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AUSTRALIA DAY BALL HONORING SAM NEILL
ARTICLES ON THIS PAGE: Sam Neill is Globally Positioned Sam Neill laments Umaga's retirement The Triangle shatters rating records Neill compares co-star's kiss to the back end of an alsatian I Am Sam Smooth Operator Post Little Fish Interview Silver Logie For Sam Neill (Thanks, Therese, for this one!) My Passion For Wine - Sam Neill Sam Neill Awarded Honorary LittD The Party Was Worth It - Neill Aussies list Sam Neill in Who's Who Sam Neill is an enigma Les vins de Sam Articles/Information Page 1 Sam In Politics | 
The Chief, in full farmer accoutrement, walks his fields in |
Sam Neill is Globallly Positioned Published by Eric Williams February 13, 2006 www.associatedcontent.com Unlike most American born actors, who only go on to achieve success here in the U.S., veteran actor Sam Neill, has put a new meaning to the new millennium terminology, “Global Positioning.” Neill, a native of beautiful New Zealand, has starred in 78 films and produced or directed nearly two dozen more in a theatrical career that began in 1974 and has spanned nearly 30 countries. In an exclusive interview, Neill, who may be known to most Americans for his many roles in films like Jurassic Park I and III and the recently released television mini-series, Triangle, shared a multitude of his thoughts on his career, his homeland and the acting business in general. EW: You’ve had a very long and distinguished career. Looking over your history, it looks like you career isn’t the typical “acting career.” You have been all over the place. (Laughing). SN: I guess I’ve always thought of it as kind of a fluke. You often end up doing the job that you do by process of elimination. It was clear I was never going to be a brain surgeon or a mechanic, so what I was left with was acting. I was a documentary film director for a while with no particular distinction and I ended up acting. EW: Well, I must say that you are a phenomenal actor. SN: It’s nice of you to Say so, but I’ve never thought of myself that way. EW: You’ve been in the business about 31 years. You started off with the directing and then you went into acting. How did that come about? SN: I was acting before, when I left the University, after a year or two of taking Shakespeare around school and that kind of stuff, but I was really more interested in film and I had a couple of fiends that were working in documentary and I felt that was something I should probably do because I didn’t have much aptitude for anything else. When I got the opportunity to get back to acting, I pretty much seized that. EW: Tell me a little bit about your personal life Sam. Are you married and do you have children? SN: I guess my background would be middle-class. My father was in the military and I grew up in a small town in New Zealand. I’m married and I have four children. EW: From looking at some of the films you’ve done in your career, you’ve worked in many countries. SN: I’ve worked in 20 or 30 different countries now but I base myself in New Zealand. If you want to be really serious about a film career, you should probably live in Los Angeles, but I prefer to live here and probably have a slightly less high-octane career because of that. I’m leaving for South Africa at the end of this week and then I’m going to Belgium and France to do a film, so I kind of like the commuting. I love traveling but at the same time, I love to come home and I don’t really feel much at home anywhere else other than New Zealand. EW: Obviously, it’s worked out well for you regardless. SN: I’m pretty happy with it. EW: Do you think you would be in more American films if you lived exclusively in Los Angeles. SN: Without a doubt, but I still work some over there and I love America and I love being with Americans. EW: How has doing work in different countries benefited your career? SN: I don’t know if it has benefited me in terms of my acting and my career but it has certainly broadened my horizons and I tend to see things from an international perspective now. I do regret when I see the world polarizing one way or another politically because I think the more I travel, the more I realize we have in common as members of the same species. EW: What are you currently working on? SN: I’m about to do a film with a young, very highly regarded French director. It’s a film in English called Angel. There’s a new English girl that has the lead and Charlotte Ramsey will be playing my wife, so that’s going to be pretty cool. I did about three or four films for television last year and I expect that it will be something similar this year. EW: It seems to me that you’ve done a wonderful job of blending in films and television roles where a lot of actors are either one or the other. SN: I think there’s always been a kind of apartheid between film and television in America. It’s not something that you’ll find in England for instance where actors move very happily from stage to television to theater and they don’t think twice of it – and I did live in England for a while before I did anything in America. It struck me as very puzzling. It was apparent that if you did television, it was like catching a disease (laughing). I think that’s changed now. For instance, if you look at the Golden Globes today, I think you’ll find a number of actors there who have been doing both. I think those perceptions have changed a lot and it has a lot to do with HBO and some of the smarter channels. EW: Tell me the feeling of landing your first acting role. SN: My first feature film was Sleeping Dogs. When I landed that role, I was excited for about five minutes and then I went into a tailspin of abject terror. After that, I was cast in another film a year or two later called My Brilliant Career in Australia and I knew from reading the script it would be kind of a breakthrough thing for me and it was. EW: Tell me about your love for New Zealand and was the filming of The Lord of the Rings a huge source of pride for New Zealanders? SN: Absolutely. It’s been a huge thing here. We’re a country of only 4 million people and to have something of that colossal scale and ambition and achievement to come out of New Zealand was something that we couldn’t have been more surprised or excited about. Of course now, Peter has produced King Kong and we have Narnia as well, so we’re flying high here. EW: Did you ever get a chance to stop by the sets of any of those films. SN: The first thing was, they wanted me to do a part in the Lord of the Rings but I wasn’t available because I had a previous commitment. I live near a place called Queens Town and it’s a very beautiful part of New Zealand and they shot quite a bit of the Lord of the Rings just down the road from my house. However, I never got to visit the set, which I regret. EW: Once again Sam, from looking at your biography, it looks like you’ve done two or three productions every year whether it’s film, theater or television. SN: I enjoy working a lot. I get fairly antsy when I’m not. Having said that, when I’m not working, I am now the proprietor of three little vineyards which I’m very proud of. I don’t like my hand to be idle. I think it’s some sort of sad Protestant work ethic that I never knew I had. I’ve always thought of myself as lazy, but you’re right. When you look at it, I’m actually fairly busy. EW: You didn’t have a lot of formal acting training. SN: No I didn’t. I’m like Grandma Moses where I’m self-taught. EW: What advice do you have for young aspiring actors? SN: My advice is … first of all, don’t do it. It is an unusually cruel profession and very few people manage to sustain a career let alone support themselves. If you must do it and some of us must, then enjoy it. EW: Would you suggest that people take formal training classes? SN: Oh, yes. There is a sort of school of thought that acting should be some sort of therapy. I’ve never thought it had any therapeutic value at all. It’s just about showing off and trying to get away with it. EW: Thank you Sam for your time and I wish you and your family the very best. SN: Thank you very much and I wish you and yours the very best as well. Take care, Eric.
Sam Neill laments Umaga's retirement January 20, 2006 - 12:14PM A "heartbroken" Sam Neill is sending retiring All Blacks captain Tana Umaga a case of wine from his Central Otago vineyard. The actor annually sends samples of his Two Paddocks product to people who have given him pleasure in the preceding year. Past recipients include musician Tim Finn, painter Ralph Hotere, cartoonist Garrick Tremain, poet Hone Tuwhare and rugby player Anton Oliver. Neill told National Radio he had also sent Prime Minister Helen Clark a case of his wine after her "victory of sorts" in the general election last year, during which he publicly supported her Labour Party. "Tana will be first up for a case of Two Paddocks this year," Neill said, adding that he was "heartbroken" at Umaga's announcement a fortnight ago that he was retiring from international rugby. "He was a wonderful captain, Tana, and a great New Zealander," Neill said. "I think he was really good for this country, marvellous to have a Pacific Island New Zealander in the top job in the country. "That's good for all of us."
