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| Leigh Hart | |
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| Pseudonym | That Guy |
| Birth name | Christopher Leigh Hart [1] |
| Born | July 20, 1970 Greymouth, New Zealand |
| Years active | 2001–present |
Leigh Hart (born 20 July 1970) is a New Zealand comedian, radio announcer and performance artist who is also known as "That Guy". He has made various appearances on New Zealand television, including SportsCafe and his own show, Moon TV .
Hart was born in Greymouth. He lived overseas with his family for ten years, including four years in Peru. [2] [3] His family returned to New Zealand when he was eleven. [4] He attended Christ's College in Christchurch before spending a year at the University of Canterbury. After working on the Channel Tunnel for two-and-a-half years in the early 1990s, he returned to Christchurch and then founded the rock band "Wild Turkey" with his brother Greg and friend Matt Johnson. [4] The band suspended activities in 1994 after being briefly jailed in France for visa irregularities and then deported. [5] Returning to Christchurch, Hart enrolled in film and television school, where he began a satirical newspaper titled The Moon. [6]
In the mid-1990s, Hart moved to Auckland and began working in television production for Greenstone Pictures. He was a writer on early episodes of The Zoo. [6] In 1996, producer Marc Ellis recruited him for a vacant guest spot on a 1996 episode of SportsCafe , in which he appeared as an "international snail trainer." [4] [6] He was subsequently offered a weekly role as a sports interviewer and took on the nickname of "That Guy". [6]
From 2002 to 2010, Hart produced and starred in Moon TV , a late night comedy show. [7] [8] The show parodied different television shows, and featured interviews with New Zealand celebrities. [6] It was nominated for Best Comedy Programme at the 2005 New Zealand Screen Awards and the 2007 Air New Zealand Screen Awards. [6] A spin-off show presented by Hart, Jason Hoyte and Jeremy Wells, Late Night Big Breakfast, ran from 2014 to 2016, [7] and was revived for an additional season in 2020. [9]
In 2010, Hart presented Leigh Hart's Mysterious Planet, which he described as an "epic TV disaster extravaganza". [6] It was a mockumentary series in which he travelled the world attempting to solve the world's greatest mysteries including Bigfoot, the Loch Ness monster, UFOs, the Bermuda Triangle, lost Inca Gold, the pyramids and Stonehenge. [10] Prior to the show airing, Hart wrote a humorous piece for the New Zealand Herald entitled "That Guy: Let's hear it for the Maori sasquatch", about his experiences attending a conference on Bigfoot. [11] Hart later said that he had experienced criticism from attendees after the column was published: "Because it's all online they went nuts. They've been tearing me to bits and abusing me [since]. I'm public enemy number one." [12]
In 2012 he presented Olympico, a three episode series with Jeremy Wells and Jason Hoyte which lampooned the London Olympics. [13] In 2013 he presented an episode of the documentary show Descent from Disaster, in which he looked back at the Strongman Mine disaster in 1967 which shook New Zealand, particularly the West Coast, and interviews his friends and family who were directly affected. [14] In 2017 he and collaborator Jason Hoyte co-hosted Screaming Reels, an unscripted fishing comedy show. [15] It was mistakenly screened by the Seven Network in Australia as a documentary series. [16] [17]
On Radio Hauraki Hart and Hoyte hosted a drive-time show called Daily Bhuja, from 2015 to 2019. [18] Hart also wrote a column for the Herald on Sunday from 2007 to 2011, [19] [20] and worked for the television show Fair Go . [21]
In 2020, Hart appeared on the first season of the New Zealand series of Taskmaster . [22] A review by The Spinoff said Hart was "the stand-out performer, largely because you can’t quite pin down what he’s thinking or what he’s going to do next". [23]
In July 2013, Leigh released his own brand of beer, Wakachangi, brewed by Harrington's Breweries. [24] It was initially marketed to students having big parties around the country (notably in Dunedin) and sold in 2-litre bottles. [24] Wakachangi was released nationwide at all Liquorlands in 330ml bottles in October 2013. [25] [26] Hart said the beer had "hardly a true word on the label"; it is said to be "a South Otago beer, with North Canterbury flavours, brewed by a West Coaster, with the ol' misty waters of the Waikato - est circa 1648", and winner of the Moon Breweries beer awards. [26] [27]
Hart is a regular speaker and M.C. at public events. In 2011 in Shanghai, he helped raise nearly half a million dollars for the Christchurch earthquake relief fund.[ citation needed ]
Radio Hauraki is a New Zealand rock music station that started in 1966. It was the first private commercial radio station of the modern broadcasting era in New Zealand and operated illegally until 1970 to break the monopoly held by the state-owned New Zealand Broadcasting Corporation. From its founding until 2012 Hauraki played a mix of classic and mainstream rock music. In 2013, it changed its music content, playing modern rock and alternative rock from the last 25–30 years. As of 2019 more classic rock and progressive rock is being increasingly played. In its modern legal form, Radio Hauraki's head office and main studios are now located at 2 Graham Street in the Auckland CBD, as one of eight stations of NZME Radio.
