N.Z. Scenes Compressed

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 32018, 19 June 1969, Page 28

N.Z. Scenes Compressed

(N.Z.P:A.' Staff Correspondent) LONDON, June 17. An estimated 16 mil- ; lion viewers last night watched the 8.8. C. prot gramme, “The Trouble- ' shooters,” set on a fic- ■ titious oil rig off the ■ Taranaki coast. . Entitled “She’ll Be Right,” ; it starred the Maori open I singer, Inia Te Wiata, as the . foreman of a team of “roughi neck” New Zealand oil drilI lers. i It was the one hundredth: episode of the series, and i will be seen in New Zealand i in 1971. , Last night’s story told of

the fight the drillers put up against their employer, the Mogul Oil Company, - which wanted to shift the. oil rig to Indonesia before ,its , prospecting rights there expired. Industrial espionage had told the company that the Japanese were waiting to move in. The production employed artistic licence to bring home the fact that the story was set in New Zealand. The trouble shooter, Peter Thornton (played by an Australian, Ray Barrett), was shown arriving at Auckland Airport, then driving off through the: Lyttelton Road Tunnel and past a background of the Southern Alps before reach-: ing his Auckland hotel. Another sequence showed

a road sign pointing one way to “Auckland, 10 Miles” and the other way to “Waiuku, 7 Miles.” The script also included some New Zealand propaganda, with references'to the lack of British support for New Zealand’s participation in the Vietnam war, and th'e prospects for trade'if Britain joins the Common Market - The producer of the programme amended one part of the script before final shooting. This was a reference to “the Poms.” According to Mr J. Lorrigan, press officer at New Zealand House, who acted as an adviser, the producer thought the term, was too insulting, and altered it to “the Brits.”