The Triangle shatters rating records www.filmmaker.co.za January 14, 2006 The premiere of Night One of SCI FI Channel's Original Miniseries The Triangle is the highest-rated program to air on SCI FI since 2003 and is the Channel’s highest-rated and most watched miniseries premiere night since the Emmy Award-winning Steven Spielberg Presents TAKEN). The Triangle was serviced by Cape Town based film producers, Kalahari Pictures, and was shot entirely in Cape Town except for 2 days of 2nd Unit in Miami. In the tradition of SCI FI's blockbuster December miniseries events Legend of Earthsea, Battlestar Galactica, Steven Spielberg Presents TAKEN and Frank Herbert’s Dune, The Triangle has wowed audiences and brought in record ratings for the Channel. The Triangle marks the first collaboration between Hollywood filmmaking talents Bryan Singer (X-Men, Superman Returns) and Dean Devlin (Independence Day), with a teleplay by Rockne S. O’Bannon from a story by O’Bannon and Singer & Devlin. In the SCI FI Channel miniseries, billionaire Eric Benirall (Sam Neill) is losing his cargo ships and their crews at a frightening pace—and now, he wants answers. Looking to put an end to these disappearances once and for all, Benirall commissions a diverse team of discipline-specific experts, to get to the bottom of this legendary anomaly.
Neill compares co-star's kiss to the back end of an alsatian 15 September 2005 New Zealand actor Sam Neill says kissing fellow heart-throb Hugo Weaving in his latest film was not all that might have been expected from Weaving's female fans. "I dreaded it and it opened my eyes once again to the kindness of women: that they actually put up with that disgusting bristly presence," he told the Sydney Morning Herald. "Hugo had a beard and in an unkind moment, I said it was like kissing the rear end of an alsatian," he said. "My heart went out to Hugo's wife. "I told her that she has sacrificed beyond the normal demands of connubial obligations," said Neill, who shaves every day. His father, an army officer, made his soldiers shave even if there was no water, he said. "They dry-shaved because it was good for morale and I agree with him". The two actors feature in a new Australian movie, Little Fish, starring Cate Blanchett. Neill plays a seedy, conniving criminal and Weaving, plays a gay, drug-addled ex-football champion, who twice kisses Neill's character.
I am Sam Sunday Life/Fairfax Media By Daphne Guinness September 14, 2005  Sam Neill: laid-back and loud. Photo: Peter Brew-Bevan Sam Neill is not ashamed to admit that he smokes three cigarettes a day and does not intend to give them up. "I have a glass of wine before dinner, I light up a fag and enjoy it immensely." And the other two? "After dinner but not always. To be honest, I have one after breakfast because a man needs to be regular at my age. It's better than bran - am I making myself clear?" Absolutely. To me and everyone else in the bar at the swanky W Hotel in Sydney. He is positively shouting - something he says he never does. "But there are times with one's children you want to shout, though of course it's counterproductive, so you may as well forget it. Anyway, they don't take any notice. So why bother?" It's 10am. Neill tosses his Hermes coat onto a chair and, in shirt sleeves and cords, tells the hovering PR, "I'll have a latte, toast and jam. Haven't had breakfast, I'm hungry." Then he throws himself on the sofa and examines the glass-top coffee table. "We could play chess or backgammon." (I've been warned that he's slow to start but once warmed up, lets rip.) We're here to discuss not only his role in Little Fish - the new Australian flick also starring Cate Blanchett in which he plays a seedy, conniving criminal - but also Sam Neill the average bloke, Sam Neill the husband, Sam Neill the father and Sam Neill the winemaker. So why no breakfast? "I've been terribly busy." But what does he do in the morning? "Well, I go for my walk. A walk three or four times a week keeps me OK." This contradicts an interview in 2000 where he says he goes to the gym every day: "I do 35 to 40 minutes on the runner, some weights, lots of stretching. I feel like a slug if I don't." Something doesn't add up. Oh that, he says, caught out but not caring, "I used to go to the gym as a fanciful anthropological exercise. It was very intriguing from an actor's point of view but I'm not big on pumping iron." Actors. How do you know if they're telling the truth? "Don't believe everything you read in the papers," he warns (implying, take care). "He's an in-the-zone actor," says Fish's director Rowan Woods. "He becomes the character yet still keeps his radar going elsewhere. Nobody I have worked with has this ability." Another warning. Anyway, what's this about Hugo Weaving, who plays a gay, drug-addled ex-football champion, kissing him in Little Fish? In fact, there are two kisses. Weaving giving. Neill receiving. "I dreaded it and it opened my eyes once again to the kindness of women, that they actually put up with that disgusting bristly presence. How do you do it? Hugo had a beard and in an unkind moment, I said it was like kissing the rear end of an alsatian. My heart went out to Hugo's wife. I told her that she has sacrificed beyond the normal demands of connubial obligations." At which point I say (and I wish I hadn't), "Why not kiss me, then I'd know how it felt?" "Well, I am shaven, civilised and a totally different prospect from Hugo." So he's declining my offer? "Yes, I've been turned by Hugo," he says, cackling at his joke. I plough on. How does he get on with his children? He has Tim, 22, with Lisa Harrow the actress whom I am not allowed to discuss, Elena, 15, with his wife, Noriko Watanabe, and Maiko, her 23-year-old daughter. "You'll have to ask them," he says defensively. "I think of myself as a reasonably good dad. Oh good... " In a classic awkward-moment breaker, breakfast arrives. "They've given me sourdough. I'd hate to be allergic to wheat because bread is one of the great pleasures of life and it's a great vehicle for jam," delivering the word theatrically. So he is a jam man. "Mmmmmm, yes, I love it. My favourite is dark bitter marmalade." His monologue usage is well-honed to deflect tricky topics. It simply won't do. I return to his children. For instance, Jeremy Irons did a film with his son - would Neill? He goes into a long Pinteresque silence, then, "I'd never encourage or discourage. It's a cruel profession. However successful, your life is littered with bad reviews and rejections by producers." That's awfully bleak for a man who starred in the aptly titled My Brilliant Career as well as Jurassic Park and The Piano. "No, that's a fact. You need a thick skin to get through. I rather like tenderness and vulnerability in people." So he has lost that? "I hope not entirely." He still has it, then? "Who knows? That's not for me to say." (I could kill him. Everyone raves about his charm but no one mentions his irritating modesty.) His own childhood is an open book. His parents, Dermot and Priscilla, were British ("My DNA is Irish but I am a fourth-generation New Zealander") and they weren't a demonstrably affectionate family. "But we loved each other in our own ways" - the stutter he had as a boy returns - "and there's a lot to be said for being the middle child. People don't notice you so much." Yet when I ask what kind of a husband he is, he responds with another infuriating, "Oh, that's not for me to say." But he must know whether he's good, bad or indifferent. He's been married for 16 years to Watanabe, a Japanese make-up artist whom he met on the film Dead Calm. He was so smitten, he told one magazine, "I followed her around like a pathetic dog for months, hoping she'd throw me a bone." Now he says feebly, "I'm probably all right," munching his toast. Does this conversation make him nervous? "Solicitous." To his eternal shame, he admits, he speaks no Japanese, not even "I love you." "You'd think a more conscientious man would be fluent by now," he concedes, "but nah!" Munch, munch. One of the odd things about him is when he's not acting, he doesn't miss it, not even the attention. "That's because I am busy with my organic farm in New Zealand. We have rare-breed chickens, South-Suffolk black-faced sheep, a goat, three vineyards." He rattles on about lavender honey, lavender oil, rosewater, thyme oil, saffron and "the nice people who work for me pick the crocuses and they-" Yes but physically, how much is he involved? "Sometimes I get to mow around the trees. That's my contribution." He talks to the grapes, too. Those vineyards, in Central Otago on the South Island, seem as important as any acting. To her astonishment, he orders the film PR to make a note of his wine tasting in Sydney next month. "You know, make sure the right people are there." He urges me to check his website, http://www.twopaddocks.com. "It's me taking the piss out of myself - something I do for fun." A July entry reads, "We hear the BBC's [miniseries starring Neill] To The Ends Of The Earth has been screened to some acclaim over the summer. We can only assume this is due to the distinguished work of Benedict Cumberbatch, Cheryl Campbell, Victoria Hamilton, Jared Harris, Charles Dance, et al, rather than that of the Proprietor. Who, it seems, is playing himself in the William Golding-written trilogy; that is, foul-tempered old curmudgeon with obnoxious politics, crap taste in hats, etc." There are even photos of the "Two Paddocks mobile" on the site. "I've just done up a new truck, a 1947 Chevrolet, the most beautiful thing in the world." His business radar is buzzing. But he seems incapable of accepting compliments gracefully. To those who describe him as intelligent, he retaliates, "Were they all on drugs when they said that? Oh God, the