Mike Hosking lets loose and talks about his life

Mike Hosking is giving Out of the Question a go because he thought the show would be fun, and fun is the litmus test for whether he will do something. Picture / Greg Bowker

Mike Hosking is taking a break. A break from "doing nothing."

"I've just been quietly getting on with my life and doing my own thing and fading away. And being private and all those sorts of things. By and large, I've just done nothing, do nothing, enjoy doing nothing, want to continue doing nothing."

Doing nothing has kept him quite busy since Bill Ralston and his turbo-broom encouraged Hosking's departure from desk of Breakfast at TVNZ.

There are giddying heights to be reached in doing nothing and so he intends to keep on at it.

But his burgeoning career in nihilism is constantly under threat.

Hosking has his girls, Ruby and Bella, and has pottered away with a radio show on Newstalk ZB on Saturday mornings. Last year he wrote newspaper columns.

And now Hosking is about to line up opposite the man they always said he'd replace - Paul Holmes. Both men on the run from the TVNZ factory, seeking and finding refuge in the Nauru for TVNZ refugees - Prime.

"The excitement is building. I'm on the edge. Nervous. Don't know if I can do it anymore."

Really?

"No. But I am quite excited."

They lead the opposing teams on Out of the Question - a "highbrow but entertaining" current affairs take on Game of Two Halves created by Julie Christie. Hosking and Holmes lead a team of three each. Michael Laws is Hosking's sidekick. The third member is a changing ring-in. Mikey Havoc hosts "because there is potential for chaos".

Hosking said he and Holmes did get on well but had only just got to know each other properly. At TVNZ Hosking was on at 6am and Holmes was on at 7pm so there wasn't a lot of crossover.

"People have this impression that if you've been in television you all sit around the television presenters' common room and chat about life. But I didn't really know him at TVNZ."

He's on Prime. Different network, maybe, but his tongue is still stuck in his cheek. It helps that Holmes is not there to defend himself.

There's Mike and Michael and in the middle is Mikey. Then there's Paul.

"They haven't found someone willing to work with Paul yet. So Paul is an island."

Is it case of, as P J. O'Rourke would have it, age and guile over youth, innocence and a bad haircut?

"No. To be fair, I'd probably be fairly confident of beating him on a regular basis. He's a bit slower. You can see the questions taking a wee bit longer to tick through. On some questions where speed is required you could see that. He'd come up with the answers two or three questions later. But he's still capable of a few funny lines."

Hosking insists there will be no smashing up of the set or leaping over the desks, as on Game of Two Halves. Holmes is getting a bit too rickety for all that.

"The chances of us leaving our seats are fairly slim. It's the mental gymnastics, not the physical gymnastics."

He takes the chance to have another dig at the absent Holmes. "At rehearsals we thrashed him. We did him like a dog's dinner. We tried out some teams and he was barely in the game. We annihilated him. But he took it well. I was surprised."

Is that why he doesn't have a team member?

"Well, he's probably gone and sacked them. It's very hard to find people who will work with him."

When he left TVNZ, Hosking did all manner of radical things which left onlookers agog. He grew his hair, for goodness sake. He even let a goatee get a look in.

His marriage ended and there was that court case to deal with, to stop New Idea printing photos of his then 18-month-old twins.

"Mid-life crisis," the onlookers whispered. "He's gone feral," thinking the inward stress of discovering he was no longer the darling of TVNZ was manifesting itself in this hirsute way.

No, Hosking insists. There was no mid-life crisis and still isn't "but the hair is still quite long".

"It was one of the best things to happen to me. It's the most interesting, liberating, fun time I have had. The reason I still don't do anything is because I thoroughly enjoy my life."

But he's not "bitter, resentful, twisted, angry, furious, frustrated" enough about it to discount returning to TVNZ, though he says he hasn't thought about it.

It's been a while since he had to do publicity interviews, "not long enough" he says.

He's emerged because he thought the show would be fun and fun is the litmus test for whether he will do something.

Otherwise Hosking intends to keep up his career of doing nothing, where there are opportunities aplenty for a man with the fires of ambition in his belly to plough.

"When I say do nothing, I just don't work. Don't want to work, haven't worked, enjoy not working."

He insists he's not a bum. "I'm a bit occupied to be a bum. But in the work department, I do as little as possible."

He insists he's not lying.

His cellphone rings and he pulls a bit of a Winston Peters.

"Oh. Sorry, this is TV3. Can I just take it?

"Just joking."

Ba da boom.

What: Out of the Question
Where and when: Prime, Wednesday, October 19, 9.30pm