yes, Like, you've sort of got
to you've got to really build a CB before you
sort of have the right to have a column or
an opinion. You know, have an opinion, but it just
(13:49):
don't publish it.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
And I do think that in certain news and that
sort of thing. What I really want you to do
is tell me, lay out the facts as they've been
exposed to you, so that I can inform an opinion.
Speaker 3 (13:59):
You don't idea, Yeah, I don't need to hear you.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
Again, living in the US, that's not the case.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
And you sort of but at least it's out there, well.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
You know, you know, we I stand, Yeah, you know exactly.
Then they don't hide it, so you sort of have
to watch both sides to find out what the truth
might be.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Yeah, you know that, But yeah, I've had an investigative journalism.
I mean, I know it sounds but I just meant
two notes in Australia for work, and I, you know,
at night in the hotel and you switch on the
TV and I just absolutely misterized it. Investigative journalist piece
in it, you know, sixty minutes sort of thing. I
was like, oh, I miss it already, you know, like
something that actually made me think.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
We have some brilliant journalists in this country and some
and some of them do some great stuff, but they're
really dictated to by what the audience reaction is and
what the mass audience reaction is going to be, because
you know, when you're driven by clacks, when you're driven
by sort of how big your audiences and stuff, you've
got to you've got to produce the output that is
going to get that reaction. So I mean, I remember
(15:03):
I did it. When I first started at TVNZ in
the newsroom, there was a thing called the Mari Loan scandal.
So basically what happened was a group of Maori businessmen
that met some businessmen in Hawaii and they said that
they could give them a massive loan and it was
in the millions of dollars and somehow Maori affairs got
(15:24):
involved and stuff, and then it was sort of a
bit embarrassing because no one was really sure if the
loan was real or not. And so Bill Rolston and
I was a junior reporter. I was pretty much like
a sports reporter who just was interested in the story.
And they sent me up to Hawaii to investigate this
group of businessmen, and then Bill came up to join me,
(15:45):
and we did this this is before the home show
and stuff. We did it like a twenty five minute
piece on the news and it was really complicated. I
couldn't even understand it. And I always one of the reporters,
and we made all these sorts of accusations, and then
the next day I had six lawsuits.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Yeah, I was like a twenty one year old journalist
and Billy's going, right, there's the price of being a
journal you know. I'm yeah, what I gonna do? I've
got no money.
Speaker 3 (16:17):
And probably a perfect place to be in here.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
Money.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
Yeah. Yeah, but it was a really interesting experience. I
can still see Angela de Ordinary was reading the story
and I remember looking at her face and she's like,
I can't understand this complicated.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
So New York you went, you were how long you
went back?
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Back? So the eight months something like that, and.
Speaker 3 (16:37):
You've been running a rugby club the year.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
Yeah. So there's a professional league in the US called
Major League Rugby and it's really growing, and.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
It is growing. I think that was my christ Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Yeah, it's it's been going for five or six years now.
A lot of New Zealand players come over and I
was in charge of the New York team and it
was really it's really interesting. It's a rugby joy, but
it's also a brand building, a storytelling job, you know,
so you're trying to grow an audience. So it's not
a million miles different to what I've done before. I
(17:08):
loved it. I loved the challenge. The people were amazing.
New York's just the greatest city. So yeah, it was
a great experience.
Speaker 3 (17:15):
But it was time to come home.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
Yeah. I just thought I did the four seasons. One
season got cut short by COVID, but yeah, I just
sort of felt that was, you know, I've done my time.
Speaker 3 (17:26):
Yeah, fair enough.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
Okay, we're going to take a break and when we
come back, we're going to chat about your career and
about how you managed to be a bit ahead of
the game. Okay, this is our advice segment. And I
(17:48):
think there are a few things we can explore here.
I want to start with you being a pioneer really
in sports media, and well you are.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
You're like almost ahead of the.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Game in many respects, right, I mean that's what sports
You know. You were the first ever sports media liaison,
weren't you.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
Yeah, it was sort of. So the Australians had had
one of ninety one will cut and have been really successful,
and they sort of. When New Zealand played Australia in
Dublin in the semi final, everyone was loving Australia and
hating on the All Blacks and so I wrote a
paper for New Zealand Rugby saying this is quite important,
you know, looking up the media is really important and
you need to sort of replicate this idea. And originally
(18:26):
they said no. And then I was doing a documentary
with them and halfway through a tour and they had
done a tour of Australia and they're getting ready to
go back to South Africa and it was the first
time since the lifting of the boycott the All Blacks
had been back, so it was a pretty important time.
And I got called into the manager's hotel room at like,
I know, two in the morning and stuff. You know,
(18:47):
it's amazing to me and my hey decisions in the
middle of the night. And they said, you're right, we're
already struggling with the media and we're going to South
Africa and we're going to cop it if we don't
get it right. So you're on board. You start tomorrow. Wow,
And so I did it.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
So what is that job?
Speaker 2 (19:03):
So, like, you literally liaised with the media. So you're
trying to put good stories out there. You're making players
become available, You're trying to hear a negative stuff that
might be coming before it does. You're getting the all
black player that jumped out the window and went and
partied at two in the morning.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
To be honest, when they hired me, I had no
idea what I was. No So I was a journalist
and journalism is quite different the PR. And so I
blundered my way through the first tour and then I
decided at the end of that I needed to go
and learn about PR because PR is more about journalists
about capturing the story, whereas PR is more about getting
(19:40):
your messages and working out how to get them out
and you know, managing the pliers in terms of their
media appearances. I mean that's just basically good manners, treating
people well, you know, and the media deserve to be
treated well. You know. They they're putting some sort of
strategy in place, you know, having some sort of crisis managements.
All sort of things do go on. You you're able
(20:01):
to sort of manage that. But I didn't know what
I was doing when I firsted the job, so you know,
I probably only worked it out by the time I left.
Speaker 3 (20:08):
Yeah, but that's part of being I mean, you were one.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
Of the first, so you do get to remember those
blaze a bit and make it up as you go.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
I said that the manager in the CEO of New
Zealand Raubia. I said, what do I do? And they said, well,
that's your job to work it out.
Speaker 2 (20:22):
Yeah, you know that most of your audience will only
liken media liaison in a sports team to Kaylee from
tid LESSO.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
Yeah, that's exactly who I looked like, which was a
scary hell you.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
Go around with Pink Pear similar were fluffy on the outside.
Speaker 1 (20:39):
Yeah, And I think and it was hard for the
media because suddenly one of their own was saying, sorry,
you can't do that in the view, yeah, or you know,
I was. I was in the middle of their relationship
and it took them a while to come to grips
with that, and and it was a long time. I
was called the media prevention officer for a long time. Yeah,
because suddenly there was another person in the way of
(21:00):
their ability to talk to the coach or talk to
the players.
Speaker 2 (21:03):
Because they used to have direct excess and now they've
got you in.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
The middle of it.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
Yeah, and then they put me in the middle.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
Well, I mean I suppose my whole experience is political,
and you know, and obviously journalists and then our own
and yes, sometimes when they'd bring you to react, i'd
go ask.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Sorry, just you have to go through you.
Speaker 1 (21:20):
You know. My favorite was there, you know, you know,
you know Willie Jackson. So Willie was a radio reporter. Yeah,
mana radio I think it was. And he rang me
out one night and it was a Friday evening before
a test match on Saturday. And back then the protocols
we didn't do interviews on the products. And he rang
me up and he said, oh, I want to talk
(21:41):
to Frank once. And I said, we'll make you know
the rules like it's Friday, Friday evening. You can't talk
to an all blog Friday and shut up shop. He said, well,
I've already spoken to him. I just rang his room.
I said, we why are you ringing me things? Just
telling you I've already done that? Just supposed to ask permission,
not do it, and then tell me you've done it.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Forgiveness, that's what they say.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
And he laughed too. And because he'd gone to school
with Frank and so they knew each other. Yeah, And
I was like, oh, why'd you bother ring of me?
Speaker 3 (22:12):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
So being in the middle like that, having been on that,
you know, been on the journalist side, I mean, so
what did you learn from it? What's that kind of
advice that you give to someone that's like trying to
sort of be the gatekeeper as well as being transparent
and open.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
And I think it's really changed. I think, like one
of the reasons I started Sports Cafe in ninety six
is I finished the All Black job in ninety five
and no one really liked me because I've been in
the middle. So I'd been annoying the players and the
coaches because I was saying, you've got to do this
media stuff and I've been annoying all the media organizations
because I was saying, no, you can't do that.
Speaker 3 (22:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
So I came out of there and I was like, man,
I was like New Zealand's most unpopular man in sport, so,
which is not unusual. But now it's changed. I think.
I think it used to be like a drafting gate
where you were all the media attentions coming inwards and
you're managing who comes in and who doesn't come in.
I think now there's so much competition for attention that
doesn't matter who you are. It doesn't matter if you're
(23:08):
the Prime Minister or the All Blacks or whatever. You
need to connect with your audience. And so now it's
an outward job. Now it's looking for opportunities. And if
you think of the media, I mean they're really they're
important because they have an audience. But lots of people
have audiences now. Yeah, So if you're in that role,
I think you're looking for opportunities as opposed to managing
(23:31):
inward media. So you're like, how do I get my
message out? How do I get people to connect with me?
