My NZ Work + Holiday Visa was put to good use again when I got a gig working with MTV! A new show called The Shannara Chronicles was being filmed in Auckland and I got a 6 week contract as a Production Manager working on behind the scenes footage. While the 12-16 hour days were completely exhausting, I learned an incredible amount. In-between fangirling over John Rhys-Davies and James Remar, I was in absolute awe of the sheer size of the production and felt super lucky to get this kind of job while traveling (especially since I was seriously considering selling strawberries at farmers markets when I first arrived in NZ).
Denise and I after a hike in Russell.
Denise (a Producer from NYC) flew over and we teamed up to create the behind the scenes content, hiring an Assistant Editor and local ENG crews to shadow the main unit and set up our own shoots .
Denise is an absolute force of life whose perfectionist work ethic is only rivaled by her insatiable energy. Despite being polar opposites in many ways, we made quite a good team and I learned so much from her just through osmosis.
Highlights of the job include:
-John Rhys Davies calling our audio guy a "little shit" in the most endearing, grandfatherly way
-Me being completely unphased by the young hunky actors working out but getting so star struck that I walked into the shot when James Remar entered the gym
-Denise tearing up Auckland every weekend and coming in Monday morning with the juiciest gossip
-the catering. All those "oh my god the craft services table makes me fat" interviews with actresses is the actual honest truth.
-working with the same crews that worked on The Hobbit + Lord of the Rings (still haven't seen it, but you know)
-James Remar referring to me as "Boston" after learning where I'm from (he's from Newton!) and having to use every ounce of restraint in my body to refrain from asking him to say "dark passenger" in his Dexter voice
It KILLS me that I can't share the photos I took on set (pesky non-disclosure agreements) but after we wrapped, Denise and I headed up to the Bay of Islands for a celebratory road-trip. Here's a few photos if you'd like to see...
