64 LISTENER OCTOBER 13 2018
That’sEntertainm
I
t’s taken a while and it’s
not actually the country’s
first competitive baking
show (we don’t talk about
the other one), but New
Zealand joins the Bake Off club
of nations this week with the
premiere of The Great Kiwi Bake
Of (TVNZ 2, Tuesday, 7.30pm).
If you’re not familiar
with the British-born TV
juggernaut, it’s an elimination
cooking show that, in a
reality-television landscape
riven with cruelty, is actually
nice to people. And it works.Over nine seasons, The Great
British Bake Off has won
the kind of mass audiences
usually the preserve of football
internationals and become
part of British culture. There
have been sewing and pottery
versions and the original
show has been screened in
200 countries. This week, New
Zealand becomes the 28th
territory to license the format
and make its own Bake Off.
Madeleine Sami takes
on a key unwritten part of
the format: the funny andrelatable lesbian, as played
by Sue Perkins and Sandi
Toksvig in The Great British
Bake Off and Mel Buttle in the
Australian version. We trust
she’ll approach this important
role with the lack of gravity
it deserves – and that she and
her co-cost Hayley Sproull
will represent New Zealand
well in delivering another key
element of the format: the
gently smutty innuendo.
The pair didn’t know each
other well before the show, but
have now become, accordingto Sproull, “inseparable sisters
who hate it when the other
person goes to the toilet
because it means we can’t
hang out”. So, that’s going
well.
They’re joined by the judges,
global baking impresario Dean
Brettschneider and catering
queen Sue Fleischl, who,
according to Sami, offer “a
perfect mix of professionalism
and naughtiness”.
The 12 bakers who line up
in the first show hail from
Invercargill to Auckland.Rising to the challenge
New Zealand finally gets its own version of the popular
and big-hearted British baking competition. by RUSSELL BROWN
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