How do I get people? Because when you run a
sports team you're really trying to sell t shirts and
sell tickets. That's the job. That's how you generate revenue
and get eyeballs for your sponsors. So you don't get
that from sort of saying no to things.
Speaker 2 (23:52):
And I suppose you're just you talking in to me
thinking about it. The other thing I often tell people
that are either going into politics or we're thinking about
it is that if you're not outward and thinking about it,
I don't believe in the kind of the brand stuff
if you like, But I do believe that if you're
not protecting in politics, if you're not careful, other people
will write your narrative and it may not be Yes,
(24:14):
they're not going to do the most positive narrative in
your life, you know what I mean. So you know,
my opposition would have said that I'm a horrible Tory
that pulled up the letter behind her and hates poor people,
you know what I mean. Whereas I would go, I
was solow, mother knew how to struggle, and now I
want to make it better for everyone.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
See what you're trying to do. You're trying to get
your story out, so you're looking for opportunities and audiences
to talk to. So the last thing you need is
a mediately aisonon person or a PR person that's saying
no to things. Yeah, but they might say no to
the wrong opportunity, but they've got to look for opportunities,
not look for reasons to say no.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
I think it's a different mindset now. I think it's like, man,
I need to talk to this influencer, I need to
talk to this brand, I need to talk to this
podcast I need to talk to and I need to
look after the HELD reporter, I need to talk after
the look after the TV and Z reporter. You know,
there's a lot of opportunities and it's going to.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
Keep changing and evolving right in that way, and that
you know, if we were talking a year ago, I
would have spoken to you and just said everything needs
to be in thirty second and sixty second sound bites
and if you're not, you know, getting the tip top
thing right, then you're you're out. But actually, I feel
like in the last few months we're equally now seeing
a bit of a craving for something a.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Bit more in depth, you know, a combo.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
So I don't mind seeing the light aside, and I
love to see them all blacks having a bit of
fun and doing the bloky good good stuff. But I
equally would like to know them a little bit better
as well.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
I think to like someone, you've got to know them.
So the first thing you've got to do is, you know,
whether it's sport or politics, you've got to work out
how you how you let people know you. You know,
and once they get to know you, whether you're an
all black or a politician or whatever, then then they've
got the ability to like and connect with you. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:54):
So you're an ideas man, right, so you create a
you're an ideas man.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
The will disclosure are a lot of the ideas come
from John Cowan.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
So where does the ideas come from?
Speaker 2 (26:04):
But then what you've equally got is the ability to execute,
and that's something that not many people do.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
So JK and I grew up together. Yeah, so we
went to school together, played rugby together.
Speaker 3 (26:15):
He has an idea is man, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
And so him. Yeah, and so quite often he'll give
me a call and it calls me Riccardo is like Riccardo,
we need to do this, yeah, and then and then
it'll let me work out how to do it.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
Yeah, Sometimes it's my idea. But so a classic was
when he was an All Black. He came to me
and I'd give him a little some offcuts of some
of the stories I'd done, you know, on a VHS,
and he said, we should do a documentary. We should
do it behind the scenes All Black documentary. But not
that they used to do these books. Let's not do
a box because no one reads box anymore. This is
(26:50):
like plate eighties. Let's do a VHS. And so we
did this thing called The Good, The Bed and the Rugby,
I remember it, and it went nuts and we just
had no there about business at that stage. So yeah,
we didn't do particularly well out of it, but other
people did. But it sold like one hundred thousand plus copies.
(27:10):
That did really well. But that's sort of how we
tend to work. You know. We might have a coffee
or beer or something like that.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
You know, since VHS is gone. That would have been
the perfect Father's Day press.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Yeah, yeah, wouldn't it? Yeah, the bullet Father's Day Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:25):
Now this is an idea. How old sports cafe is
now they talk about user generated content? Is it UGC.
We used to get people that would hire a video camera,
film something onto a VHS, then get another VHS machine
dubbed editor from VHS to VHS and then mail that
(27:46):
entry to us by the post. It's how we used
to do our competitions.
Speaker 3 (27:51):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
And we used to do this thing called New Day
where people would send us in the footage of themselves
doing crazy things naked. And now all the students that
were sitting in the footage and our lawyers and doctors
and stuff like that, yeah, yeah, quite up, and they'll come, hey,
you know that footage from nineteen you know, ninety eight.
You don't still have that. You couldn't make sure that
no one ever sees it.
Speaker 3 (28:10):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:11):
And the difference is that it is on tape. It's
still like it's an electronic.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
I digitized all of them. So for all those lawyers
and doctors out there, yeah you watch it.
Speaker 3 (28:19):
Take your breath right.
Speaker 2 (28:21):
Honestly, I grew up in the eighties and I think
my saving grace.
Speaker 3 (28:26):
Of why I could go public was that cell phone's there.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Yeah, you know, like really going through the fun crazy stuff.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
It was just like, it's a lot of pressure on
our sort of you know, younger audience now because they
are I got a really interesting education where I went
to a concert and the artist got up on stage,
and as soon as the artists got up on stage,
everyone started filming themselves at the concert. And I realized,
(28:54):
you know, when you can film yourself, you know, twenty
four seven, you become the star of your own show.
And unless you treat people like that, unless you they're not.
They just don't know what to do, you know. So
they're all that when I start.
Speaker 3 (29:07):
Do you mean so you're treating your audience.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
As if they're the star of Yeah, yeah, they're part
of it. Like they're not passive, you know, they don't
sit back and sit back and applaud when you do something. Well,
you know that they've got the ability to comment, they've
got the ability to send you video, they've got the
ability to, you know, be treated like stars. They see
themselves as almost equals, you know.
Speaker 3 (29:31):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's quite I hadn't thought.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
Of it, like, treat them like I reckon.
Speaker 3 (29:34):
Yeah, And it's pretty freaky.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
You're at a concert and everyone turns to sit back
on the artist, yeah, and look at me and chuse
themselves with the artists.
Speaker 1 (29:43):
And when I start out on TV, no one knew
how to do it, like no one knew how to
film things, edit things and put things on TV. Now
everyone knows how to do it. There's no mystery to
it at all, no so, and I still think there's
some TV people that sort of pretend that there's a mystery. Yeah,
you know, it's like, know what we're doing. This is
really clear. It's like, yeah, I just did that with
one bone.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
So you started you started a lot of things, right,
so many different projects. And we've talked about the media Liaison.
We've talked about the good, the bad, and the rugby.
We've talked about the Sports Cafe. You know the crowd
goes wild yep. I mean that's another one, right, So
how do you discover talent? How do you know who's
going to connect and not connect? Because you seem to
(30:25):
have a real ability for that as well.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
Well. The thing I really enjoy is is working out
where the audiences are now. So audiences shift all the time,
you know. So you know, when we started Sports Cafe,
Sky had a seventy thousand subscribers, you know, and now
there are a million, you know. So when we started
there was no one there, but we knew that it
(30:47):
would grow. Same with Craig as well. We started that
when when Prime came out. Now with you know, now
it's YouTube and podcasts and stuff like that, because that's
where the audience is now. In terms of talent, you know,
there's just some people that in an environment that just
tend to stand out. They tend to dominate dinner conversations,
(31:10):
and people tend to hang on their every word or
like them. So I remember running into James mcconey and
he'd been working, he'd just been made redundant for The Herald,
and he was at the press conference. It was his
last day, and I said, oh, you know, come and
do some stuff for us. You know, we're doing Crag
as well. And then straight away you could see that
(31:30):
he just had something. He's just had something. He just
had to refine it in a few different ways, you know,
became a star, you know. I mean Mark Ellis used
to sit behind me on the all Black bus. So
I used to sit next to Shan Fitzpatrick and then
behind me was Mecca and he would just go on
and on all day and have us in hysterics. So
you just knew he was funny.
Speaker 2 (31:49):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Well, Julie Christie's a great friend of mind.
She just mean the guys talent, you know it just
from day.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
The way his mind works is like just the front.
Speaker 3 (32:00):
Yeah yeah yeah. So I mean you beat yourself? Do
you bet yourself?
Speaker 1 (32:07):
Yeah? Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah I.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
Am So where does that kind of confidence come from?
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Do you think a blind faith for myself? But I
think like I have the same I remember when I
was playing rugby at school, the teacher said the worst
thing that I think anyone could ever say. I was.
I was lining up a conversion from the sideline to
win the game. I missed it, and he said to me, sal,
so you're not as good as you think you are.
(32:32):
Yeah he was. He was my manager. I was like
trying to win the game for this team. But that's
a really horrible thing to say to someone, You're not
as good as you think you are. I I just trust.
I know that I'm going to get it wrong, and
I know that I'm going to make mistakes, and I've
made I've done some terrible shows and some you know,
(32:53):
lots of things haven't worked, but I've learned from them.
But just yeah, just trust myself.
Speaker 3 (33:01):
Yeah, so what now, what's next?
Speaker 1 (33:04):
You again, that's a massive question. I mean, I don't know.
I really enjoyed. I really enjoyed doing what I did
in New York because it was something different to what
I've done before, done before. I'm loving, absolutely loving doing
the Sports Cafe podcast YouTube show because I'm just getting
to hang out with good mates and just have fun.
(33:27):
I think, you know, when you're in your twenties and
your thirties, you're driven by how do I prove myself
to the world. And then you get a bit older,
and I was going to say wise, but that's not true.
