NZH Plus September 2016

A New Zealand Herald Commercial Publication

Tuesday, September 27, 2016

TAMI NEILSON THE LONG ROAD TO SUCCESS

OLD BUNG EYES

CELEBRATING MARTY FELDMAN’S COMIC GENIUS

FOUR DAYS ON THE ROAD DESTINATION GISBORNE

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nzherald.co.nz | The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, September 27, 2016

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nzherald.co.nz | The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, September 27, 2016

INSIDE +PLUS 4 MUSIC 5 FOOD

Alan Perrott talks to singer-songwriter Tami Neilson

6-7 TRAVEL

Ewan McDonald finds the perfect place for Sunday lunch

9 GARDENING Greg Fleming hits the road and heads to the east coast

10 SCREEN

Sarah O’Neil spices up her vegetable garden

+Plus screen critic Paul Casserly looks at the late great Marty Feldman

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About us

Win a week’s free trial of My Food Bag Busy lifestyle? No time to shop and cook? Still want healthy, nutritious meals? My Food Bag is the answer and +Plus has a free week’s trial to give away to one lucky reader.

There are seven different bags to choose from, designed to delight pretty much everyone, from fussy pre-schoolers to finicky foodies.

You can have your food bag delivered weekly or fortnightly.

All you have to do is send an email to plus@apn.co.nz with ‘My Food Bag please’ in the subject line.

Include your name, phone number

Editor Greg Fleming gregory.fleming@nzme.co.nz Advertising Inquiries Ben Trethewey ben.trethewey@nzme.co.nz

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nzherald.co.nz | The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, September 27, 2016

+Plus Music

SLOW and STEADY

This one-woman, self-managed band is a product of sheer determination, writes Alan Perrott

O

K: What do Jane Austin, Vincent Van Gogh, Edgar Allan Poe, Eva Cassidy, Stieg Larsson and even Johann Sebastian Bach all have in common?

Yes, they all dabbled in the arts.

And yes, they are all dead, dead famous even, but what really unites them is that no-one got to enjoy their current (if relative) fame while they were alive and kicking.

Which is great for their estates or whoever owns the rights these days, but it’s four flavours of useless to the dearly departed.

Yet they were all banging out their craft for as long as they could regardless.

So the question becomes why?

Why flirt with the romantic if dysfunctional trope of the starving artist when they could have simply become wage slaves like the rest of their mates?

Apparently, it’s because they had no choice, like the mountaineer seduced by a peak’s mere presence, an artist will tell you they are compelled to do whatever it is they must do.

It’s what divides the true artist from the mere artisan.

Bollocks or not, there must be some way of fulfilling this drive without all the hunger, blagging or chopping off of ears.

After all, a fair number of locals seem to manage it, Don McGlashan still tours and records with nary a bum note and Moana Maniapoto’s iwi funk has somehow rendered her ageless, while singing remains a daily joy for Dame Malvina, even if it’s only to her cows.

Now, I’m not going to embarrass the multi-award-winning, American chart-registering, country singer/ songwriter/ musician Tami Neilson with inclusion among my opening cast of stars — after all she’s very much alive — but artists could do a lot worse than learn from this ex-pat Canadian’s example.

Now 39, she started out as one of the Neilson Family, and graduated from busking to performing throughout north America at 13.

It was a heady plunge into the only job she’s really known.

But even as she was opening for Johnny Cash and partying with the Osmonds, her eyes were always open wide.

“I guess I’ve always had a very clear view. My dad was a professional musician, so I saw both sides, the excitement and joy of accomplishment and celebrating all that, but also the ticking along every day, the grunt work. I’ve never had those stars in my eyes, the dream that one day I’ll make it big . . . I sometimes think it must be nice to have that little honeymoon period, just for a little while.”

Instead, the Neilson approach was to never, ever say no, because, as she says, every opportunity plants a seed and the more seeds you plant the greater your chance that one of them will bloom.

Even so, whenever they were travelling and passed someone carrying a guitar or some such, dad would slow the bus, wind down the window and shout: ‘Don’t do it, it’s a trap!’

“And we’d all laugh,” says Neilson.

It’s funny ’cos it’s true . . . especially

Singer-songwriter Tami Neilson.

