The announcement of TVNZ’s 2024 line-up has had some websites trotting out top 10 lists based on the new offerings, acting surprised that Breakfast, Seven Sharp or Fair Go is coming back, or just expertly cutting and pasting the press release.
The statement started out declaring that it was all about “TVNZ’s Aotearoatanga, or ‘New Zealandness’”. Said TVNZs Acting Director of Content, Nevak Rogers: “Our distinct Kiwi voice is what sets Te Reo Tātaki [TVNZ] apart. I’m excited by the diversity of our upcoming local content slate – the lens of Aotearoatanga ensures we’re reflecting our community and sharing their stories.
But reading between the lines of the national broadcaster’s giddy-with-excitement statement – “Sensational Scripted” was one subhead – there are signs that when it comes to local programming, TVNZ’s new year doesn’t offer much fresh local fare that requires a script, sensational, or otherwise.
Also, its local documentaries are on a biennial loop – something the organisation blames on the NZ On Air funding cycles – and 2024 is picking up the slack for 2023.
And while there are new local comedy offerings, including one from the Wellington Paranormal universe, its support for local comedians has fallen away.
Drama-wise, TVNZs’ main new addition to its schedule is Testify. The show was announced a year ago under its earlier title, The Bishop, with NZOA-announcing funding to the tune of $6 million-plus. It is headed to TVNZ 2 with its story about a charismatic young pastor who forms an unlikely alliance with a queer podcaster when it comes into conflict with his father’s rich and powerful evangelical church.
It stars Craig Hall and Vinnie Bennett and is being made by Warner Bros NZ (the production house not the owners of Three). It will be co-directed by David Stubbs (who steered the excellent Bain family drama Black Hands) and Paula Whetu Jones (Whina) who co-wrote the series with Gavin Strawhan.
The other new local drama in the TVNZ announcement is a dramedy, also with an LGBTQI+ edge – The Boy, The Queen, and Everything In Between follows Jacob, as he is released from prison and tries to make amends with his estranged father, a drag queen. It’s a six-episode half-hour affair destined for TVNZ+.
The network’s other 2024 local dramas are all further seasons of The Gone, Under the Vines, The Brokenwood Mysteries (its 10th season) and My Life is Murder. As with the current After the Party, those shows are all international co-productions, which have been co-commissioned or picked up by TVNZ.
Asked about the piggybacking, a TVNZ spokesman said “co-productions are a longstanding part of TVNZ’s content strategy. By partnering with international players, we’re able to make bigger scale drama series right here in New Zealand. This benefits not only the local production sector but allows Aotearoa’s stories to reach even further globally.”
Comedy wise, TVNZ’s new local titles include Warren’s Vortex from the team behind Wellington Paranormal, about Warren of Lower Hutt who finds his garden shed leads to parallel universe versions of New Zealand.
Returning to TVNZ+ for a second season after its 2022 debut but not in the announcement is Simone Nathan’s Jewish-Kiwi sitcom Kid Sister, which stars Taskmaster NZ’s Paul Williams as her gentile boyfriend. A fifth season of Taskmaster NZ is up in the air, possibly awaiting a NZOA funding announcement but there are no signs of the return of TVNZ’s comedy panel shows Have You Been Paying Attention? – like Three’s departing The Project, an Aussie format requiring licensee payments – or Patriot Brains.
With very few prime-time broadcast documentaries on TVNZ this year after last year’s acclaimed Documentary New Zealand slot, another bunch of docs under the DNZ banner will return sometime next year, presumably some time in winter. But why are major docos getting the biennial treatment?
“TVNZ delivers a factual slate every year,” counters the TVNZ spokesperson. “The timing of Documentary NZ features depends on funding rounds, which support some of this content.”
The six titles in the 2024 DNZ batch include Mana Kura (about a grass-roots initiative for young offenders in Papakura) and The 501s: Inside (about Australian deportation of NZ-born offenders over a decade).
Outside the DNZ umbrella is The Lost Boys of Dilworth, about the abuse at one of Auckland’s wealthiest schools, which is written by one of the victims.
TVNZ’s new observational doco offerings include the series The Hospital following junior doctors at South Auckland’s Middlemore Hospital. Having finished six seasons of its fly-on-the-wall series about their undertaker business, The Casketeers lives again in Casketeers: Life & Death Around The World in which Francis and Kaiora Tipene are off around the globe looking at grief and funeral practices in other places.
Elsewhere, there will be enough new property reality shows to fill a subdivision. Among the new offerings are a NZ version of the hardy UK renovate-real estate series, Love It or List It. As well, Phil Spencer, the co-host of that British show and of Location, Location, Location, is fronting New Zealand’s Best Homes with Phil Spencer, an Australian production which will also be showing across the Tasman and in the UK. Another new series is My Dream Green Home in which experts offer advice on how to make changes towards a more sustainable lifestyle and living environment.
One of the hosts of Love or List It NZ is actor-turned-real-estate agent Paul Glover and My Dream Green Home is fronted by rising comedian-actor Rhiannon McCall.
Both, it seems, have taken their acting talents to where there is bigger demand for them than drama or comedy.
Other new shows coming to TVNZ in 2024
Local
James Must-A-Pic His Mum a New Man – Celebrity Treasure Island winning comedian attempts to marry off his mother to someone nice.
Relentless – Kickboxers vie for a spot on an Auckland MMA team.
Four Go Flatting – Four young guys with intellectual disabilities become flatmates.
My Family Mystery – Sonia Gray rattles a few skeletons in whānau closets.
Imports
Alice & Jack – A “love story for the ages” starring Andrea Riseborough and Domhnall Gleeson.
Apples Never Fall – Another adaptation of a novel by Liane Moriarty of Big Little Lies and Nine Perfect Strangers fame and starring Sam Neill and Annette Bening.
The Day of The Jackal – Assassin thriller based on the Frederick Forsyth book already made into a movie or two. Stars Eddie Redmayne as the crack shot.
Breathtaking – Line of Duty creator Jed Mercurio’s new series starring Joanne Froggatt as a NHS doctor in the early days of the Covid pandemic.
Bill Bailey’s Aussie Wild West Adventure
Joanna Lumley’s Spice Trail Adventure
George Clarke’s Adventures in America
Great Escapes with Morgan Freeman
Planet Earth III with David Attenborough
MasterChef: Dessert Masters
Other shows returning to TVNZ in 2024
Local
Grand Designs NZ
Country House Hunters New Zealand
Moving Houses
Celebrity Treasure Island
The Great Kiwi Bake Off
My Kitchen Rules NZ
Hyundai Country Calendar
Shortland Street
Dog Squad
Renters
Motorway Patrol
Imports
The Tourist
The Responder
HALO
Rogue Heroes
Dr. Death
Star Trek: Discovery
Star Trek: New Worlds