You just get older and then then your motivation changes
a little bit, and your motivation changes to how can
I just get the most out of life? How can
I have the most fun and make that a job? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (33:50):
Why not?
Speaker 1 (33:50):
That's what I'm trying to do, is like, how can
I just have as much fun influence the things that
are important to me, but and make that a job?
You know, because I'm like the world's worst handy man,
Like I couldn't could never have been a carpenter and
a plumber. I'm a or of those people, like you know,
(34:11):
how people can make stuff like that? Like I've never
thought of myself as being creative or artistic, you know,
which is sort of surprise and considering.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
Because you are. I'm about to disagree with you.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
But I don't think of myself like that, like because
I can't draw. So when I was at school again,
I couldn't draw, So I was like, get out of art.
You're an idiot, you know. So I think I was
conditioned to think that, like I have no creativity, but
like I don't really know what I do. I just
keep doing it.
Speaker 3 (34:44):
And we'll wait and see what comes next.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Because sometimes it's just being open to the opportunities, right,
and that's kind of exciting in it. So, okay, so
with who perhaps the worst advice you were given, which
was you know, as good as you think you are.
So to finish the advice segment, what was the best
piece of advice?
Speaker 1 (35:01):
Just trust yourself?
Speaker 3 (35:02):
Trust yourself?
Speaker 1 (35:03):
Yeah, just trust yourself. And and you know, everyone has
sort of a small number of people in their lives
that they trust and that you can talk to and
stuff like that. And when they when they believe in you,
you sort of believe in yourself.
Speaker 3 (35:19):
To trust yourself, do you need to be able to
listen to yourself?
Speaker 1 (35:22):
Yep? Yeah, I mean I think like I'm going. I mean,
it's a fascinating time at the moment because like I'm
starting to learn about meditation, I'm starting to learn about
rewiring your brain. Some of the Buddhist techniques that they use.
(35:42):
I find fascinating, you know, because I'm I've always been
pretty driven. I've always been pretty driven. You had a
bit of a chip on the shoulder, like a lot
of people. It's like, you know, you don't think I'm
good enough. I'll show you sort.
Speaker 3 (35:56):
Of thing and that can get you through some times.
Speaker 1 (35:59):
It's really important. That's really important. It's really draining.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
Underestimate me go on.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
That's absolutely who I was. Like, I was a pretty
loose unit growing up. I failed journalism school because I
got in trouble in my first week. I was with
the group people who got arrested for climbing Santa Clause
at Farmers. They got charged with unlawfully on the building.
I got away because I lifted them up because I
(36:28):
was the tallest. But I hadn't gone on the building
when the police caught us. Black So yeah, So I
had a fair few situations where I wasn't the best
behaved person in the world. But always when I started
to learn to trust myself and realize that I wasn't
good at everything, but the things I was good at,
(36:48):
I was good at and I could just focus on those.
Speaker 3 (36:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (36:51):
Yeah, I like it, And I like the listening side
of it because I think, yeah, I've always had yourself.
Speaker 3 (36:59):
Yeah, my own head and out loud.
Speaker 1 (37:00):
I talk to myself all the time, all the.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
Time, and I stop and go, oh, I've been thinking
about that.
Speaker 1 (37:05):
Do you ever walk along listening to music and dance? Yeah, yeah, yeah,
I've only learned to enjoy that. Like, so have you
see me wandering along my headphones? Don't I suddenly stop
and dance. I'm having a great time.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
Well, I'm lucky because I live out in Westalkland and
we've got a woman out there that dances on the
side of the street with her headphones on, and anyone
from we Storkland will have seen her. She's just on
the main No, but she is amazing, Like, she brings
you joy and that's why she does it. So if
I see you dancing walking down the street, it will
bring me joy.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
So I grew up in South Auckland, Yeah, and loved
it and it was such a great place to grow.
It's tough, but really there's a real sense of humor
out there. There is a man and some of the
funniest people I met have met have been growing up
(38:02):
in South Aukland. That would be insane. JK is the
same thing you grow up out there as.
Speaker 3 (38:06):
Well, fantastic.
Speaker 2 (38:18):
The podcast is called Ask Me Anything, right, yep, So
this is your.
Speaker 3 (38:21):
Chance to ask me something if you'd like to.
Speaker 1 (38:23):
You sort of intimate it before. But I've been away
for four or five years something like that, and I've
come back and do you think the country has changed?
Speaker 3 (38:37):
H It's interesting.
Speaker 2 (38:39):
So I'll reflect back on something you said, which is,
actually we're all still the same people, you know, like
we're sort of the same as we were in in
the mid nineties that we are now, And I would
kind of agree with that at many levels. I think
that society around us has changed, and so we probably
question who we are a lot more now. So, yes,
some things have changed for the better. I think how sexuality,
(39:02):
I think gender identity, I think all of those things.
I celebrate that we're actually more advanced now thinking people
don't feel as marginalized and they shouldn't, right one hundred percent,
So I think some of that changes definitely for the better.
But as you say, if you've been stepped away from
New Zealand for four years and stepping back and it
feels different.
Speaker 1 (39:23):
It feels to me like we're a bit scared and angry.
Speaker 2 (39:27):
And when you're scared, you don't actually go, oh, I'm
a bit scared and fearful right now. What you do
is you express it through generally through anger and yeah.
Speaker 1 (39:37):
And it's almost like Shop is scared to try stuff,
you know, it's like, or push the boundaries or whatever,
just in case everyone jumps on them. So I know,
when we're starting this, the overwhelming reaction I got from
everyone was, oh man, how's that going to survive? You know,
you're going to get canceled within the first week, etc.
Speaker 2 (39:56):
Etc.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
And I was like, so, like, why is there a
reason not to do something? Yeah, but that seemed to
be and I hit that a lot, you know, that
that sort of oh man, you can't do that because
what if it goes wrong?
Speaker 3 (40:09):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (40:09):
Yeah, which is the opposite to what I was experiencing
when I was in the US, because in the US,
everyone thinks they're a special for it. Well, everyone thinks
they're going to be massively successful, so they don't care
if you're massively successful because I'm going to be successful anyway.
Speaker 3 (40:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (40:23):
But yeah, it's just it's just seemed a bit different
coming home. Yeah, And I don't know. That's why I'm
asking you.
Speaker 2 (40:28):
Because I don't know if it's changed or if because
when you asked it, I thought, well, I've just been
living it every day and sometimes that change kind of
creeps up on you, you know, as opposed to being is.
Speaker 1 (40:39):
Another question, with everything you've been through and changed since
you left politics, would you go back into politics today?
Speaker 2 (40:48):
No? Yeah, no, yeah, I don't even think about that.
Speaker 3 (40:51):
Yeah, like absolutely not.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
And is that because of who you are now or
is because of what politics is like now?
Speaker 3 (40:57):
A combination of both. I've done it. I think there
is elements of being there, done that.
Speaker 2 (41:02):
So and I don't I always don't think you should
kind of look backwards, particularly in a big job like that.
But equally, you know, it takes it does it takes
your life, and it takes your family's life, you know.
And I'm at a stage now where I want to
you know, my mother's not well, so you know that,
and I and it shouldn't be but it's a luxury
to be able to spend time with her, and if
(41:24):
I was in that job, I couldn't. And the relationship
with my kids and my husband and my hobbies and
my work and you know, being able to do things
like this. So whereas when you're in politics, it is
honestly all encompassation.
Speaker 1 (41:37):
Quite selfish being a politician, yes, because there has to
be all about what you.
Speaker 2 (41:40):
Do, all about you, and then even going and having
a cup of coffee, you know someone's going to talk
to you about, you know, whatever it is, and it's
just like so even if you're not on, you sort
of you're always on.
Speaker 1 (41:51):
And i'd imagine being a politician really you've got too focus.
As one is, doing what you think is the right thing,
what you believe is the right thing. But then the
second hard is having the ability to do that. You
have to get re elected. Yeah, you know, you're constantly
trying to sort of balance that between doing the right
thing and making sure that you still have the votes
make sure you can keep doing that.
Speaker 2 (42:11):
I was doing this QR and a thing you know,
because I still do in seeing and speaking and all
that sort of thing. I seem seeing and I said, oh,
I'm taking questions and you know, any questions. And someone
asked me something and I mean, oh, I'm not going
to answer that, and he goes, what do you mean
you're not going to answer it. I don't really care
if you don't like what I said. I need your
vote exactly. But when you're a politician, that's different. Yeah,
I would have I would have fudged around that right,
(42:33):
Whereas he was like, you know, what are the three
things that you're going to judge success on and you know,
on this particular date, and I'm like, oh, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (42:40):
There is is my So, I come from a long
labor family. So when they so my great grandfather was
the leader of the unemployed during the depression. They made
sort of a movie about them. And then my grandfather
was the deputy mayor of Monk and he wanted to
(43:01):
be the MP for Monery and Labor told me he
was going to get it, and at the selection meeting
he was assured. And then this other guy, this big,
heavy set guy, got up and spoke and was this
incredible orator. It was David Longie. And so my grandfather
got left behind. So I've been asked a couple of
times whether I'd put my head in the ring for labor. Yeah,
(43:23):
I just and I thought about it. I just don't
think I'm willing to make the sacrifices.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
Yeah, and it is a huge sacrifice. And then in
the public's expectations on you and having to you know,
go with the paddy. There was an example when it
was but you know, for fairly recently in the last
few months. But once you're over fifty, you can say
the other day it could mean two weeks ago, or
it could mean two years ago.