Dave Dobbyn and Tami Neilson rehearse (far left); Marlon William, Tami Neilson and Delaney Davidson.

Pictures / Michael Craig; Supplied

when she followed her new husband to his home in New Zealand and found that her beloved country was almost a dirty word in these parts.

It didn’t matter how many gigs she’d played, who she knew, or how good she was, Neilson was back at square one.

If that was dispiriting, a trip back to Nashville almost ended her career.

“I was in my 20s then, when everything was about appearance, midriffbaring, blonde teens, and I was never that girl. But it doesn’t matter who you are, Prince, Lorde, anybody, there is always someone trying to tell you what to do, ‘ditch the family’, ‘sing this’, ‘you’re not doing it right’.”

W

hat began an opportunity to write songs with country hall of famer, Dennis Morgan, in Nashville evolved into an opportunity to audition for reality television show, Nashville Star, a country version of American Idol.

After two auditions, where the only attention anyone paid was to her chest, she was ready to give up singing: “It was so disheartening, awful, and it almost tipped me over edge. To have been in this business my whole life and be reduced to that was just so embarrassing. It was a humiliating situation.”

So Neilson started seeing herself as an ex-singer until a friend pulled her aside for a pep talk: “Your songs are great, your voice is great, so forget

everyone else and go write for yourself.” As isolated as she felt, New Zealand was probably the ideal place for a do-over.

The first thing she did was slather blackboard paint all over a wall of the couple’s Mt Eden home to scribble out a five-year plan and figure out who the hell she was.

“That was really important, it’s so easy to lose focus when you’re caught up in the week to week scramble of moving from gig to gig.”

She also had to whip up a solo act — as part of the family band she’d never had to play guitar before.

Not that she’d shaken off her family completely, her first solo albums were all recorded in Canada; lo-fi, acoustic country efforts produced by her brother and, in part, sung around the kitchen table.

It wasn’t so much a stylistic conceit as a financial necessity, Neilson simply couldn’t afford studio time.

But the result was that New Zealand began to take notice and the Tui music awards began to flow.

Yet she still felt like a foreigner.

New Zealand is notoriously cliquey and even though country was undergoing a resurgence, Neilson was an outsider.

The first time she approached current band mate Dave Khan at an open mic night on Ponsonby Rd, he basically shunned her.

It wasn’t until she sang on a track for his band, the Broadsides, that he

had his “holy shit” moment.

Even then, acceptance wasn’t a done deal; her onstage personality was too big for some and she’s made a deliberate effort to reel herself in.

“Sure, I’m a confident performer,” she says.

“But some people mistake that for ego, like I was full of myself. To me they are very different things, but that’s just how things are here . . .”

Still, her growing reputation saw her included in the seminal Gunslingers Ball and Great Hayride tours, packaged gigs featuring the cream of our new breed of country players. “They were the country Olympics,” says Neilson.

“Not so much because they were competitive, but playing with people like Nadia [Reid], Marlon [Williams] and Delaney [Davidson] lifts the bar, you had to really bring it.”

She’d finally found her people and it was time to take things up a gear.

“I’d never recorded with drums before and I’d never really had other people having input into my songs, mostly because of money, but now I could actually afford to pay musicians . . . with Dynamite, I think a lot of people were expecting more of my acoustic stuff. I mean we thought we’d laid down something good, but you can never tell.’’

D

ynamite changed everything.

Her first single, Walk (Back to Your Arms) won the Silver

I’ve stuck to a slow, steady pace, it’s been my cunning 10-year plan, and I’ve never banked on the notion that I would ever be an overnight success. Now I’m hoping that the longer I take to get there, the longer I can stay.

Scroll award, and as something awarded by her fellow songwriters it was hugely emotional.

But she remains a one-woman, selfmanaged band who’s up every morning to tend her social media profile, answer emails and find time between dealing with her two young kids to sing the odd melody into her cell phone.

But things are definitely progressing.

Most exciting of all is being accepted to play at the prestigious Americana festival in Nashville, an opportunity to lift the tapu from her last appearance there.

She’s also going to be playing in Canada, with her New Zealand band, and with her family watching.

It’s exciting and terrible at the same time, because her much-loved father didn’t live to see it.