only time I ever think about myself is doing interviews. It's an uncomfortable process. I'm much more interested in other people. For instance, last night I had dinner with my friend George Gregan, the Wallabies captain. A couple of hours in his company is better than an hour in mine. Do you see what I am saying?" There it is again - that wretched modesty. Gregan, training at NSW's Coffs Harbour, laughs. They met in 1998 at the airport. Neill, on his way to watch the Wallabies play the All Blacks in New Zealand, bumped into Gregan at the luggage carousel. He had no ticket. Gregan organised it and they've been pals ever since. "He can strike up a conversation with anyone," says Gregan. "It's a special quality that Sam has. What's amusing is we'll have a good evening with the actor Bryan Brown, who's pretty vocal. It's boisterous to the last but Sam keeps that Mr Cool demeanour, while Bryan's the complete opposite. It's kind of quirky." Is Neill really 57? He looks 10 years younger. He's 58 next week, actually. "Am I that old? I'm shocked." Did he go through a midlife crisis? "I hope I'm not midlife yet." So no men's problems? "Touch wood, no. But my mother died a few years ago and had dementia towards the end. I wouldn't wish that on anyone. She was 84." So he's a candidate? "I suppose so." It's the only sombre moment in the interview but he rallies. No, he doesn't mind greying hair and, yes, he shaves every day. His father, an army officer, made his men shave even if there was no water. "They dry-shaved because it was good for morale and I agree with him." Neill is still good-looking. Naturally, he disagrees. Oddly, though, on the box getting his Silver Logie award in May for most outstanding actor in the TV drama Jessica, he didn't look too whoops. And presenting Rove McManus with his Gold Logie, he fluffed his words. Can he remember that? He thinks hard. "I fluffed my own Logie because I was astonished to get it but was the second just one incompetence after another?" Actually, he looked as though he'd had too much pinot noir (his favourite wine and the mainstay of his vineyard). This brings on loud guffaws. If there's one thing Neill doesn't worry about it's his image. "I'm always being told to shut up because I don't really care what people think. Actually, when I say that, it's more bravado, really. I'd much sooner be liked than loathed." He is backing Labour in the current New Zealand elections "and I know I'll get hell for that, too." Well, if anyone has the oomph to stir things, he does. Wealth, four homes worldwide, 50 films, umpteen television roles and success in Hollywood suggest an element of brute ambition. "Brute ambition! What an amazing phrase. For me it's que sera, sera, as Dean Martin would say." And what amazing shoes. I have just noticed them. Huge plonkers in suede with rubber wraparound soles. "Let me tell you about these shoes." He hitches a foot onto his knee and we both examine it closely. "They are American, about three feet wide and I can't imagine a more comfortable shoe. You can climb a mountain or go clubbing in them, not that these things I do. No, I won't take one off. Not in mixed company." As for security, does it come from his job or home? He is flummoxed. Well, is he fidgety when he's not working? "I am, actually, yes. That's pathetic insecurity. If I know what the next jobs are, that's security. I don't right now so I'm fidgety." The PR is back. "Ten-minute warning," she blasts. So it's quick-quick from now on. How often has he been in love? "Pass." Does he fall in love easily? "In the past, yeah." Is he self-righteous? "No. Tolerance is important." Is he impatient? "With fools and scoundrels." Would he watch someone load the dishwasher and then say they've done it badly? "No, I'd encourage someone to load the dishwasher." Obviously he thinks he is a pretty wonderful person, I say, and that sends him off again into paroxysms. "Ab-so-lute-ly, I am the bee's knees. Of course not. I'm as flawed and as fallible as anyone else." Well, he should know, he is blessed with this insight of himself. "Hahahahahahaha! You're very contentious. I'm terrified what the tenor of this interview will be when it's on the page. I'm going to look like some kind of puffed-up bloody guru!" Actually, he doesn't. Mid-photo shoot and performing a frenzied mime of being frozen naked in his 1981 horror movie Possession, he looks like a man who can act his way through anything. Even interviews.
Smooth Operator He's chased dinosaurs and was rumored to be the next James Bond. Now Sam Neill shows why he is one step ahead of the rest. BY MICHAEL FITZGERALD From the Sep. 05, 2005 issue of TIME Pacific Magazine  Photograph for TIME by Rob Young Sam Neill Monday, Aug. 29, 2005 At Sam Neill's boutique winery outside Queenstown, New Zealand, his beloved pinot noir grapes are handpicked, gently pressed and aged in barrels for 10 months. The resulting wine's flavor "is always just beyond your grasp," Neill once said. "If you do manage to get hold of it, it's only for a fleeting moment." What's true of the wine is true of the actor. In the 25 years since My Brilliant Career launched him and co-star Judy Davis onto the world stage, Neill has suggested many things to movie-goers: from smooth leading man (Reilly: Ace of Spies) to robust action hero (Jurassic Park) to bittersweet villain (The Piano). So how is his 2005 vintage looking? "We got frost in spring and in autumn," he reports, "so whether or not it'll be brilliant, we don't know. But it will certainly be scarce." He's compensating on screen with roles to tease the palate. To pick but three, he will reprise his wizardry in the just-wrapped sequel to the Merlin miniseries, be stalked as the husband of Susan Sarandon in the Melbourne-shot Irresistible, and speak in iambic pentameter (and play air guitar) as a disillusioned English politician in Yes. The piquant mix is typically Sam Neill. But as the closeted gay Sydney crime lord in the new Australian film Little Fish, his finish is almost unrecognizable. There's nothing remotely respectable about Bradley "The Jockey" Thompson, a character so crooked he seems straight. As the former lover of Hugo Weaving's ex-AFL footballer junky (in turn the confidant of a strung-out video-store proprietress played by Cate Blanchett) he's the toxic puppeteer of Rowan Woods' eye-opening Cabramatta-set crime thriller. Woods, the edgy social realist director of The Boys (1998), saw it as a challenge to reinvent the star. "He's nearly always the distinguished gent," says Woods, "as opposed to this, where he's - how can I describe it?" You can tell a lot about a man from his boots, so let's start there: the Jockey wears tan dress shoes. The shirt is open-necked, the hand bejeweled, and the hair styled perhaps by radio star John Laws' barber. But it is the soft voice, as if medicated, that insinuates most. Even the early-'90s Jaguar his nouveau-riche "businessman" drives was chosen by Neill, who used legal contacts to get in touch with underworld figures for research. But it is the character behind the façade that Neill articulates best. In one of the film's most poignant scenes, the Jockey, who is estranged from his wife and secretly gay, thanks his henchman for his "trust and discretion." Here it is as if Neill is conspiring directly with the audience. "Every sleaze is also a human being," says the actor. "I look for the humanity and maybe even a humorous dimension to the people I play." A dry wit accompanies Neill in a round of press interviews before Little Fish's Sept. 8 Australian release. Elegantly attired in tailored jacket, crisp shirt and jeans, the actor enters the hotel foyer wearing what look like two spare tires on his feet - "they're my clown shoes," he says. In fact, they're his farm boots, which bear the U.S. brand name of Providence. An apt choice, since Neill is the most accidental of actors. It was while directing documentaries for the New Zealand National Film Unit that he was asked by director Gillian Armstrong to audition for My Brilliant Career (perhaps she saw something of landed gent Harry Beecham in Neill, whose family founded one of the New Zealand's largest liquor importers). And it was while filming a TV costume drama in Melbourne a few years later that he was phoned by actor James Mason and flown to London to be groomed as a star. "I was never from an early age convinced that I had a destiny," says Neill, 57. "No, it was just a bunch of happy accidents." That sense of ease dignifies even his most forgettable roles. There's also something gracious in his reserve - and it's perhaps no accident that his best work has been with feminist directors like Jane Campion, where he has allowed the leading lady to shine. As Judy Davis told Time a few years back, "he's lovely to work with, very easy-tempered, rather an urbane chap." Blokes like him too. "He's a fantastic transformer," says director Woods. "But when he comes out of the moment and you talk to him, what's unusual is he has all of these other radars going. It's as if he's able to sit outside himself and look at what he does from a directing point of view." Last year Neill directed his first feature for Australian TV, but he's also skilled at directing public attention to causes he's passionate about. Since moving to Central Otago in 1987, he's successfully campaigned against rapid development around scenic Queenstown. Just the other week, he bobbed up at Helen Clark's election launch, introducing the Prime Minister with an attack on the war in Iraq. And don't get him started on GE foods. Otherwise, the accidental actor and activist is content to play vintner. "The best review I ever got for my pinot noir was when they called it sex in a glass," says Neill. "That'll do for me." Cinema-goers can expect a lively vintage.