Speaker 3 (43:52):
The other day, but it was.
Speaker 2 (43:55):
Someone had literally walked past and secretly videoed Gold and
Jerry Brownlee having a cup of coffee on the footpath
outside of cafe. It's not like they were doing you know,
they were having a cup of coffee in a public place,
but they secretly recorded it and there it was, and
I just see that makes me feel ill. I mean,
(44:18):
they weren't doing anything wrong, they weren't even trying to
hide it, right, And then then off goes you know,
all the social media on the rights and wrongs of it,
and I don't know.
Speaker 1 (44:26):
Yeah, And I suppose that's the hard thing about being
a politician. Is you have to you have to sort
of be you know, up there really in terms of
how you behave, et cetera, et cetera, and you are
held to a fairly high standard which sometimes can be
hard to live up to when you're the host of
a sports show that the standards a lot lower.
Speaker 3 (44:47):
My advice, don't do it.
Speaker 2 (44:49):
Yeah, good, Yeah, thanks for coming in today.
Speaker 1 (44:54):
Sorry thing question.
Speaker 2 (44:55):
No, it's okay, So thanks for coming in today. We
can people find out war from you in sports Cafe.
Speaker 1 (45:02):
Ish yeah, or sports Cafe. I mean, we're sort of
called sports Cafe Ish because I didn't want to sort
of pretend that we were making the same show. But
everyone it's calling it Sports Cafe. YouTube, YouTube, all podcasts,
iHeartRadio and social media Instagram.
Speaker 2 (45:18):
Yeah you know. Okay, go and check it out, guys,
And that except for another episode of as not my Space.
Speaker 1 (45:23):
Our my space is shut down at the moment, so
we'll be getting their backup.
Speaker 2 (45:26):
And that except for another episode of Asking Me Anything.
If you've enjoyed this episode, please follow Ask Me Anything
on iHeartRadio wherever you get your podcasts. While you were there,
check out some of our past episodes plenty there to
choose from some absolutely amazing people. Are we back next
Sunday with another fabulous guest.
Speaker 3 (45:43):
I'm Paula Bennett.
Speaker 2 (45:44):
Ask me anything, Goodbye,
Hello.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
I am Paula Bennett and welcome to season six of
my New Zealand Herald podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:07):
Asked me anything, It's so.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
Good to be back, and one thing I've learned in
life is it's never too late to learn something new.
So on this podcast, I talked to people from all
walks of life to hear about how they got to
where they are and get some advice and guidance on
some of life's biggest questions. My first guest for this
season is a man who has a wonderfully varied CV
and a pioneer in our sports media. Starting us out
(00:41):
as a sports reporter, he went on to become the
first ever all Blacks media man. He's been a tally host, creator,
and producer. He created shows like nineties cult hit Sports
Cafe you already know it is now also sports news
show The Crowd Goes Wild. He's recently returned from the
US where he was CEO of New York's professional rugby
union team, and that is probably only touching the surface,
(01:03):
so let's talk more about it. For his latest project,
He's brought back Sports Cafe, this time in podcast form.
Was Sports Cafe ish Rick Salizo, Hi, how was that.
Speaker 1 (01:15):
That's good. There's a lot more impressive than I really am.
But that was sounding good.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
Yeah, that's all right. That's what we do, isn't it.
Speaker 2 (01:21):
You know?
Speaker 3 (01:21):
So thanks for writing that all out for me. I
just thought i'd read it out on you.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
There's a bit longer, but you've missed the page for
that school.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
Oh that's a right. You will get to it as
we sort of go in.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
So I'm going to ease in first some quickfire questions.
If you could go to the pub with any celebrity,
who would it be.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
That's a good question. My growing up, my hero is
Nadia kamen Each, the Romanian gymnast, and I mentioned not
be yes, she's about the same age. And so I
was a four en year old kid watching the seventy
six Montreal Olympics. So I mentioned that to Mark and
he's been giving me grief for the last year about it.
(02:01):
So so that would be my most steel beee.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Some young men out there now that in what forty
years time will say Simon, Yeah, well.
Speaker 1 (02:11):
I mean you know she was when you think about,
you know, the idea of a perfect ten, well she was.
She did several perfect tens. Yeah, yeah, And I think fascinating.
She had a fascinating life, you know, being brought up
in Romanire and then going over to the US and
stuff like that. She'ld be cool.
Speaker 3 (02:28):
Yeah, she would be really so unexpected that and.
Speaker 1 (02:32):
If we couldn't get in, she could sort of jump
and climb and stuff get into the top.
Speaker 3 (02:36):
She could somersault over.
Speaker 1 (02:38):
So she'd be ready handed in the pub.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Yeah, and then even somersault back with a drink probably
and not spill a drop exactly. Yeah, we presume she
can still do it at sixty. But you know, okay,
then what was the drink of choice?
Speaker 3 (02:49):
Bee?
Speaker 1 (02:51):
I'm styl like, I'm pretty.
Speaker 3 (02:53):
You're pretty easy. It's not that fancy, is.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
That I did. I lived in Austin, Texas for a year,
and I really started to appreciate mescal. And but not
like we drink tequila like you know, it's four o'clock
in the morning, we just have some shots. They'll just
put it a nice and sip it and it'll be nice.
And I really really enjoy a nice messcal. Actually, oh
(03:16):
there you go.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
Yeah, I'm I'm on a currently on a hunt for
the perfect bloody mary right, because I think that with
all respect it's my podcast. People are bastardizing them, right,
they're getting too fancy, they're trying to modernize them. I
can't get to the drink through the freaking stupid garnish.
Speaker 1 (03:38):
Then this idea is that they for garnish and a drink.
It's just like we actually want a drink another salad. Yeah,
I'll have a drink and a salad separately.
Speaker 2 (03:48):
One the other day it had three different types like
a gurk and a bloody olive, a something else ENSLAMI.
Speaker 1 (03:55):
Oh, yeah, too much. We should report that person to
the police.
Speaker 2 (03:58):
We should really favorite bar pub restaurant in the world,
in the world.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
Yeah, you've been all over the World's.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
A good question. There's a One of my favorite restaurants
is a restaurant in New York called Beauty and Essex.
Speaker 3 (04:10):
And usually and Essex and.
Speaker 1 (04:13):
So it's on Essex Street. Okay, well, Beauty one of them.
The cool thing about it is it's in New York.
They have a lot of speakeasy, so they're hidden behind
something else the restaurant. So you walk in and there's
a second hand porn shop. And you walk in there
and there's all this old stuff on the and it's tiny,
and you sort of go o, where's the restaurant And
they open the door and ban there's this massive restaurant
(04:35):
and behind it and the food's unbelievable. One of the
things that they make is a ferris wheel dessert, so
they put all these different desserts in the restrold you
spin it around. But I told him, mate, that we
meet them there. And he was a key week coming
up to New York, and he walked up and down
the road for about half an hour trying to find
the place. Because it's not a restaurant. It was a
porn shop.
Speaker 3 (04:56):
But did you say secondhand porn shop?
Speaker 1 (04:59):
When I say porn sho, I don't mean sort of
like the sort of place that Mark Alice. I'm talking
about a second hand shop where you can buy old stuff,
and they call them porn shops.
Speaker 3 (05:08):
Porn is in w Yeah, but I can't.
Speaker 1 (05:11):
I can't say porn something wrong.
Speaker 2 (05:13):
That he was absolutely and then I'm like, I want that's.
Speaker 1 (05:18):
The whole idea of the restaurant going to the wrong place.
Speaker 2 (05:20):
So you know, because I think the porn was an
r is entirely people's choices, But I think I would
be judging on the second hand part of that.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
Yeah, yeah, second hand porne. I'm not sure if it's
a big market. I don't know. I've never been to
a second hand porn shop, you know, no, no, but
they have been to a secondand porn shop, as in
like chest Pea's.
Speaker 2 (05:42):
Well, all porn porn shops are second here, aren't they.
Speaker 3 (05:47):
Have we gone down a rabbit hold?
Speaker 2 (05:48):
Yeah yeah, yeah, okay, varied career.
Speaker 3 (05:52):
That's what we've talked.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
About, and so we're can talk about that but later on.
But let's talk about sports. Cafe is back kind of right,
So why podcast? Why did you bring it back?
Speaker 1 (06:03):
I caught up with Mark during the Rugby World Cup
in Paris. I caught up with with them. He was
over there and I hadn't been home for a while,
and I already enjoyed talking to him. We had a
lot of fun. We were in hysterics. And then when
I got back to New Zealand, I caught up with
Lee Lee Harp the same thing, you know, Lana as well,
and I just really enjoyed their company and I said, well,
(06:25):
want we do something, you know, and originally it was
going to be called that has been cafe but then
we thought, why don't we just do it use our
old name, you know, because that will help us get
an audience. And it's just fun. It's just for us.
It's just an opportunity to get to get and have fun.
(06:47):
And that's what we miss.
Speaker 2 (06:48):
And I mean like Sports Cafe itself was what nineteen
ninety six, so about twenty eleven.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
Yeah, we stopped in two thousand and five. I put
it enough and then and then I got a call
one night at three four o'clock in the morning and
it was Mark and he was out in Ponsonby Road
and he's like, I've got the lady from TVNZ. She's
just bumped her in the bar and she wants us
to bring Sports Cafa back. And I told her you
(07:15):
won't do it, so.