But none of this has been an accident.

Sure, she has the talent and the background, but she wouldn’t have come close to her evident success without a bloody-minded determination to keep going, keep evolving and keep saying yes.

“I’ve stuck to a slow, steady pace, it’s been my cunning 10-year plan, and I’ve never banked on the notion that I would ever be an overnight success.

Now I’m hoping that the longer I take to get there, the longer I can stay . . . and if anything I might have to start learning how to say no.”

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zherald.co.nz n| The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, September 27, 2016

+Plus Food

Lads who lunch This is what I call a decent Sunday lunch, and this is just the place to have it, writes Ewan McDonald

L

et it never be said that I can’t find a decent table and wine list, no matter how challenging the assignment, and catching up with a friend in northernmost Waikato on a winter Sunday afternoon … that’s a challenging assignment.

For my idea of a Sunday lunch is lengthy, languid and presupposes liquid. Which is why I usually host them at my place, Turtle Pond. That wasn’t a practical option so … “Bracu,” I suggested, and she agreed, possibly because my only other option was catching up at the McDonald’s in Mercer, and you try doing a five-hour Sunday lunch there.

At once refined and comfortably rustic in the Simunovich olive estate amid the Bombay hills, Bracu has the reputation of being rather upmarket.

Put that to one side, and look at the founding family’s tradition: Croatia.

The family has re-created the sort of place from their homeland where there are friends or couples and, at the next table, sisters and cousins and

grandchildren celebrating Eleanor and Arthur's golden wedding.

The staff know to bring water and not to bother approaching for at least half an hour while we catch up with the doings of the months since we last caught up, and then to approach discreetly and suggest we might like to look at the wines by the glass, and perhaps consider food, because if we don’t order soon, the golden wedding party will, and the kitchen is likely to …

So we nod and pick up the menus, and put them down again, and pick up the conversation where we left off.

We will get around to ordering sometime, and the black-skirted and stockinged staff know it. We opt for the three-course degustation: vegetarian entree, delightfully heavy on mushrooms and herbs; a lamb-based main with roasted vegetables; a dessert that leans towards things done with fruit and not too much dairy.

Happily, those are what the chefs do best. This is a farmer's market kitchen with more than a few

Clockwise: Bracu restaurant, Bombay; beef with greens; raspberry chocolate dessert.

thought-out, stylish twists.

We appreciate the staff. All are clearly local, like to chat, and they shimmer with pride for the restaurant and their area. They want us to like what they do here.

I know you expect a quirky anecdote to end these columns, so here it is. Not once but twice I've driven home from Bracu, ferreted around the car and been unable to find my glasses. So I've emailed or phoned them, and they've come back with "Sorry, no ..." both times. So, expensive lunches. But worth it.

CAUGHT up with a friend the other day for ‘coffee and a bite’. It had been yonks, although I’m not entirely sure how a yonk is defined. Each of us is rather sensitive on the subject of years these days.

(I am going to digress: that is why I have put the parentheses up. Lies, cheap shots and vile calumnies are too often spread around the theme of journalists and their lunches. As the sentence above shows, they do

not always involve alcohol. Even when I reached the rarefied heights of Editor-in-Chief – hyphens and capitals optional – I eschewed strong drink before elevenses. Unless one was invited to a champagne breakfast, but that was never more than twice or three times a week.)

“Have you noticed,” she said as we graced the electrified, revolving portals of the art gallery, “how the M--chain is taking over almost every interesting and independent cafe´ in town?”

“You’re not wrong,” I said, partly because she almost never is, and partly because if she were to be, it would be less than gallant to point it out. “I was in the city library yesterday, and their cafe´ is a branch of E------‘s.”

We thought about it as she enjoyed her cinnamon brioche, which my mother used to make on Saturday mornings but called a pinwheel, and I wrestled with my ham and cheese toastie and pondered how much bet-

Pictures / Babiche Martens; Supplied

ter off we’d have been if Mum had been able to charge $7.50 a whack for the ones she churned out of the family sandwich-maker.

“It’s rather ironic,” my friend said, for she uses words correctly, “that the art gallery and the library, which consider themselves pillars of the artistic ethos, are happy to have their cafes run by big-business, corporate, cookie-cutter franchises.”

