The Coronation and the Royal Visit were a lush visual spectacles in a time of austerity. On one hand, the Queen is this esteemed figure, this goddess from another world on the other hand, queen is a derogatory term for a gay man. The film is based on the duality of the word ‘queen’. Memory has faded and nobody cares at all. Later in the film, it’s like, five years down the track, the dog has died in complete obscurity, and it’s lying in the dump. A dog ran out and the Queen’s car had to swerve to avoid it, narrowly missing it. She was driven past the dump and came across my family and all the locals on the street corner. They really worked the Queen she went everywhere. It started as a short story-one of my first-based on my memory of seeing the Queen drive by during the 1953–4 Royal Visit, when I was a three-year old. For me, to see the film again is an emotional thing. In the little crowd scene, there’s my mother and father, both of whom are now dead, and there are people who were babies then but now have children. When you make a low-budget film, you draw in everyone you know who’s willing to be in it.

It was my second film and it has special meaning for me. It’s twenty years since I’ve seen it myself. And, there, to my astonishment, was a cheque for $20,000! It was wonderful.Īnd, here we are, this evening, looking at one of your earliest films, Little Queen. There’ll be a card in it saying, ‘You’re Unity’s favourite writer!’ She said, ‘Open it, open it!’ And I did. Peter Wells: When Tilly gave me the envelope, I thought, oh, that’s nice. It started off with you talking with Tilly Lloyd at Unity Books about Dear Oliver, as a recipient of Unity’s Fiftieth Birthday Literary Awards. Gareth Watkins: Peter, it’s been a special day for you. As part of Tuatara Open Late, at City Gallery, on, Wells showed his 1983 film Little Queen and talked to radio documentary maker, photographer, and curator Gareth Watkins. He is co-founder of Auckland Writers Festival and Same Same but Different, the LGBTQI writers festival.

He is currently documenting living with cancer in his Facebook diary, Hello Darkness. His films include Newest City on the Globe (1985), A Death in the Family (1987), The Mighty Civic (1988), Desperate Remedies (1993), and Georgie Girl (2001). His other books include Dangerous Desires (1991), Duration of a Kiss (1994), Boy Overboard (1997), One of Them! (1997), Long Loop Home (2001), Iridescence (2003), Lucky Bastard (2007), The Hungry Heart (2011), and Journey to a Hanging (2014). His latest book is Dear Oliver: Uncovering a Pakeha History (2018). Peter Wells is an award-winning writer and film maker. Peter Wells and Gareth Watkins’s conversation from May Tuatara Open Late.

Boy overboard by Peter Wells