Carol Hirschfeld attributes some of her career path to her father, “a big newspaper man”. As a sub-editor at Eyewitness News in the late 80s, Hirschfeld was convinced she preferred to work behind the camera, with no interest at all in appearing in front of it.

Since then, Hirschfeld has reported for and hosted many prime-time television productions including Fair Go, Crimewatch, 3 News and Campbell Live, as well as producing and directing hours of New Zealand television such as Frontline’s Winebox enquiry, Home Truths, A Queen’s Tour and Campbell Live. More recently Hirschfeld has worked as Head of Programing at Maori Television, and is currently General Manager of Production.

In this ScreenTalk interview, Hirschfeld talks about:

• Starting out in TV news and current affairs
• Working with Ian Johnstone on Crimewatch
• The intricacies and challenges of working on the Winebox investigation at Frontline
• The beginnings of her role on 3 News, and the resignation of John Hawkesby
• Producing Home Truths
• Her approach to producing TV series A Queen’s Tour and how she would do it differently in hindsight
• The joys of appearing as herself in Bro’Town
• Her reasons for leaving TV3
• Her aspirations for the Maori Television Service

This video is available on YouTube to embed and distribute via a Creative Commons licence.

NZ On Screen: Camera & Editing – James Coleman