Speaker 3 (07:16):
You know, you tell her.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
And then she got on the phone and she's like,
why don't you bring it back? And I said, oh,
just you know, had its time and blah blah blahah oh,
I bring it back, bring it back, come and see me,
you know. And so so he brought it back in
two thousand and eight.
Speaker 3 (07:30):
These decisions yeah morning, right.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
Yeah, yeah, And it was fun. But we did it
for a long time and it just got to the
point where it was time to stop. Yeah, but now
it feels really but it.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
Was hugely successful.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
And you mentioned when you were talking about bumping into
the old crow and then deciding you'll get back together again.
Speaker 3 (07:50):
Is part of its.
Speaker 2 (07:50):
Success that it is good mates that did have got
to share a sense of humor, that can have a
great laugh together.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
I think, you know, when you're the worst thing you
can do is try and be funny, and we're not
trying to be funny, we're just being ourselves and some
of them are really funny. So it's really And when
we started Sports Cafe, I mean it was a pretty
small show to start with, and it was just I'd
(08:18):
finished doing the All Black Job. I knew that that's
how sports people talk to each other. You know, it's
been a long time on the road with them, and
it wasn't quite the way that interviews were done. So
I thought one, you know, recreate life on the road
into into a chat show. And at that stage there'd
(08:38):
never been a successful New Zealand chat based show. I
think Bob Jones tried one. I mean there'd been a
futures Neil Roberts tried one, and they'd never quite worked,
and there was always this sort of perception that we
couldn't do humor and we couldn't do chat shows. And
I was like, oh, that's fine, we'll just we'll call
it something else and so yeah, and it's just I
(09:01):
think it's I think the beauty of sports Cafe is
it's just a group of mates talking to each other.
Speaker 2 (09:06):
So here you are back and like text changed, So
the way we get and watch and consume our entertainment
has changed traumatically. But equally what's changed is society's acceptability
of certain things as well.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Have you noticed.
Speaker 2 (09:25):
I mean it's we're in a very different world from
nineteen ninety six.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
People aren't that haven't changed that there's a layer above
them that's changed, a layer of rule setters. And someone
wrote a piece I can't even remember where it was
when we came back saying, oh, the last thing we
need is this sort of blokey crap, you know, back again,
and I was like, that's cool. If you don't like it,
don't watch it. Like it's really easy to be a
(09:51):
critic because if you don't like something, you have the
ability not to watch it. So it's really simple, like,
I don't know why people get offended by stuff that
they watch, because if they don't like it, they shouldn't
watch it or or listen to it. And there's stuff
that annoys me, lots of stuff that annoys me. I
don't I don't consume it.
Speaker 3 (10:11):
No, do you moderate at all?
Speaker 2 (10:14):
And do you think? Do you think you or if
you maybe? Well I was gonna say, maybe you've all
grown up. A. We had a conversation before we turn
the mics on, and you're still twenty four, aren't you?
Speaker 1 (10:24):
Yeah? Twenty five? Okay, I think I'm in horror a
lot of the things that have said during the show
every week, and you know, and they Mark in particular
love seeing me squirm. So he'll go to places that
he knows make me feel uncomfortable and he enjoys that,
and the audience enjoy because they always side with him.
(10:48):
But we're pretty I wouldn't say we're careful. It's not fair,
but we're aware. I mean, Maca's got a good and
Lee has got a good sense of you know, pushing
the boundaries, but being good people. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:04):
I was going to say, they've got families and and
you know, even you're in Kids Team for you a
bit right, And I've got.
Speaker 1 (11:09):
Lana sitting next to me, and I can tell from
I can just tell from the look that she's searing
through my head that you know, we're going into the
wrong space. So but what's fun is what I really
enjoy about the show is when so two people are
going off into a into a direction and I might
feel uncomfortable, and then I get sucked into it, and
(11:32):
then I start going with them into that direction because
I get I start getting amused by where they're going,
and then Lana will pull me back, or or Lana
might get sucked into the conversation and I pulled her back.
So that's the fun. That's when it's So.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
Are we more easily offended these days?
Speaker 1 (11:50):
I think we. I think there's a group of people
that like the work on being offended. You know. Yeah,
they're sort of you know, finding things, you know, to
mock out age. You know, it's like, oh this is terrible.
How dare they?
Speaker 2 (12:04):
You know?
Speaker 1 (12:05):
And as I say, I mean, I don't really get
sort of annoyed by too much stuff because I just
don't watch the stuff that annoys me.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
Well, but then I get annoyed and I'm offended, but
I'm offended at how much everything's bloody watered down and
you can't say what you really think, and so you're right.
But then that means I pretty much don't. I can't
say don't watch news because there's only one now, but
I could get so irritated journalism, I mean.
Speaker 1 (12:30):
Do you yeah, because I was a journalist. I started
out as a journalist and I actually wasn't a sports journalist.
I was a police journal for a long time, and
then I was a foreign correspondent and stuff. I've still
come back and gone, don't I don't know if we
have an hour's news, like this is how long new show?
And like it's almost like a game whe year, So
when are they going to run out? You know, because
(12:52):
you know when then they're doing a story about the
pig that got out of the thing or something. Because
you know, we're a small country, don't have a lot
of people, we don't have a lot of big news.
Speaker 3 (13:01):
And take me, the weather's good, what do you.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Do for news as everyone's out at the beach? So
but yeah, I mean what I'm getting frustrated with a
little bit at the moment, and sports journalism is you
knows that sort of start acting like fans, you know,
or I suppose it's the same political journalism where people
(13:28):
are taking sides. You know. You know a lot of
a lot of journalists write opinion pieces and columns and
stuff like that, and half the time I don't even
know who they are. Yes, Like, you've sort of got
to you've got to really build a CB before you
sort of have the right to have a column or
an opinion. You know, have an opinion, but it just
(13:49):
don't publish it.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
And I do think that in certain news and that
sort of thing. What I really want you to do
is tell me, lay out the facts as they've been
exposed to you, so that I can inform an opinion.
Speaker 3 (13:59):
You don't idea, Yeah, I don't need to hear you.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
Again, living in the US, that's not the case.
Speaker 3 (14:06):
And you sort of but at least it's out there, well.
Speaker 1 (14:09):
You know, you know, we I stand, Yeah, you know exactly.
Then they don't hide it, so you sort of have
to watch both sides to find out what the truth
might be.
Speaker 2 (14:17):
Yeah, you know that, But yeah, I've had an investigative journalism.
I mean, I know it sounds but I just meant
two notes in Australia for work, and I, you know,
at night in the hotel and you switch on the
TV and I just absolutely misterized it. Investigative journalist piece
in it, you know, sixty minutes sort of thing. I
was like, oh, I miss it already, you know, like
something that actually made me think.
Speaker 1 (14:38):
We have some brilliant journalists in this country and some
and some of them do some great stuff, but they're
really dictated to by what the audience reaction is and
what the mass audience reaction is going to be, because
you know, when you're driven by clacks, when you're driven
by sort of how big your audiences and stuff, you've
got to you've got to produce the output that is
going to get that reaction. So I mean, I remember
(15:03):
I did it. When I first started at TVNZ in
the newsroom, there was a thing called the Mari Loan scandal.
So basically what happened was a group of Maori businessmen
that met some businessmen in Hawaii and they said that
they could give them a massive loan and it was
in the millions of dollars and somehow Maori affairs got
(15:24):
involved and stuff, and then it was sort of a
bit embarrassing because no one was really sure if the
loan was real or not. And so Bill Rolston and
I was a junior reporter. I was pretty much like
a sports reporter who just was interested in the story.
And they sent me up to Hawaii to investigate this
group of businessmen, and then Bill came up to join me,
(15:45):
and we did this this is before the home show
and stuff. We did it like a twenty five minute
piece on the news and it was really complicated. I
couldn't even understand it. And I always one of the reporters,
and we made all these sorts of accusations, and then
the next day I had six lawsuits.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (16:04):
Yeah, I was like a twenty one year old journalist
and Billy's going, right, there's the price of being a
journal you know. I'm yeah, what I gonna do? I've
got no money.
Speaker 3 (16:17):
And probably a perfect place to be in here.
Speaker 2 (16:19):
Money.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
Yeah. Yeah, but it was a really interesting experience. I
can still see Angela de Ordinary was reading the story
and I remember looking at her face and she's like,
I can't understand this complicated.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
So New York you went, you were how long you
went back?
Speaker 1 (16:35):
Back? So the eight months something like that, and.
Speaker 3 (16:37):
You've been running a rugby club the year.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
Yeah. So there's a professional league in the US called
Major League Rugby and it's really growing, and.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
It is growing. I think that was my christ Yeah.
Speaker 1 (16:48):
Yeah, it's it's been going for five or six years now.
A lot of New Zealand players come over and I
was in charge of the New York team and it
was really it's really interesting. It's a rugby joy, but
it's also a brand building, a storytelling job, you know,
so you're trying to grow an audience. So it's not
a million miles different to what I've done before. I
(17:08):
loved it. I loved the challenge. The people were amazing.
New York's just the greatest city. So yeah, it was
a great experience.
Speaker 3 (17:15):
But it was time to come home.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
Yeah. I just thought I did the four seasons. One
season got cut short by COVID, but yeah, I just
sort of felt that was, you know, I've done my time.