Paul Henry Hopes, known professionally as Paul Henry, is a New Zealand radio and television broadcaster who was the host of the late night show The Paul Henry Show on New Zealand's TV3 which ended December 2014 so that Henry could host a new cross platform three-hour breakfast show Monday to Friday on TV3, RadioLive and online. Paul Henry launched on 7 April 2015 and initially had an audience larger than the two shows it replaced on radio and TV. For nine months in 2012, he also co-hosted an Australian television show, Breakfast, which ceased production on 30 November 2012, due to low ratings.
Jeremy Wells is a New Zealand media personality who hosts the Radio Hauraki breakfast show with Matt Heath, Seven Sharp alongside Hilary Barry, and the NZ version of Taskmaster.
Moon TV is a New Zealand comedy television series. It is produced by Leigh Hart. In 2006 the show received NZD$176,324 in funding from NZ on Air for six half-hour episodes, to screen on TV2.
Leslie Matthew Heath is a New Zealand actor, producer, radio host, sports commentator, columnist and musician. He played Danny Parker on Back Of The Y Masterpiece Television and Dick Johansonson in the feature film The Devil Dared Me To. He was guitarist and singer for the 2000s band Deja Voodoo. He has worked on shows for MTV2 in the UK and appeared on Eating Media Lunch. Heath hosts the Matt and Jerry Breakfast Show with Jeremy Wells on Radio Hauraki. He has been a columnist for The New Zealand Herald since June 2014 and provides cricket commentary for The Alternative Commentary Collective. Heath runs the motion graphics company Vinewood Animation Studios with Philip Brough. In 2018, he co-hosted The Moment with Mike Lane on TVNZ Duke throughout the 2018 Commonwealth Games. Heath is the author of a cookbook titled "The Best of Leslie's Kitchen".
Jason Hoyte is a New Zealand screen and voice actor and radio DJ. He has at least 25 television shows to his credit and is best known for his roles as Steve Mudgeway in Seven Periods with Mr Gormsby and Malcolm "Smudge" in Nothing Trivial. He is also known for starring in the film The Insatiable Moon, and starred as Franklin Corke in the New Zealand Comedy/Drama Outrageous Fortune.
SportsCafe was a New Zealand sports TV show. The show's original run was hosted by Lana Coc-Kroft, Marc Ellis, Leigh Hart, Graeme Hill, Ric Salizzo and reporter Eva Evguenieva. In 2001 Leigh Hart was added to the cast under his persona of 'That Guy'.
Martin Devlin is a New Zealand radio and television broadcaster. In July 2012, The Radio Network announced that Devlin would take over the morning show for NZ's first private station, Radio Hauraki. Devlin later anchored a show on Newstalk ZB, until 2021.
Guy Malachi Jones Williams is a New Zealand comedian and television personality. Williams was a co-host on satirical news and entertainment television programme Jono and Ben, until the show's end in 2018. In 2019, he began hosting New Zealand Today, a show detailing the lives and events of New Zealand towns and the people who live in them.
Rose Catherine Lettitia Matafeo is a New Zealand comedian, actress and TV presenter. She was a writer and performer on the New Zealand late-night comedy sketch show Funny Girls. In 2018, she won the Edinburgh Comedy Award for Best Show at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe for her show Horndog.
New Zealand Media and Entertainment is a New Zealand newspaper, radio and digital media business. It was launched in 2014 as the formal merger of the New Zealand division of APN News & Media, APN New Zealand; The Radio Network, part of the Australian Radio Network; and GrabOne, one of New Zealand's biggest ecommerce websites.
Guy Montgomery is a comedian from New Zealand. He was the winner of the Billy T Award in 2014 and the Fred Award in 2023.
Josh Thomson is a New Zealand actor and comedian of Tongan heritage. He is best known for his work as a comedian on 7 Days, Taskmaster New Zealand, Have You Been Paying Attention NZ, Patriot Brains, and as a host on The Project NZ.
Melanie Rita Bracewell is a New Zealand comedian, actress and scriptwriter. In 2018, Bracewell won New Zealand's Billy T Award. She currently co-hosts The Cheap Seats and was a contestant on the fourth series of Taskmaster NZ.
Taskmaster New Zealand is a New Zealand comedy panel game show, first broadcast in 2020 on TVNZ 2. The format for the show was created by British comedian Alex Horne during the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2010 and was subsequently developed into a successful UK television show in 2015.
Angella Dravid is a New Zealand stand-up comedian, writer and actress.
Paul Anthony Williams is a New Zealand comedian and musician. Williams plays the role of Taskmaster's assistant on the New Zealand version of the international television series Taskmaster, and is one of the show's principal writers. He was nominated for the 2017 Billy T Award for up-and-coming New Zealand comedians for his stand-up comedy.
Brynley Alexandra Stent is a New Zealand actor, comedian and scriptwriter. She appeared on the first season of the New Zealand adaptation of Taskmaster and played the character Kelly-Anne Johnson on long running New Zealand soap opera Shortland Street. She won the 2021 Billy T Award for best breakthrough comedian for her show Soft Carnage.
Christopher Parker is a New Zealand actor, comedian, writer, TV personality, and podcaster.
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