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MediaJuly 28, 2016

Don’t rock the boat: the real reason Radio Hauraki refuses to pronounce its own name right

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Soon-to-be-former Radio Hauraki DJ Alex Behan explains why everyone has been pronouncing the station’s name wrong for years – and why it needs to stop.

UPDATE: The station appears to have indicated it will soon change its pronunciation.

The first question I asked when I was offered a job at Radio Hauraki was “Am I allowed to pronounce it correctly?” The answer was no.

Howraki is a brand. It is the oldest commercial radio brand in the country. We are currently going through a transition phase and we have a loyal middle New Zealand audience. We can’t risk losing the audience we currently have.”

I was a bit surprised. They had changed logo from the cool pirate boat. They were changing music direction and their presenter line-up. Their new tag line was ‘It’s Different’. Pretty much everything was on the table for change, it seemed. Why not change the wilfully ignorant (if not outright racist) pronunciation of the brand name?

“Not everyone is as open minded as you.”

Listening to that answer I started thinking that maybe I was totally out of touch with the New Zealand audience. Maybe I live in a bubble of like-minded people who value our bicultural heritage?

I rolled through some facts in the back of my mind.

I know that Hauraki is targeting an 18-44 year-old male demographic and is the only male-focused music station in the media conglomerate that it belongs to. It’s up against The Rock, The Sound and George, all male-focused, all owned by the opposition. None of those three opposition brands make any notable effort in regards to Te Reo Māori.*

The assumption by both MediaWorks and NZME, therefore, is that the listening audience don’t care. Management’s assessment is that they stand a better chance of pleasing a largest number of people if they continue to say Howraki.

But I really need this job. I’ve just arrived back in New Zealand, and I have Grey Lynn rent to pay.

“Would you like to sign this contract?”

“Yes please.”

So I started working at Howraki. It was made very clear to all of us on staff that the reinvention of Hauraki was an important final attempt to save a languishing brand. They needed relevance and cultural currency. The way I saw it the cheapest and most efficient way to do that was to start saying the name correctly after 48 years of ignorant pronunciation.

Different logo, same incorrect pronunciation
Different logo, same incorrect pronunciation

Yet every time I raised the issue with management there would be some well-meaning chat, then the buck would get passed to invisible upper management and life would go on.

I understand your point of view Alex,” they’d say. “But it’s not up to you to rename or mispronounce the name of the radio station. It’s not my call, it’s not your call. That’s a board decision. I don’t mind if you drop it in once in a while during Māori language week, but you can’t do it all the time, that’s out of step with the marketing of the whole station. The history of the station has been this pronunciation and that’s just how it is.”

It’s not an answer that satisfies me but it’s the only kind of answer you get. You never really get to fight the power. I’m not even sure which board decides. Is there even a board? I certainly don’t know who’s on it.

At Newstalk ZB when they read the weather for the greater Auckland region, they never talk about the Howraki gulf – it’s Hoeraki over there. ZB and Hauraki share the same management. The Board is the Same Mysterious Board! They know how it is supposed to be pronounced. But Hauraki isn’t a word anymore, it’s a brand. Brands can only be changed by edicts from on high. Who are these mysterious string pullers?

Sage advice from Radio Hauraki
Sage advice from Radio Hauraki

Are they mostly older white guys? Sure. Are they racist? Casually maybe? Who’s to say? Even if they were, that’s not what drives decisions like this. What drives these brand strategies is maximising profits and audience and they do that by giving you what they think you want.

They think you want Howraki.

During Māori language week the first two years I didn’t drop a beat. I Hoeraki’ed all over the place. I mean, that was the one week where they couldn’t touch me yeah? It really stood out, I thought it sounded great and the majority of feedback was positive. (To be honest, there were one or two racist call outs which didn’t surprise or bother me). As soon as Māori language week ended, I was pulled aside and asked to go back to the regular program. I continued to do my job – I had Grey Lynn rent to pay.  

