Don McGlashan documentary premieres

The first film profile of musician and Distinguished Alumnus Don McGlashan will receive its world premiere at the New Zealand International Film Festival (NZIFF) in Auckland this month.

Anchor Me: The Story of Don McGlashan is directed by alumna Shirley Horrocks and will screen at the Civic Theatre on 9 August.

From Anchor Me and Bathe in the River to Dominion Road and (in collaboration with another alumnus Richard von Sturmer) There Is No Depression in New Zealand, Don has written some of New Zealand’s most-loved songs. He graduated from the University in 1982 with an Arts degree, was named a Distinguished Alumnus in 2012 and was inducted into the New Zealand Music Hall of Fame in 2023.

Shirley Horrocks has had a 40-year career as a maker of documentaries about New Zealand writers and artists, such as Marti Friedlander, Len Lye and Allen Curnow, as well as scientists, such as Dame Juliet Gerrard.

Shirley, who gained an MA (Hons), an MBA and a drama diploma from the University, received an ONZM for services to filmmaking in 2019. Her documentary on the musician is her thirteenth film to screen at the NZIFF, distinguishing her as the New Zealand director who has shown the most films at the festival.

Don has said he loved singing in the University choir, and also recalls the American poetry course that involved keeping a journal instead of writing essays. “The habit stayed with me,” he says, “and my journal is often the source of my songs.”

Don has gained a literary reputation for his writing of song lyrics, and he was awarded a literary fellowship at the University in 2001.