Speaker 3 (17:26):
Yeah, fair enough.
Speaker 2 (17:28):
Okay, we're going to take a break and when we
come back, we're going to chat about your career and
about how you managed to be a bit ahead of
the game. Okay, this is our advice segment. And I
(17:48):
think there are a few things we can explore here.
I want to start with you being a pioneer really
in sports media, and well you are.
Speaker 3 (17:56):
You're like almost ahead of the.
Speaker 2 (17:57):
Game in many respects, right, I mean that's what sports
You know. You were the first ever sports media liaison,
weren't you.
Speaker 1 (18:04):
Yeah, it was sort of. So the Australians had had
one of ninety one will cut and have been really successful,
and they sort of. When New Zealand played Australia in
Dublin in the semi final, everyone was loving Australia and
hating on the All Blacks and so I wrote a
paper for New Zealand Rugby saying this is quite important,
you know, looking up the media is really important and
you need to sort of replicate this idea. And originally
(18:26):
they said no. And then I was doing a documentary
with them and halfway through a tour and they had
done a tour of Australia and they're getting ready to
go back to South Africa and it was the first
time since the lifting of the boycott the All Blacks
had been back, so it was a pretty important time.
And I got called into the manager's hotel room at like,
I know, two in the morning and stuff. You know,
(18:47):
it's amazing to me and my hey decisions in the
middle of the night. And they said, you're right, we're
already struggling with the media and we're going to South
Africa and we're going to cop it if we don't
get it right. So you're on board. You start tomorrow. Wow,
And so I did it.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
So what is that job?
Speaker 2 (19:03):
So, like, you literally liaised with the media. So you're
trying to put good stories out there. You're making players
become available, You're trying to hear a negative stuff that
might be coming before it does. You're getting the all
black player that jumped out the window and went and
partied at two in the morning.
Speaker 1 (19:19):
To be honest, when they hired me, I had no
idea what I was. No So I was a journalist
and journalism is quite different the PR. And so I
blundered my way through the first tour and then I
decided at the end of that I needed to go
and learn about PR because PR is more about journalists
about capturing the story, whereas PR is more about getting
(19:40):
your messages and working out how to get them out
and you know, managing the pliers in terms of their
media appearances. I mean that's just basically good manners, treating
people well, you know, and the media deserve to be
treated well. You know. They they're putting some sort of
strategy in place, you know, having some sort of crisis managements.
All sort of things do go on. You you're able
(20:01):
to sort of manage that. But I didn't know what
I was doing when I firsted the job, so you know,
I probably only worked it out by the time I left.
Speaker 3 (20:08):
Yeah, but that's part of being I mean, you were one.
Speaker 2 (20:11):
Of the first, so you do get to remember those
blaze a bit and make it up as you go.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
I said that the manager in the CEO of New
Zealand Raubia. I said, what do I do? And they said, well,
that's your job to work it out.
Speaker 2 (20:22):
Yeah, you know that most of your audience will only
liken media liaison in a sports team to Kaylee from
tid LESSO.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
Yeah, that's exactly who I looked like, which was a
scary hell you.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
Go around with Pink Pear similar were fluffy on the outside.
Speaker 1 (20:39):
Yeah, And I think and it was hard for the
media because suddenly one of their own was saying, sorry,
you can't do that in the view, yeah, or you know,
I was. I was in the middle of their relationship
and it took them a while to come to grips
with that, and and it was a long time. I
was called the media prevention officer for a long time. Yeah,
because suddenly there was another person in the way of
(21:00):
their ability to talk to the coach or talk to
the players.
Speaker 2 (21:03):
Because they used to have direct excess and now they've
got you in.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
The middle of it.
Speaker 1 (21:07):
Yeah, and then they put me in the middle.
Speaker 3 (21:08):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (21:09):
Well, I mean I suppose my whole experience is political,
and you know, and obviously journalists and then our own
and yes, sometimes when they'd bring you to react, i'd
go ask.
Speaker 3 (21:19):
Sorry, just you have to go through you.
Speaker 1 (21:20):
You know. My favorite was there, you know, you know,
you know Willie Jackson. So Willie was a radio reporter. Yeah,
mana radio I think it was. And he rang me
out one night and it was a Friday evening before
a test match on Saturday. And back then the protocols
we didn't do interviews on the products. And he rang
me up and he said, oh, I want to talk
(21:41):
to Frank once. And I said, we'll make you know
the rules like it's Friday, Friday evening. You can't talk
to an all blog Friday and shut up shop. He said, well,
I've already spoken to him. I just rang his room.
I said, we why are you ringing me things? Just
telling you I've already done that? Just supposed to ask permission,
not do it, and then tell me you've done it.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Forgiveness, that's what they say.
Speaker 1 (22:04):
And he laughed too. And because he'd gone to school
with Frank and so they knew each other. Yeah, And
I was like, oh, why'd you bother ring of me?
Speaker 3 (22:12):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
So being in the middle like that, having been on that,
you know, been on the journalist side, I mean, so
what did you learn from it? What's that kind of
advice that you give to someone that's like trying to
sort of be the gatekeeper as well as being transparent
and open.
Speaker 1 (22:27):
And I think it's really changed. I think, like one
of the reasons I started Sports Cafe in ninety six
is I finished the All Black job in ninety five
and no one really liked me because I've been in
the middle. So I'd been annoying the players and the
coaches because I was saying, you've got to do this
media stuff and I've been annoying all the media organizations
because I was saying, no, you can't do that.
Speaker 3 (22:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (22:47):
So I came out of there and I was like, man,
I was like New Zealand's most unpopular man in sport, so,
which is not unusual. But now it's changed. I think.
I think it used to be like a drafting gate
where you were all the media attentions coming inwards and
you're managing who comes in and who doesn't come in.
I think now there's so much competition for attention that
doesn't matter who you are. It doesn't matter if you're
(23:08):
the Prime Minister or the All Blacks or whatever. You
need to connect with your audience. And so now it's
an outward job. Now it's looking for opportunities. And if
you think of the media, I mean they're really they're
important because they have an audience. But lots of people
have audiences now. Yeah, So if you're in that role,
I think you're looking for opportunities as opposed to managing
(23:31):
inward media. So you're like, how do I get my
message out? How do I get people to connect with me?
How do I get people? Because when you run a
sports team you're really trying to sell t shirts and
sell tickets. That's the job. That's how you generate revenue
and get eyeballs for your sponsors. So you don't get
that from sort of saying no to things.
Speaker 2 (23:52):
And I suppose you're just you talking in to me
thinking about it. The other thing I often tell people
that are either going into politics or we're thinking about
it is that if you're not outward and thinking about it,
I don't believe in the kind of the brand stuff
if you like, But I do believe that if you're
not protecting in politics, if you're not careful, other people
will write your narrative and it may not be Yes,
(24:14):
they're not going to do the most positive narrative in
your life, you know what I mean. So you know,
my opposition would have said that I'm a horrible Tory
that pulled up the letter behind her and hates poor people,
you know what I mean. Whereas I would go, I
was solow, mother knew how to struggle, and now I
want to make it better for everyone.
Speaker 1 (24:29):
See what you're trying to do. You're trying to get
your story out, so you're looking for opportunities and audiences
to talk to. So the last thing you need is
a mediately aisonon person or a PR person that's saying
no to things. Yeah, but they might say no to
the wrong opportunity, but they've got to look for opportunities,
not look for reasons to say no.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:47):
I think it's a different mindset now. I think it's like, man,
I need to talk to this influencer, I need to
talk to this brand, I need to talk to this
podcast I need to talk to and I need to
look after the HELD reporter, I need to talk after
the look after the TV and Z reporter. You know,
there's a lot of opportunities and it's going to.
Speaker 2 (25:04):
Keep changing and evolving right in that way, and that
you know, if we were talking a year ago, I
would have spoken to you and just said everything needs
to be in thirty second and sixty second sound bites
and if you're not, you know, getting the tip top
thing right, then you're you're out. But actually, I feel
like in the last few months we're equally now seeing
a bit of a craving for something a.
Speaker 3 (25:22):
Bit more in depth, you know, a combo.
Speaker 2 (25:24):
So I don't mind seeing the light aside, and I
love to see them all blacks having a bit of
fun and doing the bloky good good stuff. But I
equally would like to know them a little bit better
as well.
Speaker 1 (25:33):
I think to like someone, you've got to know them.
So the first thing you've got to do is, you know,
whether it's sport or politics, you've got to work out
how you how you let people know you. You know,
and once they get to know you, whether you're an
all black or a politician or whatever, then then they've
got the ability to like and connect with you. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (25:54):
So you're an ideas man, right, so you create a
you're an ideas man.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
The will disclosure are a lot of the ideas come
from John Cowan.
Speaker 3 (26:02):
So where does the ideas come from?
Speaker 2 (26:04):
But then what you've equally got is the ability to execute,
and that's something that not many people do.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
So JK and I grew up together. Yeah, so we
went to school together, played rugby together.
Speaker 3 (26:15):
He has an idea is man, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:16):
And so him. Yeah, and so quite often he'll give
me a call and it calls me Riccardo is like Riccardo,
we need to do this, yeah, and then and then
it'll let me work out how to do it.