Sam Neill  Acclaimed New Zealand actor and winemaker Sam Neill, 57, stars with Cate Blanchett and Hugo Weaving in the gritty new Australian movie Little Fish. Posted Thursday, Sep. 01, 2005 What a powerful movie. For a nice guy, you do an excellent spiv! (Laughs) I'm not sure if spiv's the word, but he's certainly low-life and low-life with a vivid comb-over. Is that your first gay kiss onscreen? You're a very busy boy. What's the longest break you've had between films? But you've got a vineyard in New Zealand. Doesn't that keep you occupied? Sounds idyllic. I've seen some glowing reviews of your Two Paddocks pinot. Is that up there with a good acting review? You were described in one article as a wine geek. How involved do you get in the process? I imagine you have to do a bit of quality control ... What is attracting celebrities to the wine biz? I'm thinking Sting, Gérard Depardieu, Bob Dylan ... And your family goes back generations in the liquor business ... I read you're a big fan of the Beach Boys ... "Kokomo" didn't force a rethink on that? Did you meet him? You've been getting involved in the New Zea-land election (for Labour) ... Could you be lured into a political career? In 1993, when you were Who's Sexiest Man Alive ... (More laughter) ... you modestly said you looked like a haggis. It's been 12 years - do you want to update the dish?
Sam Neill Awarded Honorary LittD by New Zealand's University of Canterbury Article from the University of Canterbury's Chronicle - 24/05/02 
Dr Sam Neill speaking at the graduation ceremony Dismantling stereotypes and trying new approaches Dr Sam Neill speaking at the graduation ceremony On the morning of Wednesday, April 17, Associate Professor Howard McNaughton (English) presented actor Sam Neill for his honorary LittD. His speech follows. "Chancellor, distinguished visitors, friends and colleagues of the University and graduands. "Today, Canterbury - like most major universities - offers courses in film and screen culture, not just in the department dedicated to that field but extensively throughout the Faculty of Arts. In this, the University is recognising the importance of film not just as an art form but perhaps more importantly as a major force which shapes our cultural identity. "Sam Neill and I entered this University within a year of each other, at a time when studying film was unthinkable, and the closest we got to studying drama was English I lectures in the Great Hall. Film was something only spoken of in the Students Association cafeteria - now known as the Dux de Lux - and virtually unrepresented in the University library, now recycled as Annie's Wine Bar. Going to a play meant a long journey into inland Canterbury to find that marvel of contemporary theatre architecture, the recently opened Ngaio Marsh Theatre. "As a student at Canterbury, Sam worked with two remarkable theatre directors, each distinguished in a very different way, and each, we may conjecture, sending him very different messages about what it meant to be an actor. In Dame Ngaio Marsh's A Midsummer Night's Dream, which I remember as the best of Ngaio's late productions, Sam encountered a director with a low tolerance of New Zealand English and an approach to performance arts that was strongly influenced by the Old Vic tradition, a style which she understood meticulously and applied astutely. In Mervyn Thompson's Marat/Sade, which was widely seen as the start of a new era for the University Drama Society, Sam found a director who could never be anything other than a wild man from Rununga and who fiercely promoted a regionalist voice in the theatre throughout his career, which also had a substantial impact on the future of New Zealand drama. "Sam's way of dealing with this conflict of direction was simply by escaping to Wellington, although a lasting influence of these directors may perhaps be traced in the extraordinary versatility which many commentators have noted in his work. The chair of communication studies at a leading university has recently written that 'Neill's inflection reveals the most obvious example of an accent that can travel between Australia and New Zealand without being recognised [anywhere] as 'foreign'. "Sam's later career is too well known to need detailing by me: The New Zealand Players, the National Film Unit and working with that remarkable director Paul Maunder, who was himself working at the interface between theatre and film. "From an artistic and professional point of view, Sam's career to date constitutes an outstanding achievement. He has been honoured many times within the world of the arts and it is important that the University should similarly recognise a record of excellence in cultural production and creativity which has the capacity to touch and influence the lives of whole populations. But I want to draw attention to four aspects of his work that make it particularly appropriate that he be recognised in this way today. "Although he has had a large number of high-profile commercial successes, Sam has also always shown a commitment to innovative, art-house, documentary and educational film. No-one would identify him with any one role, or even one type of role; his career has been a sustained exercise in dismantling stereotypes and constantly engaging with new approaches. "Although he is a major figure in the international film industry, Sam has never relaxed his commitment to New Zealand and Australian film. Even as I was writing this oration, The Press carried a front page story that Sam was about to start work on a new New Zealand film, to be shot on the Coast, very close to Mervyn Thompson's Rununga. "In the 1990s, Sam became known as the leading champion of the New Zealand environment on the screen, making the international film industry aware of the infinite photogenic potential of the South Island landscape. The commercial significance of this is obvious to us all, but we should also recognise that giving this kind of heightened visibility to the environment also brings a powerful force of conservation. "I wish finally to return to the point with which I started, that film is now a major force which shapes our cultural identity. We can go further than that and suggest that an actor's roles may have the same kind of effect, that cultural identity and national myths may be shaped by influential performers. Precisely that has been argued by Dr Tara Brabazon, a prominent academic, who wrote in a book recently published by the University of New South Wales that 'Sam Neill occupies a central role in Australian [and New Zealand] cinema, and in the history of Australasian masculinity. He has moved through the multiple modes and "revivals", from the early "literary" films to a multicultural and feminist-inflected masculinity. . . . His heroes teeter on the edge of the acceptable masculine. . . he challenges the limits of blokedom.' "Madam, I have the honour to present Nigel John Dermot Neill for the award of the degree of Doctor of Letters (honoris causa)." -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "Buggering about" and doing the crossword - Sam Neill Sam Neill, LittD (honoris causa), gave the graduation speech at the morning ceremony on Wednesday, April 17. "Well now, that's the thing, that's the catch with graduating . . . everybody gets to hear those other names of yours that no-one ever knew. Although I note that one person here's name was Aroha and of course that's something we could all do with a lot more of. I thought I was going to faint there, I had been sitting for so long, so if you want to get up and stretch you absolutely have my permission. C'mon, you know you want to. "Should I wear my hat now? I am very pleased with it. I'm not sure if it should be worn like a golfer or sort of Sam Jackson gangster style. Could be a useful thing. "Chancellor, Vice-Chancellor, members of the Council, distinguished guests and graduates. Kia ora. I want to first of all thank Professor McNaughton for those kind words. I was very interested in that quote from the Australian academic. I haven't the slightest idea what she was talking about. But I have a suspicion that it was something kind, which is good. Perhaps we could clear up that masculine business later on . . . I am entirely confused by that. "In fact, it is odd to hear yourself described in any terms at all. It is a peculiar sensation. I once, years after I left Canterbury, was curious as to why I could never get work on television. I thought it was something I would be all right at and I found myself in Auckland with the master file TV2 had in those days on every actor in New Zealand. I thought, well, I would look myself up, and I did. "I found my page and there was a photo of myself and underneath it my talents were pithily described. It said: 'Could be all right in homosexual roles.' So you see