Southerly change

Celebrating Celebrity Treasure Island's bold new direction.

- RUSSELL BAILLIE

CELEBRITY TREASURE ISLAND TVNZ 2, 7.30pm, Monday to Wednesday from September 18; TVNZ+

It's been shot in Fiji. It's been shot in Tonga. It hasn't been shot in Samoa, possibly because the guy who actually wrote Treasure Island is buried there and the sound of him spinning in his mountain grave would ruin the shot.

But now, after Covid-era shows on a bleak and windy Northland beach, Celebrity Treasure Island is back on an island. As the publicity says, it's on the island of "Te Wai Pounamu". Yes, the biggest, highest, most telegenic and second-most populated of the isles of Aotearoa.

Te Wai Pounamu residents have long welcomed screen productions for the income and tourism marketing it brings to their remote paradise. And, of course, our television programmes have long been popular there.