Some acting experience an advantage but not required

OPINION

If David Cunliffe were an actor, his preferred acting style might best be described as Shakespearean – declamatory, expansive, grand in tone and gesture, rich in soliloquy.

It is a style suited to the stage but unfortunately totally unsuited to the more intimate vehicle of television and in particular to the television interview or debate in which small groups of people in their living rooms at home eavesdrop on an equally small group of people in a studio talking and debating.

Cunliffe’s failure, and the failure of his advisors to draw this distinction between what is appropriate to the stage and what is appropriate to television was in my view a significant factor in Labour’s defeat. He was too big, too loud, too OTT. You could see that he was acting.   

The best and worst example of this was the final television debate chaired by Mike Hosking.

One ought not to dignify the 22 programme minutes which TVNZ devoted to this last opportunity for viewers to judge who should run the country for the next three years by calling it ‘a debate’ at all, but it did serve to illustrate the Cunliffe team’s lack of understanding of what will appeal to the television viewer.

The Labour leader was aggressive, loud, interruptive and constantly talked over the Prime Minister.

Then, to add insult to injury, he repeatedly told the much quieter and considerably less interruptive Key, "You’ve had your go, John. It’s my turn now!"

Hosking, no slouch in the interviewer’s chair, could not control him. "David, you’re interrupting too much," he observed on one occasion. And on another, "You’re shouting at me."

I can imagine that the Cunliffe camp – along with several political commentators –  scored the debate a raging success for the Leader of the Opposition. "Great stuff, David. You really stuck it to him!" Voters clearly thought otherwise.

Perhaps the most widespread criticism you hear of David Cunliffe is that he doesn’t seem sincere; that the things he says seem to lack spontaneity, to sound rehearsed, scripted, to be part of a performance. It’s not just that the Labour Leader’s acting is over the top; it’s that he should be acting at all.

I think there’s some truth to this, to the ‘but’ that lies at the back of so many people’s minds, the ill-defined but nagging doubt as to whether this is a man you can trust or someone you can afford to like. I hear this all the time. On the street. At parties. In discussion with friends. Ask them for the evidence to support their conclusion and you rarely get a clear answer. It’s just an impression, a perception, a feeling. But it may account in part for Labour’s dismal showing in the election. And it may be enough to prevent David Cunliffe ever becoming Prime Minister.

I saw a different David Cunliffe late on the night before the election. He was on The Paul Henry Show. It was apparently ‘Talk like a Pirate Day’ and Henry said Cunliffe  had to talk like a pirate during the interview. What followed was not just funny but delightful – two silly kids having a lovely time being pretend pirates talking about politics.

What had made the difference? Well, Cunliffe was exhausted and I suspect  the  actor in him had gone to bed. His guard was down. And I thought this out-of-control, giggling man, talking like Long John Silver and collapsing in gales of laughter, was the nicest and least disingenuous person you could imagine.

Will we see that Cunliffe again? I doubt it. When he’s making a speech or when the red light is on, the actor will return. It’s a reflex and reflexes are the hardest thing to shift. Pity! I really liked the pirate.

And everything that Cunliffe appears not to be, Key appears to be: affable, at ease, comfortable in his own skin, unpretentious, straightforward, straight. And yes, ‘the sort of guy you’d be happy to have a beer with’.

There’s an irony here of course. It’s got to do with ‘the common touch’. Former Wall Street forex dealer, multi-millionaire businessman and leader of the right-wing New Zealand National Party, John Key, has it. David Cunliffe, far-left Leader of the New Zealand Labour Party, doesn’t. Go figure.

Figuring on Q +A yesterday morning just what accounted for Saturday’s rout of the Labour Party, a high-powered panel of political commentators debated whether David Cunliffe was personally responsible for that rout. Most thought not. Right-wing commentator Matthew Hooton was the dissenting voice. David Cunliffe, he said, was the prime, if not the sole cause of Labour’s defeat.

It occurred to me that this eminent Q+A panel was sorely out of touch with the fact that we live in the age of presidential-style election campaigns. If the voters like one leader and do not like his or her opponent, the liked leader’s party will benefit and the disliked leader’s party will do less well. If the difference in perceived likeability is significant or extreme, that may itself be a significant and perhaps the most significant factor in the result. More significant certainly than the objective merits of the candidates or their parties’ platforms. That’s showbiz folks! Hooton was right.

It may also be the case that the Labour Party is in dire need of reform, but if that reform does not include the selection of a charismatic, popular and widely admired Leader, John Key can look forward to a fourth term as Prime Minister.

Some acting experience an advantage, but not required.

Media trainer and commentator Dr Brian Edwards blogs at Brian Edwards Media.