I realised right then that my future as a actor in New Zealand might be a little limited because there weren't many homosexual roles on television and/or in the theatre in those days. And oddly today, even now Shortland Street is curiously skewed in favour of heterosexual roles. So I had to take my career and talents, such as they are, elsewhere. "I want to acknowledge and congratulate all you graduates today, and goodness weren't there a lot of you? Yes indeed. I am very pleased to note it's all the arts graduates today. I want you to know that in my book there is no finer accomplishment than a degree in the arts. You know, engineering and science and medicine and all those things, of course they have their uses and we probably need them. But for sheer accomplishment and depth of education, all round usefulness and . . . just . . . panache, there is nothing that comes near a degree in the arts. Of course I include education, and these are all arts degrees. But there are one or two which suspiciously have become specialist, social work for instance. Because the great thing about an arts degree is its generality and I feel privileged to be given an honorary arts degree today in your presence on the same day as yourselves. "You might ask what is the difference between an honorary degree and your degree? Well, you worked very hard for yours and I did no work at all. At least it didn't feel like work - if what I have done with my life is why I am being honoured today. And if I could wish one thing for all of you, it's that you find that one thing in life that doesn't feel like a grind, it doesn't feel like work but it feels like living and being alive and even having fun, in spite of the sweat and tears and hurdles and so on that you will come across. "I carry a notebook wherever I go. And if I can give you a bit of advice, carry one of these. I carry it in my pocket. And whenever I have a new thought, an original idea, I just whip out the pocket book and I write it down. I don't have a palm pilot - I disdain the palm pilot because I predate computers - so I have this thing instead. If you were a person who had a lot of original ideas and a lot of new thoughts, it could be an expensive exercise. Imagine if you were Russell Crowe for example ñ our best loved poet ñ you know ñ imagine how many of these things old Russ would go through when he's on a poetry job. "But I am a bit more economical with these things and I have only got up to page 12 and I have had this book for 11 years. I was just looking in here to see if I had written anything profound which I could pass on to you today on your graduation, because that is traditional, that you talk to graduates and give them a bit of advice - but no, it looks like the page is absolutely blank. But I do have a quote about university. It is a half-remembered quote from the great Flan O'Brien who said something like this. The purpose of a university education is to teach a young man how to say hello in four languages and how to make a break of 45 in billiards even with a bad cue. "Those are very wise words and a great comfort to me and probably to some of you whose degrees are characterised with the letter C rather than A or A+. I got one B- and I thought I was trying a bit hard, so cut it back and it was all Cs and C- after that. 'Hello' in four languages - I can manage English and French - that's two - I must have missed those other two lectures. Look, I am the first to admit that I was far from conscientious when I was here and I would like to give thanks to all my kind friends who actually went to those lectures and lent me the notes afterwards. Some of you will know what I am talking about. "But I am profoundly grateful for the time I had here at the University because I actually think there is a lot of wisdom-getting. It was all the things I shouldn't have been doing that actually turned out to be the foundation of my career. It was all those things characterised as 'buggering about' that turned out to be really useful. Doing plays at the Ngaio Marsh Theatre, debating up in the common room, talking all that pretentious nonsense in the café, taking the afternoon off to watch movies down at the Square ñ these are the things that have turned out to be what my life has become. "Even learning to do The Press crossword. And that has turned out to be absolutely invaluable because what I do in my work is mostly sit around waiting for something to happen and if you can do the Christchurch crossword, there is no crossword in the world that would hold any fear for you at all. The New York Times, The Guardian, bring them on, there is no trouble at all. "Mind you, there is a lot more to a university. Passing things and doing your assignments and all those things are very important - I don't want to get myself in trouble with the people behind me but it was here, because of that, that I turned from rather a dull boy to a man who became interested in things. It is true to say that academia has appropriated some of those things thought of as 'buggering about' - now that there is a department of film and theatre studies. We took up drama really because we saw it as a very efficient way of meeting girls. And vice versa. Now, because of this department, you can actually do a course, in order to do drama, to meet girls. How brilliant is that?! "I am deeply gratified with this honour. I'm very happy with the hat. But at the end of the day this is your day and I want to congratulate you again and wish you all the brightest of futures."
MONDAY, 27 AUGUST 2001 N E W S S T O R Y The party was worth it - Neill 25 August 2001 By MARJORIE COOK Sam Neill was feeling a "little bit slow" yesterday but believed his Dunedin party on Thursday was worth it. "All my friends just had a great time. They all said it was the best premiere they had been to anywhere in the world," the Jurassic Park III star said when contacted at his Queenstown home yesterday. He expected it to raise a considerable amount of money for the Dunedin Hospital children's ward. "It was very moving for me to be home," Neill said. The actor was raised in Macandrew Bay. "Probably the best Dunedin moment for me was being on stage with Martin Phillipps and David Kilgour and The Chills. "They are genuine local heroes and to be on the Dunedin Town Hall stage at the same time as them was completely remarkable," Neill said. Neill said he would do it again despite hard work putting the party together. "You've got to do the work and you've got to love the place, like I do,"he said. He had spoken to the musicians yesterday. Midge Marsden loved the pipe band welcome at the airport, Bic Runga described it as one of the best days of her life, Tim Finn felt it was a particularly special night, and Annie Crummer had loved it, Neill said. The musicians were now looking forward to returning to Dunedin soon.Neill was moved people waited in the Octagon to see him and his friends walk to the Regent Theatre. "I've never seen that in New Zealand before," he said. He welcomed GE protesters, who were in a similar party mood, and accepted an organic apple although he did not get time to eat it. "We don't know enough about GE to let it loose. Keep it in the lab. We just don't know what the implications are," Neill, who is also a Central Otago winemaker, said. His wine, Two Paddocks, was aiming for organic accreditation within four years, he said. Neill is relaxing at his Queenstown home before returning to work in Australia for Dirty Deeds. He is also working on his first production, a South Island movie he hopes will be filmed later this year. The film is a joint project with Neill's production company Huntaway Films and Preston Laing Films of Wellington. A champion of Wakatipu Basin environmental issues, Neill said he would follow the Queenstown-Lakes District Council elections with great interest. Sam and friends party like it's 146 million BC
Aussies list Sam Neill in Who's Who 18.10.2001 7.08 am Actor Sam Neill is one of the new listings in the latest Australian version of Who's Who. But while the publication sees itself as "the authoritative reference to notable Australians", editor Margaret Herd says it's not a case of Australians claiming another New Zealander as one of their own. Herd said yesterday that Neill was added because of his contribution to Australian film history. "We've included Russell Crowe for a few years, but we're not claiming him as an Australian either. "Sir Ron Brierley is there again, as well as Jane Campion. They're not Australians, but they've worked in Australia and are prominent figures." The 2002 edition of Who's Who in Australia was released this week and contains 13,000 entries. Born in Northern Ireland, Neill grew up in New Zealand and travels on a New Zealand passport, but also spends much of his time between films in Australia.