Speaker 2 (26:27):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:28):
Yeah, Sometimes it's my idea. But so a classic was
when he was an All Black. He came to me
and I'd give him a little some offcuts of some
of the stories I'd done, you know, on a VHS,
and he said, we should do a documentary. We should
do it behind the scenes All Black documentary. But not
that they used to do these books. Let's not do
a box because no one reads box anymore. This is
(26:50):
like plate eighties. Let's do a VHS. And so we
did this thing called The Good, The Bed and the Rugby,
I remember it, and it went nuts and we just
had no there about business at that stage. So yeah,
we didn't do particularly well out of it, but other
people did. But it sold like one hundred thousand plus copies.
(27:10):
That did really well. But that's sort of how we
tend to work. You know. We might have a coffee
or beer or something like that.
Speaker 3 (27:17):
You know, since VHS is gone. That would have been
the perfect Father's Day press.
Speaker 1 (27:21):
Yeah, yeah, wouldn't it? Yeah, the bullet Father's Day Yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:25):
Now this is an idea. How old sports cafe is
now they talk about user generated content? Is it UGC.
We used to get people that would hire a video camera,
film something onto a VHS, then get another VHS machine
dubbed editor from VHS to VHS and then mail that
(27:46):
entry to us by the post. It's how we used
to do our competitions.
Speaker 3 (27:51):
Wow.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
And we used to do this thing called New Day
where people would send us in the footage of themselves
doing crazy things naked. And now all the students that
were sitting in the footage and our lawyers and doctors
and stuff like that, yeah, yeah, quite up, and they'll come, hey,
you know that footage from nineteen you know, ninety eight.
You don't still have that. You couldn't make sure that
no one ever sees it.
Speaker 3 (28:10):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (28:11):
And the difference is that it is on tape. It's
still like it's an electronic.
Speaker 1 (28:15):
I digitized all of them. So for all those lawyers
and doctors out there, yeah you watch it.
Speaker 3 (28:19):
Take your breath right.
Speaker 2 (28:21):
Honestly, I grew up in the eighties and I think
my saving grace.
Speaker 3 (28:26):
Of why I could go public was that cell phone's there.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Yeah, you know, like really going through the fun crazy stuff.
Speaker 1 (28:33):
It was just like, it's a lot of pressure on
our sort of you know, younger audience now because they
are I got a really interesting education where I went
to a concert and the artist got up on stage,
and as soon as the artists got up on stage,
everyone started filming themselves at the concert. And I realized,
(28:54):
you know, when you can film yourself, you know, twenty
four seven, you become the star of your own show.
And unless you treat people like that, unless you they're not.
They just don't know what to do, you know. So
they're all that when I start.
Speaker 3 (29:07):
Do you mean so you're treating your audience.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
As if they're the star of Yeah, yeah, they're part
of it. Like they're not passive, you know, they don't
sit back and sit back and applaud when you do something. Well,
you know that they've got the ability to comment, they've
got the ability to send you video, they've got the
ability to, you know, be treated like stars. They see
themselves as almost equals, you know.
Speaker 3 (29:31):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, that's quite I hadn't thought.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
Of it, like, treat them like I reckon.
Speaker 3 (29:34):
Yeah, And it's pretty freaky.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
You're at a concert and everyone turns to sit back
on the artist, yeah, and look at me and chuse
themselves with the artists.
Speaker 1 (29:43):
And when I start out on TV, no one knew
how to do it, like no one knew how to
film things, edit things and put things on TV. Now
everyone knows how to do it. There's no mystery to
it at all, no so, and I still think there's
some TV people that sort of pretend that there's a mystery. Yeah,
you know, it's like, know what we're doing. This is
really clear. It's like, yeah, I just did that with
one bone.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (30:04):
So you started you started a lot of things, right,
so many different projects. And we've talked about the media Liaison.
We've talked about the good, the bad, and the rugby.
We've talked about the Sports Cafe. You know the crowd
goes wild yep. I mean that's another one, right, So
how do you discover talent? How do you know who's
going to connect and not connect? Because you seem to
(30:25):
have a real ability for that as well.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
Well. The thing I really enjoy is is working out
where the audiences are now. So audiences shift all the time,
you know. So you know, when we started Sports Cafe,
Sky had a seventy thousand subscribers, you know, and now
there are a million, you know. So when we started
there was no one there, but we knew that it
(30:47):
would grow. Same with Craig as well. We started that
when when Prime came out. Now with you know, now
it's YouTube and podcasts and stuff like that, because that's
where the audience is now. In terms of talent, you know,
there's just some people that in an environment that just
tend to stand out. They tend to dominate dinner conversations,
(31:10):
and people tend to hang on their every word or
like them. So I remember running into James mcconey and
he'd been working, he'd just been made redundant for The Herald,
and he was at the press conference. It was his
last day, and I said, oh, you know, come and
do some stuff for us. You know, we're doing Crag
as well. And then straight away you could see that
(31:30):
he just had something. He's just had something. He just
had to refine it in a few different ways, you know,
became a star, you know. I mean Mark Ellis used
to sit behind me on the all Black bus. So
I used to sit next to Shan Fitzpatrick and then
behind me was Mecca and he would just go on
and on all day and have us in hysterics. So
you just knew he was funny.
Speaker 2 (31:49):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Well, Julie Christie's a great friend of mind.
She just mean the guys talent, you know it just
from day.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
The way his mind works is like just the front.
Speaker 3 (32:00):
Yeah yeah yeah. So I mean you beat yourself? Do
you bet yourself?
Speaker 1 (32:07):
Yeah? Yeah, yeah, yeah yeah I.
Speaker 2 (32:10):
Am So where does that kind of confidence come from?
Speaker 1 (32:12):
Do you think a blind faith for myself? But I
think like I have the same I remember when I
was playing rugby at school, the teacher said the worst
thing that I think anyone could ever say. I was.
I was lining up a conversion from the sideline to
win the game. I missed it, and he said to me, sal,
so you're not as good as you think you are.
(32:32):
Yeah he was. He was my manager. I was like
trying to win the game for this team. But that's
a really horrible thing to say to someone, You're not
as good as you think you are. I I just trust.
I know that I'm going to get it wrong, and
I know that I'm going to make mistakes, and I've
made I've done some terrible shows and some you know,
(32:53):
lots of things haven't worked, but I've learned from them.
But just yeah, just trust myself.
Speaker 3 (33:01):
Yeah, so what now, what's next?
Speaker 1 (33:04):
You again, that's a massive question. I mean, I don't know.
I really enjoyed. I really enjoyed doing what I did
in New York because it was something different to what
I've done before, done before. I'm loving, absolutely loving doing
the Sports Cafe podcast YouTube show because I'm just getting
to hang out with good mates and just have fun.
(33:27):
I think, you know, when you're in your twenties and
your thirties, you're driven by how do I prove myself
to the world. And then you get a bit older,
and I was going to say wise, but that's not true.
You just get older and then then your motivation changes
a little bit, and your motivation changes to how can
I just get the most out of life? How can
I have the most fun and make that a job? Yeah?
Speaker 3 (33:50):
Why not?
Speaker 1 (33:50):
That's what I'm trying to do, is like, how can
I just have as much fun influence the things that
are important to me, but and make that a job?
You know, because I'm like the world's worst handy man,
Like I couldn't could never have been a carpenter and
a plumber. I'm a or of those people, like you know,
(34:11):
how people can make stuff like that? Like I've never
thought of myself as being creative or artistic, you know,
which is sort of surprise and considering.
Speaker 3 (34:22):
Because you are. I'm about to disagree with you.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
But I don't think of myself like that, like because
I can't draw. So when I was at school again,
I couldn't draw, So I was like, get out of art.
You're an idiot, you know. So I think I was
conditioned to think that, like I have no creativity, but
like I don't really know what I do. I just
keep doing it.
Speaker 3 (34:44):
And we'll wait and see what comes next.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Because sometimes it's just being open to the opportunities, right,
and that's kind of exciting in it. So, okay, so
with who perhaps the worst advice you were given, which
was you know, as good as you think you are.
So to finish the advice segment, what was the best
piece of advice?
Speaker 1 (35:01):
Just trust yourself?
Speaker 3 (35:02):
Trust yourself?
Speaker 1 (35:03):
Yeah, just trust yourself. And and you know, everyone has
sort of a small number of people in their lives
that they trust and that you can talk to and
stuff like that. And when they when they believe in you,
you sort of believe in yourself.
Speaker 3 (35:19):
To trust yourself, do you need to be able to
listen to yourself?
Speaker 1 (35:22):
Yep? Yeah, I mean I think like I'm going. I mean,
it's a fascinating time at the moment because like I'm
starting to learn about meditation, I'm starting to learn about
rewiring your brain. Some of the Buddhist techniques that they use.
(35:42):
I find fascinating, you know, because I'm I've always been
pretty driven. I've always been pretty driven. You had a
bit of a chip on the shoulder, like a lot
of people. It's like, you know, you don't think I'm
good enough. I'll show you sort.
Speaker 3 (35:56):
Of thing and that can get you through some times.
Speaker 1 (35:59):
It's really important. That's really important. It's really draining.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
Underestimate me go on.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
That's absolutely who I was. Like, I was a pretty
loose unit growing up. I failed journalism school because I
got in trouble in my first week. I was with
the group people who got arrested for climbing Santa Clause
at Farmers. They got charged with unlawfully on the building.