“Rather than artisans?” I said. “Of course, artisan originally meant ‘workman’. Funny how its meaning has evolved to the total opposite – craftsman or artiste.”

She delicately twiddled the Earl Grey teabag in her cup. I removed strands of molten cheese from my cheek. We agreed: it would be appropriate if the art gallery, library and museum valued their comestibles at a level of integrity similar to the treasures within. It could be worse.

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nzherald.co.nz | The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, September 27, 2016

+Plus Travel

Four days on the road

Picture / Greg Fleming

Greg Fleming hits the track and heads off towards the east coast

I

always look forward to a road trip. Even these days when cheap airfares set local holiday spots in competition with easyaccess meccas such as the Gold Coast and Bali — but there’s nothing like a good drive to a great destination, even in winter.

Four days and around 1000 kms meant a lot of car-time, so first thing to get sorted was the music.

A 2016 seven-seater Holden Captiva (diesel) would be our wheels, and various Spotify playlists our entertainment (remember to download to your device before leaving otherwise you’ll be left music-less in a gorge).

While the playlists met with some debate (“Dad, more jazz? Can we listen to something we all like?” says the 12-year-old from the back seat) everyone loved the Captiva; it turned out to be the perfect car for a longhaul family holiday — sturdy, powerful and a beast on the open road.

Thanks to the crisp infotainment touchscreen, navigating using Google maps and playing music via bluetooth was a breeze and sounded

great (six hours in the car can traverse a lot of musical territory everything from RL Burnside to Lee Morgan through to the back-seat requests of Selena Gomez and Leon).

Our first leg was Auckland to Rotorua.

Rotorua Why this route and not the more direct through Whakatane?

Lunch at Ciabatta bakery (first rule of the road: always plan your travel around food).

This modest Swiss-owned bakery, tucked away in an industrial section of Fenton, makes great pretzels (the mustard are divine) and produces some of the best bread and pastries in the country. We’d been here before and it’s just as good as we remembered.

These days, Rotorua’s busy reinventing itself. While the iconic attractions of boiling mud pools and Maori culture remain, the growing city is using its forestry, wildlife parks and thermal spas to attract a new kind of visitor, one bent on outdoor activities and ecotourism.

So if you have time, hit one of the

mountain-bike trails at Whakarewarewa forest. Another option — also involving trees — is a canopy tour of the nearby Mamuku Forest by zipline.

All ages and skill-levels catered for.

The three-hour drive from Rotorua to Gisborne passes through some beautiful country (gas up at Lake Rotoiti), though the Waioeka Gorge is a trial (logging trucks galore), but Gisborne’s worth it.

Gisborne It’s a small city — around 30,000 live here — and yes, it’s the first in the world to see the sun rise, but there’s a warmth here that has nothing to do with that ball in the sky.

Locals take life at their own pace and to a car load of jaded longcommute Aucklanders that’s a welcome change. Hospitality here is less provincial charm, more no-BS Kiwi courtesy. It’s Gissy man, slow down.

Of course the optimum time to visit is in the summer when you really can appreciate that wonderful coastline.

Head north out of town and there are beaches galore. Makorori and Wainui are world-famous for the con-

sistency and quality of their surf and you can get up close to the sea-life at Tatapouri Bay with some stingray feeding. The winter option is to stay close and explore the city by bike.

Cycle Gisborne can provide bikes, gear and even a guide should you

There’s nothing like a good drive to a great destination. wish.

Bordering our hotel was the scenic coastal walk/cycle way to Waikanae beach — this was a great easy ride, splendid at sunrise. We then doubled back and biked along the river as the sun set, exploring nearby suburbs, ducking our heads as we rode under bridges.

You’ll pass a statue commemorating James Cook’s troubled landing in New Zealand; the first cultural exchange was going well until traditional challenges were misunderstood and Cook’s men killed several Maori.

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Napier Early the next day, we drove the three hours south to Napier: Gisborne’s more cosmopolitan cousin. Napier boasts some great cafes (try Smiths in Ossian St, Ahuriri) and a superb restaurant in Mister D’s.

It’s also rather beautiful — the pageant beauty next to Gissy’s more laidback charm.