EMPIRE MAGAZINE NOV. 2001 WORDS CHRIS MURRAY PORTRAIT BRADLEY PATRICK Sam Neill is an enigma. The first thing you noticewhen meeting this fit 54 year-old veteran of over 50 feature films and numerous mini-series and TV appearances is that he's much taller and imposing than you'd expect. He's been the silent enforcer from the Southern Hemisphere for over 20 years since breaking the international barrier with a stand-out performance in Gillian Armstrong's My Brilliant Career. So much so that James Mason insisted the quiet-spoken thesp be cast as Damien Thorn in the third Omen chapter, The Final Conflict. Spending time in the UK thus introduced Neill into British homes with his regular spot on the small tube as Reilly: The Ace Of Spies. The Poms loved him so much, Neill was voted the best actor on British television. Today, proudly Kiwi and projecting the confident aura of a man who's just casually worked out the meaning of life rather than just appeared alongside CGI dinosaurs in Hollywood for Jurassic Park 111, Neill greets Empire warmly. Settling himself in the dinosaur room of the Australian Museum, and after the publicist is out of earshot, he grins. "Jurassic Ill's gonna be a little too late for your next issue, isn't it?" Taking this as a green light to probe the mind of this accomplished actor, rather than merely play the publicity machine, it's obvious this rather mysterious elder- statesman of international repute (who normally dislikes the interviewing process) is ready for a candid chat. Why accept the role in the third instalment of the Jurassic series, and not the second? To be perfectly frank, I never rated myself in the first film. I kind of thought, Steven [Spielberg] does these films all the time, he'll show me the way on how to play this sort of character in this type of film, cos it's a real departure for me. But of course, inevitably, Steven had a lot of things to think about and nothing escapes him. I really felt I hadn't looked after the character enough. So when I was asked to do the third one, I >thought, this is my chance to get it right and think about what is required to be an action hero. I did a bit of research and thought a bit about people like Lee Marvin and Clint Eastwood and those sort of action actors that I like. It is a genre of acting that's not to be underestimated - how difficult it is, and how much effort is required. You've done such diverse roles as a voice for The Simpsons to playing the Antichrist. What are your criteria for choosing roles? Yeah, it is pretty diverse. There's a lot to be said for diversity. It would be a mistake to find yourself channelled into one kind of role, plus people would get sick of watching you do the same bloody thing all the time. The other thing is, it simply makes it more interesting for me to go to work. Just to think about a different way of going about things. So you choose things simply for the reason of never having done it before? Yeah, I think that's absolutely right. That's the actor's job, really. It's too easy to get lazy on film. There were huge films that rocketed your career, yet there's one performance that really stood against the grain and that was in The Umbrella Woman with Rachel Ward. Yeah, [laughing] that was Neville! Ooh that's a while ago, isn't it? What was I doing in that again? Oh yeah, he was ultimately a sad character. One of those big shaggers... who was desperately lonely - cos screwing is not the same thing as actually being intimate. That's all Neville knew, was screwing. Ultimately he was a sort of misogynist. I've known people like that who were great so-called "ladies' men" but actually there's something about them, that you know innately, in fact, they hate women. If I was to meet him, I know I'd despise him. But he was fun to play. You've been lucky enough to work with actors ranging from Max von Sydow to Peter OToole, Robert Redford and James Mason. How do you handle the pressure of performing alongside such people? There's part of me that was, is and will continue to be a fan. It's one of the hidden bonuses in what I do that not only do I get to meet and hang out with these people, but I actually play with them too - cos that's what you're really doing. Actors aren't called players for nothing. Ever met any idols who have shattered yourperceptions? I've worked with hundreds, if not thousands of actors over the years. In all that time I've only worked with two people I have honestly grown to dislike, to my surprise with both of them. I think, by and large, actors are over-celebrated and underrated... both at the same time. We make too much fuss about actors and it's absurd this cult of celebrity that goes with acting. At the same time, actors aren't really supposed to have brains or opinion or personalities even. I've met and worked with so many actors who I've not only found very entertaining and likable, but are fully fledged human beings. Believe me, I do know how that sounds, but I genuinely like actors. Can we ask who those two undesirables are? No, no, I couldn't possibly tell you that [laughs], yet I will certainly never work with them again. But telling would be...ungentlemanly. Was there ever a moment when you were in a film and the heavens parted, revealing this was your chosen field? I don't think I've had a "road to Damascus" moment on film, I think, but probably the films I've done that give me the most pleasure are the odd little things you have to be a buff to have seen, I'd say. Death In Brunswick I'm very fond of. The Dish I like immensely and In The Mouth Of Madness. What keeps your motor running when it's obvious you're the most unlikely person to be involved in this movie business "circus"? I'm not terribly "circus"-involved, really. I put my head above the trenches when we need to promote a film like this, and I'm happy to do so cos I like Jurassic Park. Plus you also should, as a matter of moral obligation, support your work. So I do get out and do interviews. I'm not very comfortable with it, but it's a part of the patch. I'm not really seen "out on the town", so the circus aspects of showbiz I'm not really part of, I don't think. Not to blow windup your arse, but it seems the real "actors" of this world all have a similar approach. The other reason is... some of them actually shouldn't. Robert De Niro, who I would say that most actors accept, is the best actor on celluloid today and has been pre-eminent for years. But he's hopeless in inter-views. I saw him on Letterman once, and you just hoped that the stage would open up and swallow him and that would be it. Sometimes it's better people just don't, you know. Keep the mystique, mate. Also, TV things are the toughest, cos you're obliged to entertain, and actors aren't trained to do that. They're supposed to remember lines and follow scripts, not be a stand-up comic. I've heard you're starting a production company? Yeah. It's early days, and we haven't produced anything yet [laughs], but we'd like to think we're developing things. It's such a trend now with actors at a younger age - it's surprising that it's taken you so long. It has come late. That's in part because I'm becoming increasingly New Zealand- orientated, I suppose, and I wanted to be able to generate more work there. Not just for myself but for others too. There's about three projects in the works. The first off the blocks is supposed to be a film by Gaylene Preston called Perfect Stranger. It's as New Zea-land films tend to be, a rather dark and twisted love story. What is it about New Zealand films and their illusion of "surprises behind the curtain"? [Laughing] They tend to have certain Gothic dimensions, ddn't they. It's curious, cos I don't think we're any darker in ourselves than anyone else particularly. It just seems to be the way they turn out. It may be one of those things that New Zealand cinema is going through, like Australian cinema goes through phases. Our next phase may be quirky comedies. The Dish is a great example of a film that couldn't be made anywhere else but here [Australia]. If these things are told truthfully, they can work on an international level. Although it disappointed me that The Dish didn't do well in the States. I think Warner Bros. threw it away, because every journalist I've spoken to in the States loved it. I hope it will have an afterlife on video and people will re-discover it. I really didn't need any persuasion to be on that project, and Rob [Sitch, director] was needlessly very persuasive. I'm very fond of what Working Dog produce. So what's this Two Paddocks winery gigyou're involved in all about? Well, it's Pinot Noir. It's very good Pinot Noir from one of the world's premier Pinot areas, Central Otago, New Zealand. We're on our fifth vintage, and I'm as surprised as anyone as to how good it is. What compelled you to do it in the first place? Oh, I just thought it would be fun. I have a couple of friends who were making and growing wine and I like doing things with the land, yet I'm not personally interested in sheep. But wine, that's different. It's been completely fascinating and I've learnt a lot about all sorts of things, not least myself.
