Jason Gunn has been on the airwaves for more than 30 years and is best known for hosting hit TV programmes The Son of a Gunn Show, The Rich List, McDonalds Young Entertainers and Wheel of Fortune.
He joined Jesse Mulligan to talk about the event that would shift his perspective on life, the rewards of storytelling and treated listeners to a few impressions.
Photo: NZ on Screen
A couple of years ago, Gunn had heart attack.
Being someone who doesn't drink or smoke, and who is relatively fit, it may not be something you would expect.
But, he says, heart attacks can happen to anyone.
It turns out Gunn has a family history of heart attacks.
“It was a good heart attack, the doctor said 'you’re very good at those Jason'."
Gunn told the doctor he wanted to make sure that would be his first and only one.
“I adore my children, I love them to the Moon and back, they're all getting too old, too quick and the idea that my future with them was going to be cut short, completely terrified me, they’re my best friends, they’re everything, and my beautiful wife of course.”
It was a period that made him re-evaluate what he was doing in life and led him to start his own business teaching people the art of storytelling.
“It’s the most rewarding thing I’ve done in a long, long time.”
As a broadcaster you’re an enabler, allowing others to shine, he says.
“I look back at my greatest moments and it’s what you do with the, loose term ‘fame’, while you’re in there and I will always look back at my days on children television and think of the children I visited in hospital, and the children I visited in schools and was able to say to them; I reckon you’ve got what it takes, I reckon you’re pretty special.”
There’s a chance no one else is saying that to them, he says.
Gunn has an issue with the current generation of influencers who he’s not sure are doing such good things with their fame. “But hey, old man Jase.”
While he’s not sure how exactly he fell into hosting game shows, he says children’s television will always be his prime time.
Jason Gunn Photo: GCM
“Having said that, even on shows like The Rich List and Game of Fortune, my role was to enable people to come on there, everyday New Zealanders like myself, and come on the television and make them feel at ease so they can go and be all that they could be…and hopefully win some money.”
Gunn was nervous about Dancing with the Stars; “Do we really need a show about dancing?”
It was the first show he made after the death of his father and he struggled with the thought of being on the television without him watching.
“I thought, you know what, I’m going to come down those stairs and I’m just going to talk to my dad and that’s what I did, and it worked.”
Gunn’s dad was an accountant, with a wonderful dry sense of humour.
His mum is “the greatest storyteller the world has ever known”.
But it was his uncle Ray who had a big influence on his career.
“He could always make my Dad laugh, I remember thinking this is a magic tool…”
If he could give one piece of advice to parents, it would be to put your children in improv classes.
“Because life is improvisation, life is thinking on your feet and being able to get up on your feet and go with it and those are the greatest skills I learned coming through school, were those improvisation classes.”