Its calling card is its Art Deco architecture (there are tours available that delve into its history — the 1931 quake and the resulting architecture if that’s your thing) but you may, like us, keep returning for its food and culture — the MTG Art Gallery had a superb Nigel Brown retrospective on display.

But the highlight of this leg of the trip was lunch at Mister D’s.

We always eat here when in Napier and it’s always good, but that afternoon’s meal was exceptional. Beautifully cooked fish (Blue Nose — fresh from the port at Ahuriri) for me, and a rich, mushroom-flavoured risotto topped with a piece of eye-fillet poached in olive oil for the wife and kid; exceptional — even the vege side-

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zherald.co.nz n| The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, September 27, 2016

What to do BAY OF PLENTY Rotorua ● Zipline it with a treetop canopy tour: http://canopytours.co.nz/ ● Mountain bike in Whakarewarewa forest Gisborne ● Take a bike tour — http:/ /www.cyclegisborne.com/ — have everything you need. They’ll even bring your bikes to your hotel. ● Feed the stingrays — Dive Tatapouri www.divetatapouri.com ● Dome Theatre — drinks, pizzas and beanbags — oh and movies, great if you’ve got kids in tow.

dishes were spot on.

To finish, we tackled the famous Mister D’s injectable donuts (the waiter brings you a syringe with your filling of choice — you do the rest).

It’s a nice piece of theatre and one our 12-year-old videoed for Instagram.

The donuts are pretty good too. It’s bistro-style dining, casual and relaxed — and at $145 for three — great value.

The drive back to Gisborne on State Highway 2 gave us uninterrupted music time as the 12-year-old slept off the donut sugar-high — Future, Howlin’ Wolf, and Napier’s own postrock trance merchants Jakob were on high rotate. We returned too late to visit the Dome Theatre — the fully licensed art-house movie theatre (complete with bean-bags and pizzas), but it’s a beacon on the — let’s-faceit — pretty quiet Gisborne nightlife,

HAWKES BAY Napier ● Feed the penguins at The National Aquarium ● Take a drive to Havelock North — great deli, wonderful orchards ● Take an Art Deco tour of the city

madras all mains $14 Mon-Wed. ● Napier — coffee at Smiths cafe, Ahuriri. Lunch and dinner at Mister D’s Tennyson St

Best Coffees

● Raglan Roast — 116 Wainui Rd, — no contest — new to Gisborne and perfectly placed for summer surfers, and fantastic coffee.

The Music

Subscribe to your preferred streaming service, download your fave albums or make your own playlists for the road.

Lee Morgan — Greatest Hits Future — EVOL Howlin’ Wolf — Greatest Hits Jakob — Solace Leon — Treasure EP

Where to stay ● Portside Hotel, Gisborne — clean, modern accommodation and a great location. Friendly staff, comfortable rooms, free WiFi and a salt-water pool. heritagehotels.co.nz

Where to Eat Clockwise: Sponge Bay, Gisborne (top); a beautiful dish at Mister D’s; an art Pictures / Greg Fleming deco building in Napier.

especially if you have kids in tow.

The following day, as we drove out of town through the vineyards and mandarin-laden orchards of Ormond, we were surprised by how much affection we’d built-up for this often-

misunderstood city.

My advice?

Leave your passport at home this summer, gas up and hit the road — Gissy may just surprise you — just don’t try to do it in four days.

● Rotorua — lunch at Ciabatta Bakery, White St, Fenton - try dinner at Leonardos (opposite Eat Street — great, unfussy Italian food.) ● Gisborne — try lunch at Albie and Frank’s. Great sandwiches — Ballance St. Do dinner at Tamarind Indian restaurant on Gladstone Rd — try the lamb

The Wheels

A 2016 7-seater Holden Captiva.

You can pay a lot more for an SUV, but why would you when the Captiva has it all: heated (front) seats, up-to-the-minute infotainment and safety features — and it’s a beauty to drive.

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nzherald.co.nz | The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, September 27, 2016

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E9

zherald.co.nz n| The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, September 27, 2016

+Plus Gardening

Spice up your edible garden be found if you look around.