www.southlandtimes.co.nz S O U T H L A N D T I M E S S T O R Y Les vins de Sam What is it with movie types and their wine? First Chateau Coppolla and now Sam Neill who, when not acting, can be found down on the farm in New Zealand quaffing bottles of his own Pinot Noir Patrick Barkham Sunday April 14, 2002 'Don't swallow. You'll get drunk,' says Sam Neill, pointing to the sink where I should discharge my mouthful of his Two Paddocks 1999 Pinot Noir. It seems rude to spit out such fine red wine in front of such a generous host, in his own home, but it is 11am, and we've got a winding car journey to Neill's winery and three tiny vineyards in southern New Zealand ahead of us. The actor (and now winemaker) gives his glass a swirl. 'One thing you can say about Two Paddocks is that it does get you pissed. I thought this could be our slogan at one time. "Two Paddocks - it gets you pissed." ' Wine is one of many things Neill is deadly serious about. 'I hate using that overworked word "passion" because it's a word that sucks to me,' he says. 'There is a lot of pseudery that goes with wine appreciation.' But he believes two things are often overlooked. One is the length of finish. 'My first wines didn't have this. A good wine should persist on the palette for a long time.' The other is the nose. He buries his nose in his glass and gives an appreciative sniff. 'If you ever see Gerard Depardieu putting his nose in wine - it is a thing of beauty.' Neill's eyes twinkle. 'I've only met him a couple of times but I saw that nose in a glass.' We burst out of Neill's workshop into the brilliant New Zealand light. He points out a blue heron that flaps up from his pond and pauses to remonstrate with his sun-loving Staffordshire bull terrier - with 'a face only a mother would love' - for not keeping the rabbits out of his garden. She's called Fire. 'We inherited the name. Calling "Fire" around the neighbourhood causes consternation.' The air is Alpine-crisp and smells of earth and meadows. The hilltop house where Neill lives with his wife, Noriko, a make-up artist, and their young daughter, Elena, has views to the mountainside where Neill skies in winter. In the other direction are the Remarkables, a spectacularly jagged range of peaks. Neill built his simple but luxurious 'Georgian Irish' home 15 years ago, nestled between the lakes and mountains surrounding the increasingly chic adventure holiday town of Queenstown. His English mother and New Zealand father moved from Omagh, Northern Ireland, to Dunedin, on New Zealand's South Island, when he was three. Now 54, Neill began his career in local theatre and TV, moved to Australia during its late Seventies film boom, and has now appeared in more than 70 film and TV productions. He has spent most of the last 25 years 'charging around' the world to star in films like Jurassic Park, The Piano, Dead Calm and Omen III but, unlike fellow Kiwi Russell Crowe, has never cut his New Zealand ties. Neill's engagement in his local community - particularly over environmental issues - makes him a national treasure. 'He's a legend,' one Kiwi tells me. After four back-to-back films, including Jurassic Park III, Neill has just spent a rare six months at home. He's not been idle. A highlighter pen and a script for a lavish Granada TV production of Dr Zhivago is slung on the coffee table in his barn-like living room. Neill will shortly be flying to Prague to play Komarovsky - 'the cad', he says. This will be a welcome break from recent boffin roles for the actor whose sharp looks and gentlemanly demeanour once had him tipped as the next James Bond. Neill can't sit still. A quiet day in Queenstown involves dashing around the countryside in the Landcruiser with Ian, his unflappable 'executive shitkicker', who is fielding calls and rearranging Neill's schedule on his Psion organiser. 'It's very bucolic today,' Neill sighs as we barrel past a bizarre field of llamas on our way to the winery. Nine years ago, a winemaker friend persuaded Neill to buy a small plot of land in the claustrophobic valley that winds its way between Cromwell and Queenstown in Central Otago. The region is a six-hour drive from Christchurch, the South Island's major city, past the spectacular snow-capped Mount Cook along the kind of twisting roads that make you feel trapped in one long car advert (manufacturers bring their latest models from all over the world to film ads here). European settlers only colonised here when gold was discovered in 1862. Fifteen years ago, a new gold rush began when people started planting vineyards and found that Central Otago's warm, dry summers and cool nights suited the notoriously fickle Pinot Noir grape. Land that would only support half a dozen rabbits has rocketed in value. Neill soon snapped up two more plots in an even more isolated valley, 40 miles from the bungee-jumping, heli-skiing buzz of Queenstown. He is fascinated by the Pinot Noir grape and the subtle wine it produces. 'It's the most elusive of grapes. It is the fastest growing and fastest ripening.' The most southerly wine-growing region in the world, Central Otago's brilliant sunlight is tempered by a dry climate and cool nights that prolong the grape's growing season. Neill harvests in May - the equivalent of November in the northern hemisphere. He says the region's fledgling Pinot industry is bound to expand. 'You can grow it anywhere, but there are only a few pockets in the world to date that grow it well - Burgundy, parts of Oregon, a couple of pockets in Victoria, Australia, Martinborough in New Zealand, and Central Otago.' His Two Paddocks label has produced four small vintages, which have gained better reviews each year. Neill enthuses over its 'voluptuous fruit characteristics'. Unlike bombastic Bordeaux, Pinot tends to be versatile and light, and is now the essential accompaniment to cheese at any party held by Queenstown's fashionable local set, who consume many of Neill's bottles. Those not drunk by Neill and his large circle of family and friends have found their way into cellars around the world, including that of the Ivy in London. I'm glad I spat as we lurch along the sickeningly winding road from Queenstown to Cromwell. We flash past Neill's first vineyard at Gibbston, a tiny plot on a steep north-facing slope (as it has to be Down Under), which has provided most of his Pinot Noir so far. At Cromwell, we turn into a small industrial estate housing the Central Otago Wine Company, a boutique winery co-owned by Neill that bottles wine for 10 small producers in the region. Before joining Neill, his young winemaker, Dean Shaw, followed the Pinot trail around the world, harvesting the grapes in France and South Africa. 'Because it's not so in your face you have to think about the textures and subtleties and nuances of flavour,' he says, a floppy hat wedged over his eyes. Shaw and Neill take a meticulous, enthusiast's approach to producing Two Paddocks Pinot. The grapes are thinned on the vines to improve their intensity of flavour. Handpicked, they are soaked for a week in vats where the natural yeasts start converting the sugar into alcohol. Shaw mixes in a few stems to add 'texture and tannins'. The grapes are then pressed as gently as possible with a canvas balloon and the wine poured into small, aged oak barrels. Neill insists on using French oak. US oak is fine for white wine, but 'there is too much vanilla in it' for Pinot Noir. The wine is then stored in a climate-controlled warehouse for 10 months. The wines in different corners of the vineyards are processed separately, before their flavours are tasted and carefully blended and bottled. 'Dean sometimes asks me do I want this or that, but he knows a million times more than I do,' says Neill. Last year's harvest will be bottled soon and the factory is at full tilt. Neill turns to Shaw. 'It's going to be good, isn't it?' he says, looking like an enthusiastic inventor amid all the metallic thuds and shouts of 'turn the agitator off' from the men working in the factory. 'The first [vintage] was good, the second was very good and the third I think is excellent. The 2000 is differently excellent. What surprised me is how quickly we got to excellent.' We drive past a vast hydro dam, before dropping down into Earnscleugh Valley. Neill is ruminative, easily fascinated, and quickly distracted. 'That, there, is a magpie,' he says, pointing. 'They were introduced from Australia. A lot of things were brought in by homesick Brits.' They also shipped in blackbirds - and trout and salmon. 'I couldn't be more delighted. Some of the best fishing in the world is in New Zealand. These things were sensible,' he nods. But the worst was the possum. 'We have 80 million of them and they're ruining our native forests. This is a national disaster. Many of the worst things in history were done with the best intentions. Back at their house, Neill and Noriko have a beautiful bed cover, made from 120 possum skins. 'I feel good every time I get under it,' he says. Before we get to Neill's other two vineyards, Alex Paddocks and Redbank, we stop at the Old Post Office, now a pub, in Clyde, a pretty village full of gold-miners' cottages and immaculately tended gardens. Inside, the barmaid knows Neill likes ice in his ginger beer and the local drinkers, as locals do, know we are heading out to his vineyards. A big man Neill doesn't know plonks himself down and strikes up a slow conversation. 