I got away because I lifted them up because I
(36:28):
was the tallest. But I hadn't gone on the building
when the police caught us. Black So yeah, So I
had a fair few situations where I wasn't the best
behaved person in the world. But always when I started
to learn to trust myself and realize that I wasn't
good at everything, but the things I was good at,
(36:48):
I was good at and I could just focus on those.
Speaker 3 (36:50):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (36:51):
Yeah, I like it, And I like the listening side
of it because I think, yeah, I've always had yourself.
Speaker 3 (36:59):
Yeah, my own head and out loud.
Speaker 1 (37:00):
I talk to myself all the time, all the.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
Time, and I stop and go, oh, I've been thinking
about that.
Speaker 1 (37:05):
Do you ever walk along listening to music and dance? Yeah, yeah, yeah,
I've only learned to enjoy that. Like, so have you
see me wandering along my headphones? Don't I suddenly stop
and dance. I'm having a great time.
Speaker 2 (37:23):
Well, I'm lucky because I live out in Westalkland and
we've got a woman out there that dances on the
side of the street with her headphones on, and anyone
from we Storkland will have seen her. She's just on
the main No, but she is amazing, Like, she brings
you joy and that's why she does it. So if
I see you dancing walking down the street, it will
bring me joy.
Speaker 1 (37:41):
So I grew up in South Auckland, Yeah, and loved
it and it was such a great place to grow.
It's tough, but really there's a real sense of humor
out there. There is a man and some of the
funniest people I met have met have been growing up
(38:02):
in South Aukland. That would be insane. JK is the
same thing you grow up out there as.
Speaker 3 (38:06):
Well, fantastic.
Speaker 2 (38:18):
The podcast is called Ask Me Anything, right, yep, So
this is your.
Speaker 3 (38:21):
Chance to ask me something if you'd like to.
Speaker 1 (38:23):
You sort of intimate it before. But I've been away
for four or five years something like that, and I've
come back and do you think the country has changed?
Speaker 3 (38:37):
H It's interesting.
Speaker 2 (38:39):
So I'll reflect back on something you said, which is,
actually we're all still the same people, you know, like
we're sort of the same as we were in in
the mid nineties that we are now, And I would
kind of agree with that at many levels. I think
that society around us has changed, and so we probably
question who we are a lot more now. So, yes,
some things have changed for the better. I think how sexuality,
(39:02):
I think gender identity, I think all of those things.
I celebrate that we're actually more advanced now thinking people
don't feel as marginalized and they shouldn't, right one hundred percent,
So I think some of that changes definitely for the better.
But as you say, if you've been stepped away from
New Zealand for four years and stepping back and it
feels different.
Speaker 1 (39:23):
It feels to me like we're a bit scared and angry.
Speaker 2 (39:27):
And when you're scared, you don't actually go, oh, I'm
a bit scared and fearful right now. What you do
is you express it through generally through anger and yeah.
Speaker 1 (39:37):
And it's almost like Shop is scared to try stuff,
you know, it's like, or push the boundaries or whatever,
just in case everyone jumps on them. So I know,
when we're starting this, the overwhelming reaction I got from
everyone was, oh man, how's that going to survive? You know,
you're going to get canceled within the first week, etc.
Speaker 2 (39:56):
Etc.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
And I was like, so, like, why is there a
reason not to do something? Yeah, but that seemed to
be and I hit that a lot, you know, that
that sort of oh man, you can't do that because
what if it goes wrong?
Speaker 3 (40:09):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (40:09):
Yeah, which is the opposite to what I was experiencing
when I was in the US, because in the US,
everyone thinks they're a special for it. Well, everyone thinks
they're going to be massively successful, so they don't care
if you're massively successful because I'm going to be successful anyway.
Speaker 3 (40:22):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (40:23):
But yeah, it's just it's just seemed a bit different
coming home. Yeah, And I don't know. That's why I'm
asking you.
Speaker 2 (40:28):
Because I don't know if it's changed or if because
when you asked it, I thought, well, I've just been
living it every day and sometimes that change kind of
creeps up on you, you know, as opposed to being is.
Speaker 1 (40:39):
Another question, with everything you've been through and changed since
you left politics, would you go back into politics today?
Speaker 2 (40:48):
No? Yeah, no, yeah, I don't even think about that.
Speaker 3 (40:51):
Yeah, like absolutely not.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
And is that because of who you are now or
is because of what politics is like now?
Speaker 3 (40:57):
A combination of both. I've done it. I think there
is elements of being there, done that.
Speaker 2 (41:02):
So and I don't I always don't think you should
kind of look backwards, particularly in a big job like that.
But equally, you know, it takes it does it takes
your life, and it takes your family's life, you know.
And I'm at a stage now where I want to
you know, my mother's not well, so you know that,
and I and it shouldn't be but it's a luxury
to be able to spend time with her, and if
(41:24):
I was in that job, I couldn't. And the relationship
with my kids and my husband and my hobbies and
my work and you know, being able to do things
like this. So whereas when you're in politics, it is
honestly all encompassation.
Speaker 1 (41:37):
Quite selfish being a politician, yes, because there has to
be all about what you.
Speaker 2 (41:40):
Do, all about you, and then even going and having
a cup of coffee, you know someone's going to talk
to you about, you know, whatever it is, and it's
just like so even if you're not on, you sort
of you're always on.
Speaker 1 (41:51):
And i'd imagine being a politician really you've got too focus.
As one is, doing what you think is the right thing,
what you believe is the right thing. But then the
second hard is having the ability to do that. You
have to get re elected. Yeah, you know, you're constantly
trying to sort of balance that between doing the right
thing and making sure that you still have the votes
make sure you can keep doing that.
Speaker 2 (42:11):
I was doing this QR and a thing you know,
because I still do in seeing and speaking and all
that sort of thing. I seem seeing and I said, oh,
I'm taking questions and you know, any questions. And someone
asked me something and I mean, oh, I'm not going
to answer that, and he goes, what do you mean
you're not going to answer it. I don't really care
if you don't like what I said. I need your
vote exactly. But when you're a politician, that's different. Yeah,
I would have I would have fudged around that right,
(42:33):
Whereas he was like, you know, what are the three
things that you're going to judge success on and you know,
on this particular date, and I'm like, oh, I don't know.
Speaker 1 (42:40):
There is is my So, I come from a long
labor family. So when they so my great grandfather was
the leader of the unemployed during the depression. They made
sort of a movie about them. And then my grandfather
was the deputy mayor of Monk and he wanted to
(43:01):
be the MP for Monery and Labor told me he
was going to get it, and at the selection meeting
he was assured. And then this other guy, this big,
heavy set guy, got up and spoke and was this
incredible orator. It was David Longie. And so my grandfather
got left behind. So I've been asked a couple of
times whether I'd put my head in the ring for labor. Yeah,
(43:23):
I just and I thought about it. I just don't
think I'm willing to make the sacrifices.
Speaker 2 (43:31):
Yeah, and it is a huge sacrifice. And then in
the public's expectations on you and having to you know,
go with the paddy. There was an example when it
was but you know, for fairly recently in the last
few months. But once you're over fifty, you can say
the other day it could mean two weeks ago, or
it could mean two years ago.
Speaker 3 (43:52):
The other day, but it was.
Speaker 2 (43:55):
Someone had literally walked past and secretly videoed Gold and
Jerry Brownlee having a cup of coffee on the footpath
outside of cafe. It's not like they were doing you know,
they were having a cup of coffee in a public place,
but they secretly recorded it and there it was, and
I just see that makes me feel ill. I mean,
(44:18):
they weren't doing anything wrong, they weren't even trying to
hide it, right, And then then off goes you know,
all the social media on the rights and wrongs of it,
and I don't know.
Speaker 1 (44:26):
Yeah, And I suppose that's the hard thing about being
a politician. Is you have to you have to sort
of be you know, up there really in terms of
how you behave, et cetera, et cetera, and you are
held to a fairly high standard which sometimes can be
hard to live up to when you're the host of
a sports show that the standards a lot lower.
Speaker 3 (44:47):
My advice, don't do it.
Speaker 2 (44:49):
Yeah, good, Yeah, thanks for coming in today.
Speaker 1 (44:54):
Sorry thing question.
Speaker 2 (44:55):
No, it's okay, So thanks for coming in today. We
can people find out war from you in sports Cafe.
Speaker 1 (45:02):
Ish yeah, or sports Cafe. I mean, we're sort of
called sports Cafe Ish because I didn't want to sort
of pretend that we were making the same show. But
everyone it's calling it Sports Cafe. YouTube, YouTube, all podcasts,
iHeartRadio and social media Instagram.
Speaker 2 (45:18):
Yeah you know. Okay, go and check it out, guys,
And that except for another episode of as not my Space.
Speaker 1 (45:23):
Our my space is shut down at the moment, so
we'll be getting their backup.
Speaker 2 (45:26):
And that except for another episode of Asking Me Anything.
If you've enjoyed this episode, please follow Ask Me Anything
on iHeartRadio wherever you get your podcasts. While you were there,
check out some of our past episodes plenty there to
choose from some absolutely amazing people. Are we back next
Sunday with another fabulous guest.
Speaker 3 (45:43):
I'm Paula Bennett.
Speaker 2 (45:44):
Ask me anything, Goodbye,
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Bobby Bones Show
Listen to 'The Bobby Bones Show' by downloading the daily full replay.