There is also a range of unusual crops to grow, such as tomatillo growing inside their lantern shaped husks, the nutty tasting asparagus pea, ruby

Add variety and colour to your vegetable garden with unusual crops, writes Sarah O’Neil

Growing your food can elevate your meals from the ordinary to the amazing and the great thing is now is the perfect time to get started

D

id you know carrots weren’t originally just orange?

There was a rainbow of colours from white, yellow, brilliant red and deep purple to be found alongside the now-familiar orange carrot we know today.

Legend has it, back in the days when William of Orange ruled over Great Britain, he declared only orange carrots should be grown and we are still obeying his orders today.

However, while other carrots faded from popularity, they didn’t disappear completely, and for the keen home gardener the seeds are readily available.

Carrots aren’t the only vegetable where the available varieties have been reduced to only a few recognisable ones.

Stepping into the world of the gardener opens up a mind-blowing array of vegetables you never thought possible.

Take the humble tomato for instance. It is common to find a range of around half a dozen varieties, yet if you were to explore the varieties available as seeds to the home gardener, you will find that number closer to 100, making it very difficult

Sarah O’Neil in her vegetable garden.

to decide what to grow. It isn’t until you taste a home-grown tomato, fresh from the plant and still warm from the sun, that you will discover just how incredible the humble tomato can be. Some are quite sharp and acidic, and lift a salad as the key ingredient, while others are quite mellow and not too acidic at all.

And those are just the flavours — they also come in a multitude of shapes, sizes and colours. Some are more ‘meaty’ and have less seeds so they are perfect for cooking, and the tiny cherry ones are perfect for

Picture / Ted Baghurst

snacking on. Some grow so big that one slice will fill a burger bun. Once you grow your own and find favourites that are suited to your personal tastes you will never look back.

Peppers and chillies are another great example for the keen gardener.

Instead of the bland bell pepper and the burning hot cayenne, there are many options to suit the heat you can handle, and the search is always on to see who can find and grow the hottest. As a home grower though, you will notice the heat isn’t the be

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all and end all of the chilli. In the lower heat range, you will discover that flavour is more the focus and can vary greatly, often with just the hint of a tang. Many of them are large enough to stuff with your favourite ingredients and are a wonderful addition to your summer table.

Even something as completely ordinary as a cabbage can come in many forms. You can grow a large one to feed an army over the course of a week or grow smaller ones to suit a smaller family. There are almost a dozen different kinds of cabbage to

red silverbeet, sweet and tasty pepinos and mild-flavoured chokos.

Growing your food can elevate your meals from the ordinary to the amazing and the great thing is now is the perfect time to get started.

Growing from a seed can seem a little daunting, but with care and attention, they will germinate into tiny green seedlings.

Continue to nurture and water them in the warmth of a sunny windowsill and you will soon find yourself with strong seedlings ready to be planted out in the garden.

Then you will enjoy the pleasures of tasting vegetables fresh, delicious and which have been picked just moments earlier.

— Sarah O'Neil is an author, blogger and passionate gardener writing about the trials and tribulations of growing food for her family. Her books The Good Life and Play in the Garden are available at all good bookstores. www.sarahthegardener.co.nz

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E10

nzherald.co.nz | The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, September 27, 2016

+Plus Screen

The life of a bung-eyed genius Paul Casserly TV review

There's a hole in my neighbourhood Down which of late I cannot help but fall Elbow – Grounds For Divorce I’ve always wondered what the hole in the Elbow song was, a bar I surmised, or a perhaps brothel?

For me the hole I keep falling down is attached to the Wi-Fi router that’s attached to the VDSL copper network.

I find myself falling down a Twitter hole, an Instagram crevice and latterly a YouTube too.

It was during one of these YouTube tumbles that I came upon a wonderful documentary about the late great comic actor, Marty Feldman, while looking for something else.

Gene Wilder had just died and I wanted to see if I could find some Young Frankenstein, the Mel Brooks movie and my favourite Wilder comedy. And there he was, that bungeyed genius who has stolen nearly every show he’s been in. Marty Feldman’s working life is given a satisfying survey in this BBC production from 2006.

It’s called Marty Feldman: Six Degrees of Separation, the Six Degrees part of the title is possibly a slightly lame attempt to sex up the biography with a concept — so mid 2000s.