Those of us working in corporate environments make a lot of decisions based on things like having Grey Lynn rent to pay. The people who work for Radio Hauraki are neither racist nor ignorant. Much of the work they did the last few years to bring the brand out of the stone age has been admirable (I can’t tell you how relieved the entire staff were when the NSFW page was pulled from the website thanks to our amazing social media guy). Many people on the inside of brands try to instigate change but they are working within a system that supports conformity. It’s hard to stand up to that.

The mispronunciation of the word Hauraki continued to rankle me though. I started to feel like this is the kind of systemic cultural appropriation by the corporate world that us little guys are supposed to stand up for. I was hardly alone in my thinking at the station, yet I still felt powerless.

Of course, not everyone conforms.

Mikey Havoc. The man they cannot control. The man they took off daily radio mainly because they can’t control him. Not just on this issue – on any issue. Mikey used to Hoeraki the shit out of it. Mikey Havoc is walking cultural currency. He knows how to respect a word, how to respect a culture and his audience.

Let’s be clear: I am no friend to Mikey Havoc, but the guy has mana and he would never Howraki without his tongue firmly in his cheek. Mikey is heard less on air these days which is a shame for the whole radio landscape. Not conforming, it seems, doesn’t pay the Grey Lynn rent.

This is business. These decisions are based on what a certain group of people think you want. Their assumption, rightly or wrongly, is that Howraki is the safer of two options and will appease the widest audience.

My assumption is that increasingly New Zealanders are more upset by racism, sexism, cultural appropriation and discrimination in the media now than ever before. But that conversation doesn’t seem to have penetrated to Mysterious Board level yet.

Maybe part of the issue is this: the radio we consume is increasingly controlled and meticulously calculated by a very small number of people and it’s not the people you hear. They make their decisions based on what they think you want and the ratings tell all. Which also means every time Thane steps over the line, or Dom offends half the nation, these are also brand strategies – just like the one to say Howraki instead of Hoeraki.

As the world gets smaller and information travels quicker, I have seen broadcasters surprised out of their old media thought patterns and forced to U-turn their choices based on audience reaction. Radio stations, like all brands, monitor very closely their listeners’ feedback and social media. So if you want them to update their pronunciation, there’s a place to hit them where they’ll listen

* George fans will be quick to point out that they occasionally have Te Reo Māori place names and numbers. I would just as quickly point out that they operate on a frequency license that requires them to promote Māori culture – considering that fact the effort they make is appallingly slight.


UPDATE: The station appears to have indicated it will soon change its pronunciation.

Keep going!
A scene from Jim Hosking’s THE GREASY STRANGLER will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 – May 5,2016.
A scene from Jim Hosking’s THE GREASY STRANGLER will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 – May 5,2016.

MediaJuly 26, 2016

‘Flatulence is funny’ – Elijah Wood on The Greasy Strangler (and a beanie giveaway to top KFC)

A scene from Jim Hosking’s THE GREASY STRANGLER will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 – May 5,2016.
A scene from Jim Hosking’s THE GREASY STRANGLER will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 – May 5,2016.

Alex Casey talks to Elijah Wood about producing The Greasy Strangler, the film bound to get the most dry-retches in the New Zealand International Film Festival this year, and wrangles a rare beanie competition for one lucky greaseball to win. 

“I love it, a beanie set the country on fire, that’s genius. I love New Zealand.” I love you too Elijah Wood, I resisted whispering. We were discussing the great KFC beanie giveaway – the finest competition of our time, inspired by the excellent beanie-based marketing for The Greasy Strangler on the Sundance circuit. Elijah models one below, please for the love of God head to our Facebook page if you want a chance to win one of the only Greasy beanies in Middle Earth.

A scene from Jim Hosking's THE GREASY STRANGLER will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 - May 5,2016.

The Greasy Strangler is doing a naked kneeslide into the New Zealand International Film Festival this week, leaving a trail of slime, farts and eyeballs in its wake. Produced by a notable few including Elijah Wood (Deep Impact) and Incredibly Strange director Ant Timpson, the film loosely follows a father, his adult son, and the totally normal hobby of greasing yourself up at night and strangling people in the neighbourhood. The sick, drawn-out jokes flow through the film as steadily as the bodily fluids, resulting in something akin to Tim and Eric with a severe bout of food poisoning.

