King Kong Premiere in Wellington, New Zealand—Twenty Years On
Jamie Bell, Colin Hanks, Andy Serkis, Thomas Kretschmann, Adrian Brody and Naomi Watts on stage at the King Kong premiere in Wellington, NZ.
Just a quick note to say I can’t believe it’s been twenty years today since the premiere of Peter Jackson’s King Kong, at the Embassy Theatre in Wellington!
I was an accredited photographer in the media pen that day (as I had been for several previous premieres of Peter Jackson films by then), and knew by this time to get there early to have the view towards the cinema along the red carpet; and, as ever the sun came out and gave us all incredible lens flare when looking back towards the stage—but, eventually, it set.
Once the stars had arrived and the screening was underway, it was a little more peaceful out on the street, so I took the chance to grab a photo of Weta Workshop’s Tripod sculpture that had recently arrived on the corner of Courtenay Place—I was standing on the street when I took it, which would normally be a bad place to wait for someone to walk through the shot, but this was the one day I could stay for a few minutes and wait!
Weta Workshop’s Tripod sculpture in Wellington, a tribute to the home grown film & screen industry of New Zealand.
Of course, one thing not many people knew about (or stuck around for) was that during the film screening, Weta Workshop and the event organisers had arranged for vehicles from the film to be changed while everyone was watching Kong, so the street outside when they emerged would look like a rampaging ape had been through…there was smoke everywhere, vintage planes, lights searching the skies, trucks with guns on the back, and a few damaged automobiles quietly arrived at the venue.
The Embassy Theatre in Wellington, dressed for guests at the film screening to emerge to a scene of destruction.
Hard to believe it’s been so long since that night—and that the film is now twenty years old, too!
But, I was a fair bit younger when the casting department asked if I’d be available to play a photographer in the film—sadly, they initially wanted me to be one of the photographers whose flashes set Kong off on his rampage in the theatre, which I would have been totally happy to do, but in the end they filmed that scene in Auckland so I didn’t get a chance to provoke him.
Ultimately my biggest moment was as one of the press photographers after he falls from the building, I’m down near his toes when the big crane shot pulls back and Jack Black gets to say the final line—"Oh no, it wasn't the airplanes. It was beauty killed the beast…"
If you see a photographer at the very corner who’s studiously changing the film in his Speed Graphic and swapping the bulb in his flash, that’ll be me…! (I’m the one in the hat. No, the other one.)
Final scene of Peter Jackson’s King Kong (2005), featuring me in a hat.
(And as an extra bonus, here’s me in a different hat, in a tiny screenshot of the media pen at the premiere…)