'A lot of rocks out at Redbank. I moved a lot of rocks there,' he says. 'Yep,' says Neill. 'Built a wall up there with them.' 'That's a good wall,' says Neill, matter-of-factly. Not much escapes the shrewd gaze from what one US film critic once described as '.45 calibre eyes that will plug holes in your sitting room wall'. As we head on towards Alex Paddocks, he mentions he's been watching a lot of films because he is in the Academy and it is Oscar time. He loved Mulholland Drive. 'I thought it was the most amazing thing I'd seen for a long time. But the last 15 minutes completely perplexed me.' He went to a party held by the film's Australian star, Naomi Watts, in the States. Suddenly he turns to Ian. 'Can you get her phone number? I really want to call her and find out what the fuck was going on.' He collects paintings by local artists. 'This is what we do best. It may be because we're slightly inarticulate people.' The most fired-up he gets is in discussing New Zealand's lack of a national gallery. 'We are a country with a number of wonderful poets and short-story writers. We have some good sculptors and some very interesting Maori artists. We've got a few actors but we have a bounty of very brilliant painters and yet no national gallery. What kind of sense is that? It's a matter of national shame.' Then there is wine. 'It's all been a slow revelation to me,' he says. Wine was in his blood. 'It's about 75 per cent now,' he smiles. Around the time of Central Otago's goldrush, his great-grandfather set up a company importing wines and spirits into New Zealand. It remained a family business until 20 years ago. Neill grew up with wine on the table at dinner (beer was strictly for the holidays in his middle class world). He remembers the dumpy round bottle of Portuguese rose he first got drunk on 'at school, with terrible results'. But his interest in wine only really developed at the same time as everybody else in the country, he says. 'People started to make wines that were affordable and drinkable and they soaked through into your life. I spent a year driving through Europe in a VW Kombi, like a lot of people did in the 1970s, and got used to drinking wine every night. When I worked in the movies I started drinking better wine, then curiosity led to a bit more knowledge of what I was doing. 'When you drink a glass of your own wine, if you have any kind of palate at all you can judge it with some kind of objectivity. That sort of objectivity is not available to you as an actor watching yourself.' Food and wine are about conviviality,' he says. 'You wouldn't want to drink wine in isolation. I've got so many great friends in all different corners of the world. There is always some idiot who is up for a bottle of wine, wherever you are.' Neill admits that he could not live off his three little vineyards. There is a saying in New Zealand: 'How do you make a millionaire? Give someone two million and tell them to open a vineyard.' Pinot is a low-yielding vine, the grapes are handpicked, and Neill focuses on quality not quantity. 'One day it will look after itself,' he says, but right now he is not unduly bothered by his losses. He is more concerned when retailers sell it above the NZ £12 he suggests. 'I have seen it for sale at NZ, which enrages me. I've always admired Morgan, the English car company, because when Mr Morgan was asked why he didn't sell the car for a higher price, he said: "Otherwise the wrong people would drive it." I'd hate to think my wine was only being drunk by property developers.' Two Paddocks has not yet seriously entered the European market, but Neill has several distributors lined up. One lesson he has learnt from his family's wine business is the importance of the unpretentious Two Paddocks name. A brandy called Beehive was his father's best-selling product, and Neill recounts his father's theory that it was because New Zealand punters were too embarrassed to ask for an exotic French brandy whose name they couldn't pronounce. A similar dynamic seems to exist today. As French winemakers steadily lose market share to accessible New World brands, some are copying Southern Hemisphere branding and using simpler names. We hit a bumpy dirt track and drive past a small house and garden, where two children bounce on a trampoline. 'This is a very out-of-the-way corner of New Zealand. You'd never have a reason to come here,' Neill says. The rocky terrace of Alex Paddocks overlooks a broad, beautiful, and slightly bleak valley. All you hear is birdsong and the wind rushing through the parched yellow grass. The vines are under nets, Neill explains, to protect them from birds. 'It all looks like a giant condom.' Five weeks from picking, the grapes are small, round and already taste sweet. Neill absent-mindedly plucks several leaves from a vine to better expose the grapes to the sun. 'Everything is done by hand except mowing between the rows,' he says. The earth is dry and stony and looks singularly unpromising. 'You don't want the grapes in heavy lush soil because they just become these overwhelmingly powerful vines and they forget about growing grapes.' Alex was planted with Burgundy clones grafted on to US rootstock in 1998. Neill and Shaw are still learning how the young vines and their fruit behave in New Zealand's glacial soils (which are far younger than European soils). 'I think this will be fruit-driven, very silky and delicate through the mouth,' Neill predicts as he bounds up the north-facing slope ahead of me. 'There's something exhilarating about this site. It never fails to excite me. I just feel it will be one of those famous little vineyards in NZ one day,' he shouts. 'Here's the secret ingredient. These hills are covered in herbs.' He plucks thyme from the dry ground. 'These will just add a very subtle extra dimension - a little bit of herbal influence,' he says with a straight face. There is a touch of the Prince Charles about Neill's old-fashioned love of the land and enthusiastic support for hunting and fishing. He has become closely involved in arguments about development in Queenstown. 'It is under terrible duress, like anywhere that is involved in tourism,' he says. 'People want to move here because there is something idyllic about it. This is a knotty problem, but one which has been dealt with many years ago in Britain. It would be marvellous if you could all live in the Lake District, but you've had to say "we're full. You can't build any more." These things are taken for granted in Europe but are regarded as absolutely draconian, undemocratic and unjust in a frontier society like this. The best one can do is support some modicum of controls.' The tide turned late last year, he hopes. The 'rabidly' pro-development mayor retired and the man Neill and fellow activists championed got in, promising to regulate the pace at which vast Alpine-style houses and hotels were popping up on the mountainsides. Redbank, just down the road from Alex Paddocks, is Neill's third and newest vineyard. The poplars lining the track leading through the valley give it a French look. 'We'll take the 'gator,' says Neill. 'I love this machine.' We jump on a little green and yellow John Deere, more go-cart than tractor. Redbank, a former government research farm, is a mosaic of fields, dotted with pear trees, apricot orchards, rows of tomatoes and plots of rosemary, thyme, bay leaves and lavender. 'I'm leaving those. I see them as a benign influence,' he says. An overpowering waft of freshly cut lavender seeps from a shed door. Neill is bottling the oil and selling it. 'Again, there is no money in it but it's a nice thing to do.' Neill has also planted some Riesling at Redbank. 'You wouldn't grow Riesling in Burgundy. I don't know why. It's an oddity,' he ponders. 'It's undervalued because of those ghastly sweet German Rieslings we drunk when we first started drinking wine in the Seventies, but I think it will be the other great wine to be grown here in Central Otago.' After his stint filming in Prague and a forthcoming role in Perfect Strangers, made by his own production company (his first film in New Zealand since The Piano), Neill will relocate one of Redbank's apricot orchards and plant more Pinot. He envisages this large orchard becoming the centrepiece of Two Paddocks. Redbank's more sheltered site will offer very different flavours to the dry rocky hillside at Alex Paddocks. Neill will produce separate vintages as soon as he can. We lurch to a halt at Redbank's top boundary, under the poplars. Across the broad valley, empty but for birds and a couple of farmhouses, the mountains soften in the late afternoon sunlight. 'You must have empathy with the land. You need some heartfelt connection with the land, otherwise it's a bit pointless,' Neill says. 'I love coming here. I think it's a great place.' Then we're off again, back towards Queenstown in the Landcruiser. Neill turns to Ian, his assistant. His farm manager at Redbank has 'got to prioritise the shelter belt modification' he says, frowning. We pass a field of cows. He swings round boyishly. 'They're very attractive looking cows. I've never seen them before.'
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