Visionary,compassionateproducer

• Published date: 01 October 2022
• Publication title: Otago Daily Times (New Zealand)

The veteran producer was commander of Dunedin’s Natural History Unit and head of programme production for TVNZ at the same time

In 1997 he helped arrange a deal that saw the unit sold to Fox Television and renamed Natural History New Zealand (NHNZ), while still keeping its main base in New Zealand.

Mr Stedman became its managing director and turned it into one of the world’s largest producers of wildlife and factual programming.

Despite being an ‘‘icon of the industry’’, he was a man of humble beginnings and he never sought fame or recognition.

Mr Stedman was born at St George’s Hospital, in Christchurch, on December 20, 1947 — the fourth of Samuel and Geraldine Stedman’s five children.

From his first breaths, he struggled.

His oldest brother Ray Stedman said Michael suffered from asthma and had a dose of whooping cough, which in those days was treated by a high-altitude flight in a small unpressurised plane.

‘‘His asthma was really bad — there were tense times.

‘‘An aunt who had been a nurse experienced in child care spent hours with him at some of the worst of these. Sadly these treatments were unable to help much.’’

Doctors in Christchurch suggested the family move to Dunedin, where the climate might be better for his health.

So towards the end of 1949, the family briefly moved to Corstorphine and then settled in Wakari, where the climate and the environment suited him better.

‘‘The new location allowed Michael — as it did all of us — to push boundaries as we escaped into the wild.

‘‘At age 4, Michael received a little wooden wheelbarrow for Christmas.

‘‘With this barrow, he took up gardening and busied himself helping Fr Loughnan, the parish priest, break in some turf.

‘‘During one of these missions, Fr Loughnan stopped to have a roll-your-own. History does not relate how the bottom of Michael’s bubble pipe came to be burned out.’’

Because of his health, Mr Stedman missed a lot of school, which caused angst among his teachers.

It was not helped by his mother, who had an alternative set of priorities which painted a broader picture.

She was a highly educated woman versed in the classics, literature, music, theatre and the arts, and sought to make museums, music, the theatre and galleries part of her children’s experience.

It rubbed off on him, and, as he grew, he became active in the Scouts and theatre — particularly the Globe — and learned ballet and classical guitar.

‘‘It was a pity that the school vocational guidance councillor, in a fit of...