A sign the world is about to end
Martin Doyle
I couldn’t stop laughing on Sunday night.
With a similarly convulsed crowd of others, I was watching a group of actors doing theatresports at Circa. One of them, Tim Gordon, did a priceless running gag of being a zombie rising from the dead and advancing on the others with his arms out. Every time, they were able to restrain him and shove him back to where he came from. Then, sure enough, almost robotically, he would get out again. You got the idea that despite all their screaming and leaping around, the other actors were never going to beat this one. It was funny and scary at the same time.
It was probably a good thing for us to watch because all of last week my gentle mind had been overly preoccupied with three big things: the rape of a woman in New York, the Budget, and the end of the world on Saturday night. You’d think that’d be enough to keep us all occupied for one week, but there was more... Steve Fitzgerald, as if rising from a crypt at Wellington Airport, announced the WELLYWOOD sign was going to go ahead. My flesh crept.
But on another level, it’s almost funny, too. A bit like the zombie at theatresports. Despite the fact Wellingtonians don’t want it, the Mayor doesn’t want it, marketing experts think it stinks, and most people in cyberspace mock the hell out of it, Steve Fitzgerald keeps springing up with the sign. All I can say is, if there’s a winning argument for having this sign, then we haven’t heard it yet. No one has been able to articulate why it’s beautiful or desirable.
My own theory is that Fitzgerald knows something we don’t know. From his control tower, he probably watches the 76,000 Kiwis who permanently leave New Zealand every year. Think about it – 76,000. That’s equivalent to half of Wellington. That’s serious. I reckon Steve decided that the only way to keep people in New Zealand is to either drug the whole population, or else replace the emigrants with older, blander, more docile immigrants with lots of money who like to queue for movies. Such people will never leave once they’ve bought their armchairs. There’s a lot of people like this round the world. But how do you get them to come here? Certainly NOT with an aggressive, hot-arse tag like “Absolutely, Positively Wellington”. You need something... bloodless... to hook these people in...
I believe his original idea was “Wellywood Rest Home”, but shortened it to make it more like a catatonic state than just a building. After all, the term ‘Wellywood’ breathes institutional safety, mogadons, shuffling slippers, Noddy, toddy, and zombies. Anyone living in a place called Wellywood is never going to go overseas. [They’re never going to go anywhere.]
So, let’s salute Fitzgerald for unearthing the nine comatosing, bone-like letters of WELLYWOOD. This name is the true sign of the times.
With a similarly convulsed crowd of others, I was watching a group of actors doing theatresports at Circa. One of them, Tim Gordon, did a priceless running gag of being a zombie rising from the dead and advancing on the others with his arms out. Every time, they were able to restrain him and shove him back to where he came from. Then, sure enough, almost robotically, he would get out again. You got the idea that despite all their screaming and leaping around, the other actors were never going to beat this one. It was funny and scary at the same time.
It was probably a good thing for us to watch because all of last week my gentle mind had been overly preoccupied with three big things: the rape of a woman in New York, the Budget, and the end of the world on Saturday night. You’d think that’d be enough to keep us all occupied for one week, but there was more... Steve Fitzgerald, as if rising from a crypt at Wellington Airport, announced the WELLYWOOD sign was going to go ahead. My flesh crept.
But on another level, it’s almost funny, too. A bit like the zombie at theatresports. Despite the fact Wellingtonians don’t want it, the Mayor doesn’t want it, marketing experts think it stinks, and most people in cyberspace mock the hell out of it, Steve Fitzgerald keeps springing up with the sign. All I can say is, if there’s a winning argument for having this sign, then we haven’t heard it yet. No one has been able to articulate why it’s beautiful or desirable.
My own theory is that Fitzgerald knows something we don’t know. From his control tower, he probably watches the 76,000 Kiwis who permanently leave New Zealand every year. Think about it – 76,000. That’s equivalent to half of Wellington. That’s serious. I reckon Steve decided that the only way to keep people in New Zealand is to either drug the whole population, or else replace the emigrants with older, blander, more docile immigrants with lots of money who like to queue for movies. Such people will never leave once they’ve bought their armchairs. There’s a lot of people like this round the world. But how do you get them to come here? Certainly NOT with an aggressive, hot-arse tag like “Absolutely, Positively Wellington”. You need something... bloodless... to hook these people in...
I believe his original idea was “Wellywood Rest Home”, but shortened it to make it more like a catatonic state than just a building. After all, the term ‘Wellywood’ breathes institutional safety, mogadons, shuffling slippers, Noddy, toddy, and zombies. Anyone living in a place called Wellywood is never going to go overseas. [They’re never going to go anywhere.]
So, let’s salute Fitzgerald for unearthing the nine comatosing, bone-like letters of WELLYWOOD. This name is the true sign of the times.
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