After sitting through a screener at my work desk absolutely horrified, with the brightness dialed down to -11 in case of a wild penis occurring on screen (very likely), I was able to chat to Elijah Wood about his company Spectrevision getting behind the film that has put me off sausages for life. Keeping it cool, I bit my tongue and swore not to mention anything to do with Mordor, Samwise, or the weight of mithril. The publicist buzzed me through and I immediately blurted out that he was on my pencil case growing up, that it was an immense honour to interview Frodo, and that New Zealand “misses him”.

An actual photo taken of our conversation.
An actual photo taken of our conversation.

After awaking from a humiliation-induced black-out, it was time for us to get greasy.

Thank god you’re here. I want to talk about the Greasy Strangler because no one else has seen it here yet. I’ve just been sitting here stewing on it by myself. What I want to ask you is, what did I just watch?

Well let me ask you: what did you think of the film?

I still don’t even know. It was extremely gross, but by the end I found it quite the father and son situation actually kind of touching. But mostly gross. As a producer, how would you explain The Greasy Strangler to somebody who might just be reading this because you’re our dude from Lord of the Rings?

Setting the film up is not an easy task, especially just setting up people’s expectations. It’s sort of what you just said, essentially the heart of the story is a father son relationship film. They live together way past the point of which they should, but in the background there’s also a man who covers his naked body in grease and kills people called The Greasy Strangler. There’s also a love triangle at the centre of the film between the father, the son and this girl Janet.

It’s essentially a comedy with genre elements, and a big gross-out element. It’s not an easy thing to describe, tonally it really rides this kind of bizarre balance between being really funny, uncomfortable, disgusting, and touching all at once.

You’ve said before that The Greasy Strangler is what you and Spectrevision look for in a film, which got me wondering… what exact part grabbed you? Was it the car wash scene?

I think it’s just that it is so different from anything else. For us, it represents the opportunity to work with a filmmaker we love and put our energy and time behind allowing him to see his vision through. The film is so unlike anything else that we’ve seen or anything else that exists. The movie really has a rhythm that’s all it’s own. We just fell in love with the script and just wanted to be a part of supporting this filmmaker, so it represents us and our kind of directives in that way.

A scene from Jim Hosking's THE GREASY STRANGER will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 - May 5,2016.

It’s interesting you say that it kind of hits different rhythms, I definitely noticed when I was watching it – it has a completely different sense of timing unlike anything I’ve ever seen. You don’t even really know when to breathe properly, it completely throws everything pace-wise out the window.

Totally, that’s all Jim [Hosking, director]. It very much operates on the contrary to how a film should be rhythmically and the way it should be cut together. A moment will stretch out past the point of being comfortable, all those things are very much unique to Jim and specifically what he wanted to do with this movie and I love those things.

I think why it makes the film divisive, and it’s certainly not for everybody. We’ve heard both sides, some people absolutely love the film and really get it, and then people who just really, really hate it. Movies that elicit strong reactions are some of my favourite kinds of films, where you see something and you can have a debate with someone who feels the opposite. There’s just something wonderful about that.

A scene from Jim Hosking's THE GREASY STRANGLER will play at the 59th San Francisco International Film Festival, on April 21 - May 5,2016.

One element that I’m assuming people are responding to with repulsion is all the gloopy, greasy elements. It got me thinking about the best cinema snacks to accompany the film. Are there any?

Well, you could certainly pair hot dogs and bacon with the film which would be very appropriate, but if you’ve got a weak constitution perhaps it’s best not to have any snacks. If you’re easily grossed out, I wouldn’t be bringing anything in with you.

Great advice. I noticed that you guys wore some really great Greasy beanies at Sundance, are these available for purchase? New Zealand bloody loves beanies, we went crazy for some free KFC beanies recently, and basically broke Twitter trying to win them.

… Really?