Thankfully, the filmmakers don’t push it, in fact my bet is they had it imposed on them by an executive, and give it enough lip service just to get away with it. Although, it has to be said, Marty was connected to many people, some big names among them. He wrote skits that starred the Two Ronnies and John Cleese, starred in Mel Brooks movies and was even a star witness at the obscenity trial of the counterculture magazine OZ. He wrote comedy for living as young man. The radio series Round The Horne, was a blockbuster of its time and it was Feldman who cowrote it along with Barry Took. The show featured the camp comedic skills of Kenneth Williams, and ran from 1965 – 1968, re-runs were still being played weekly on RNZ National up to the millennium.

Those bulging eyes, with one roaming off all over the shop, lizardlike, were not present in photos of the young man. Feldman had an operation that was carried out to address a thyroid condition. When he returned from the hospital his eyes

From left Marty Feldman, Gene Wilder, Peter Boyle, and Teri Garr in a scene from the movie Young Frankenstein, 1974.

Marty was connected to many people, some big names among them. He wrote skits that starred the Two Ronnies and John Cleese, starred in Mel Brooks movies and was even a star witness at the obscenity trial of the counter culture magazine OZ. had bulged and bunged into that trademark Marty Feldman gaze.

He was a prolific and talented writer — working for vintage comics like Frankie Howard, before joining John Cleese, Graham Chapman and Tim Brooke-Taylor (The Goodies) for At Last, The 1948 Show.

Then Cleese, and Michael Palin wrote for Feldman, launching his successful TV series Marty and helping him become a star. The show includes a recurring skit in which Marty plays a cockney bishop who annoys passengers in a railway car.

It’s funny, and I’ve never seen it before, though it feels familiar as I have seen the work of Monty Python.

This is where the degrees of separation start the cross over into

revelation. You, as I certainly did, may have thought that classic Four Yorkshiremen skit (I was born in cardboard box, middle of t’ road . . .) was pure Python, but it was written

by Marty Feldman, along with Cleese, Graham Chapman, and Tim BrookeTaylor.

The original footage of the sketch, with Feldman as one of the moaning Yorkshiremen, features and is also on YouTube. The Pythons and Feldman parted company as his star rose and, as hinted by John Cleese, Marty started to disappear up his own arse.

The soon-to-become Pythons had written a swag of material for season 2 of the hit show Marty (two Baftas), but the gags were rejected. Perhaps they were crap? Seems unlikely, as

they were all used successfully by the Pythons, just a few years later.

From here, we follow Marty to Hollywood and on to the set of Young Frankenstein, the Gene Wilder vehicle that had taken me here in the first place.

What a moment in time, Mel Brooks, Wilder and Feldman, all at their best.

Marty also had a good line in chat show banter.

While promoting the film he told a story about when he learnt that Peter Boyle, who played the monster, had to spend four hours a day in makeup, he asked how long he would be down for.

“Just in and out” came the reply, “and I’m playing a freak with a hunchback” jokes Marty, eyes bulging from his deadpan mug.

Mel Brooks once said of him: “He smoked sometimes half a carton of cigarettes daily, drank copious amounts of black coffee, and ate a diet rich in eggs and dairy products.”

Perhaps that goes some way to explaining the heart attack that killed

MARLIN

Picture / Getty Images

him aged just 48, while on set in Mexico. Comic co-Star Dom DeLuise (Silent Movie) puts the coffee intake at 50 cups a day, which I read as a polite way to imply that Marty was on drugs. It’s not touched on in the film but Eric Idle is more forthcoming on his online blog: “There were rumours of cocaine abuse, and clearly the heart attack was massive, though probably survivable in LA. I was always told the story of the ambulance being stuck in Mexico City traffic, which is amongst the worst in the world, so that makes some sense.”

All through the film Feldman talks of his idol, Buster Keaton, the silent movie legend who informed so much of his work.

“I feel about Keaton what the average organ player feels about Bach.” He says. “It transcends influence.”

Fittingly, both men ended up falling down a similar hole in their neighbourhood graveyard, at Forest Lawn in Los Angeles.

— Marty Feldman: Six Degrees of Separation, YouTube.

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E11

zherald.co.nz n| The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, September 27, 2016

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nzherald.co.nz | The New Zealand Herald | Tuesday, September 27, 2016

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