On a roll: Brian Nankervis, centre, and co-host Julia Zemiro are on the road to the Queenscliff Music Festival.
Erin Pearson
DURING suit-fitting in Prahran’s trendy Greville Street for an upcoming ARIA appearance, RocKwiz co-host Brian Nankervis announces he has “best job in the world”.
He has just spent 10 months touring Australia with a travelling version of the hit SBS television show, which he hosts with Julia Zemiro.
With RocKwiz now on the bill for next month’s Queenscliff Music Festival, Nankervis said taking the risk of putting the show on the road had paid off “10 fold”.
“I think that because the show is a little rough around the edges it has an independent vibe and I think people really respond to that,” he said.
“It’s all about connecting with your past.”
RocKwiz debuted in 2005 as a live music trivia quiz program with a mix of celebrity teams, chat, music and comedy after Nankervis shot a pilot of his concept for the show in 2003.
But Nankervis, who first found fame as loopy beat poet Raymond J Batholomeuz on Hey, Hey It’s Saturday, said RocKwiz got off to a rocky start.
“It was wonderful but slightly tempered because they (SBS) said that, while they wanted the show, they wanted a host with an ethnic background.
“That was a little disappointing but I thought I could either get on my high horse or we could make a TV show. I’ve now been the host for five years.”
The show has so far filmed 105 episodes at St Kilda’s Esplanade Hotel, with the travelling version adding a further 21 at venues from Darwin to Launceston.
Nankervis said RocKwiz was a hands-on production.
“Because the show is on SBS and has quite a small team we have a lot more control over what we do.”
Nankervis said the spontaneous nature of RocKwiz had led to many “memorable” moments.
“In Darwin someone in the audience lent on a switch, which we didn’t know about at the time, and a loud fire siren went off,” he laughed.
“The band fled the stage but the audience was extremely relaxed and sat there for a very long time unconcerned by the fact the theatre could have blown up. They are very relaxed in Darwin.”
“One of my most memorable shows, though, would be when Dan Sultan and Ella Hooper sung a Little Help From My Friends. It was a fabulous showbiz moment.”
Complete with its own rock band, the AFI-award winning show features two musical celebrities and four contestants divided equally between two teams playing for only “the honour of winning”.
Nankervis said the line-up of contestants to feature at Queenscliff was “top secret”, although big names such as Tim Rogers, John Paul Young and Angry Anderson had previously performed on the road show.