Yeah, KFC released three and got thousands of retweets. The country set itself on fire for them. Then they gave away some socks too.

What a funny distinction. I love it, a beanie set the country on fire, that’s genius. I love New Zealand and I miss it so much. The beanies at Sundance were a stroke of genius. You would just look through the sea of people and you’d occasionally just see these little pink heads running around.

I have a feeling that there might be some at the New Zealand Film Festival. I would imagine that Ant Timpson probably has some in his possession, in which case they will certainly make an appearance [head to our Facebook to get your greasy paws on one]

The Greasy beanie: great for work and play
The Greasy beanie: great for work and play

I’ve seen people refer to The Greasy Strangler as the ‘walkout film’ of the festival circuit. Have you ever walked out of a film in your life?

I have, yeah. I don’t particularly like it though, I don’t like walking out of movies, there’s something about sticking with them almost out of respect, I think that’s kind of important, but I’ll admit that in the past I have.

I ended up walking out of one film in the third act – so I waited a real long time – in New Zealand somewhere. I think it was The Messenger? The Joan of Arc film? I struggled with that one. There was a movie called The Apostle with Robert Duvall. I think I was young and it was a pace I wasn’t familiar with, so I walked out. I’m a little ashamed because it’s actually a very revered movie, I just wasn’t ready for it.

Maybe people will say that about The Greasy Strangler in years to come. Looking at the festival booklet and a few other films, it seems like farts are making a big comeback. Can you speak to that trend as an industry professional?

Well the only two movies that I’m aware of that share farts are our film and Swiss Army Man. Both of them were divisive movies at Sundance, and both of them actually had walkouts. I haven’t actually seen Swiss Army Man yet, but it’s meant to be brilliant. Yeah, I don’t know, why is that that farts have come back? I think it’s great, flatulence is funny and it’s always going to elicit a response. Guaranteed.

TGS

I read that you had aspirations to create Oscar-winning horror films, is that still part of Spectrevision’s ethos?

That whole idea is speaking to the stigmatisation of genre and horror, they typically get relegated to a lower class of thought or as a lower class of filmmaking. At their best, horror and genre films are as artistically viable as any other film that would be an award contender.

Something like The Exorcist, for instance, is an absolute classic of cinema. It’s not necessarily thought of in terms of it being a horror film, although it very much is. In fact, the filmmakers themselves deny that it’s a horror movie because of that stigmatisation, that notion that a horror film exists only in B-grade quality.

Do you reckon there are other horror films around, aside from The Exorcist and I guess Silence of the Lambs, that you think are worthy of an Oscar?

More recently, I would say something like The Witch. The cinematography is stunning, the performances are absolutely stunning and harrowing and absolutely Oscar-worthy. The storytelling is incredible, the set design is amazing, the score is phenomenal… yeah, I would say The Witch absolutely.

I have a pitch for a horror film right now, would you like to hear it?

[silence]

It’s about Snapchat and it’s called The Snapchat Killer. The film is about a killer who creeps up behind you and sends a Snapchat saying “I’m here” or whatever, but the kicker is that the film itself is distributed through Snapchat. You get it in ten second increments and it’s like a meta kind of thing. Are you interested?

That’s kind of brilliant. Using the medium itself as a distribution model for your film and experiencing something via social media that exists only for social media is interesting, that’s a really cool idea.

It won’t make any money though.

Yes but Snapchat has a lot of money. It won’t in the traditional way no, but I think one could get paid a lot for making it because maybe it’ll get more people to sign on to Snapchat, I don’t know how that works.

You’re the producer, not me. I’ll leave it with you. Is there anything else you want to say to the people of New Zealand before they all go and watch this incredibly strange film?

Prepare yourself, but in this case I think mainly prepare for laughs. I have a feeling that New Zealand audiences are going to love it, that’s my instinct.


Head to our Facebook page to win a double pass to The Greasy Strangler and a very rare beanie

The Greasy Strangler is in the New Zealand International Film Festival, 10.15pm this Saturday at Skycity Theatre.