MARCH 7 2020 LISTENER 71
TV REVIEW
‘B
ugger it, I’m going to speak
about this,” declared The
AM Show’s Mark Richard-
son, with the defiance
of a man with a national radio and
television platform who never seems
to shut up. “All right, I get it. I don’t
get it, because I don’t
get it, do I? I sort of
do,” he burbled while
co-host Amanda Gil-
lies grimaced in what
looked like actual
pain.
I didn’t get it, either.
But as a demonstra-
tion of the state of
much local public dis-
course, it spoke ranty,
nonsensical volumes.
This latest “tirade”,
as Newshub gleefully
reported, followed an
interview with writer Helene Wong.
She’d taken to wearing a T-shirt read-
ing “I am not from Wuhan, drop the
pitchfork” to protest Covid-19-related
racism towards Chinese people.
Richardson is sick of hearing
about racism. “I’ve been told I’m
racist all the time. And what’s
more, the more you tell me
that, I think the more coun-
terproductive it’s becoming.
Anyone heard of pushback?”
So if people say, “Bugger it,
I’m going to talk about racismA masterclass of
Kiwi storytelling
eases the pain
after a far-too-
common rant.
Harrowing experiences
“I was just being
tossed aroundlike a doll and
watching the
scaffold jumpa foot off the
ground.”I experience”, they’d better expect a backlash.
It’s a spectacle that goes back to Paul Henry, Paul
Holmes and others – smug personalities congratu-
lating themselves on their inability to relate to an
experience different from their own; celebrating a
failure of imagination.Y
ou despair. Then you switch on the television
and there’s something that does the opposite.
The documentary Help Is on the Way screened
on Prime nine years after the Christchurch earth-
quakes. It’s a masterclass in not letting the medium
get in the way of the message; of storytelling that
allows you to begin to imagine an experience
you hope never to have. Archival footage from
Christchurch on February 22, 2011, still shocks.
But most of the story is vividly told by some ofthe 36 people who were trapped in the 26-storey
Hotel Grand Chancellor. Barrie, a builder: “I was
just being tossed around like a doll and watching
the scaffold jump a foot off the ground.” Andy, a
guest: “I was bouncing and slamming, like, actually
getting air.” Graham, concierge: “I knew I’d never
go back in that building again, because you
could see the tilt on it.”
Those trapped on upper floors in
a building that could collapse at any
moment found the stairs – “I was telling
my legs go, go, go,” says American hotel
guest Jeremy – only to find the stairs
destroyed between levels 22 and 14.Trapped. People began to knot
sheets. In a story of No 8 wire hero-
ism, Barrie and his laconic workmate
Leigham figure out an ingenious, if
dangerous, way down. There’s a raid
on the mini-bars. Two German tour-
ists hiding under a table with a Bible
join the group. When they get within
reach of rescue, Barrie realises a few
people are still trapped on the higher
levels. “For f---’s sake! I went back up.”
Andy’s partner, Amber, breaks
down recalling when then Senior Ser-
geant Dave Harvey gets a can of paint- he’d noticed with alarm the knotted
sheets – and writes a message: help is
on the way.
This is also about
afterwards. Several
interviewees don’t
just talk about
trauma; they show
how trauma works.
Their experiences are
recounted as if in a
still-unreeling present,
as if still process-
ing experiences too
unruly to be fully
consigned to memory.
Amber, weeping: “I
remember thinking
with eyes closed,
‘What will I hear? ... What will it be
like at the end of my life?’” There’s
the arrival of a crane, like a tank
through a war zone.
This documentary of people in a
tight corner pulling together shows
that, nine years after the earthquakes,
there’s no end to the compelling
stories to be told. And that one way
to begin to imagine another’s experi-
ence is to shut up and listen to what
they have to say. l
HELP IS ON THE WAY, Prime, primetv.
co.nz/help-is-on-the-way-catchup
DIANA
WICHTEL
Amber and Andy.
Left, the Hotel Grand
Chancellor. Below,
Mark Richardson.GE
TTY (^) I
M
AG
ES