Ensemble co-founder Rebecca Wadey flatted with author Caroline Barron in 1995, the period in which her new book Golden Days is set. A story of female friendship and Auckland’s 90s nightlife, the book also asks some difficult questions about the culture at the time, particularly when it comes to predatory male behaviour.
A former model turned model agency owner turned author, Caroline brings insider knowledge to her characters; serious Becky who’s seeking a more dangerous life, and Zoe, an untethered, often reckless friend who is happy to provide it for her.
Rebecca sat Caroline down to ask some tough questions including, who is the main character Becky named after?
Caroline Barron: I'm so thrilled you've read Golden Days because obviously there's a lot in there that you would recognise and remember. How was the reading experience for you?
Rebecca Wadey: It was unsettling and great and amazing and traumatising all at the same time. But yes, it was also super interesting reading it from the perspective of someone who was there at the time. And obviously it was our flat. With that said, let's address the elephant in the room. Her name's Becky, but she's not me, she’s you.
CB: It is our old flat. You're exactly right. It’s 19 Minnie St [Eden Tce]. And the name Becky has nothing to do with you whatsoever, it’s just a weird coincidence; it just really suited that character. That character isn't me, either.
Those two women are a kind of a conglomeration of people who I’ve known over the years. But I definitely used the setting of our life; it was the flat that you and I and Phillip lived in. And all the streets and the bars and the clubs and the clothes and the nightlife and the magazines, it's all there. It's all real. And then I've put my characters back into that scene.
RW: That's a really interesting thing about reading the book, is that it is so real. A lot of writers make things feel like international or not of a place – like it could be set anywhere. Golden Days is so authentically Auckland that it makes it super fun and quite gossipy to read.
CB: There are a few ‘real’ people. Like Simon Grigg [the owner of legendary High St clubs The Box and Cause Célèbre, where portions of the book are set]. I sent Simon an outline and he was really happy to be named.
RW: Do you find when writing something that could be seen as semi autobiographical that you hold back, or that you're worried what people might think?
CB: I had to make sure that they weren't real characters, or that they were far enough from any real characters. I wrote an article for Newsroom where I explained that, in a way, I kind of slotted some things in there that were, I wouldn't say revenge, but they were my way of wrapping them up and popping them in a box.
That's the weird way that creativity works. And you'll remember I was always writing poems, and the poems that are in the book are from this old black folder that I spent so many hours writing and typing up on my funny old computer.
It was really amazing to be able to get some of that stuff in there. If you'd told 18 or 19-year-old me that my poems were going to be in a published book one day, I wouldn't have believed it.
I also talk about how the girl in the cow print stockings, in that image in the art piece that Becky and Zoe make, that was actually a photo that was taken of me.
The photographer had said there’d be no breasts shown in it. I had just the stockings on, no top. And then I was in 7th form at St. Cuthbert’s with my breasts out in a magazine just absolutely mortified, gutted and embarrassed that that had happened. Back then I didn't think I had the power to do anything about it. That's how influential those magazines and those people were.
RW: I remember seeing that photo in Pavement. We were around at a friend's house and the mag was there and everyone was looking at it. You were quite nonchalant about it. And I see now it was your way of shutting down the conversation, the embarrassment or humiliation of having your body out there with friends of yours looking on. But at the time I was like, she's so cool, she doesn't even care.
CB: It makes me feel quite emotional when you say that because that's exactly what I would've been doing, just pretending it was nothing. Because what else was I going to do?
RW: And these were good friends. Nice people. They're not like creepy sleazy guys. Still sitting around, looking at your breasts.
CB: This completely grosses me out now that I think about it. I would love to say to the younger me, just be more careful. It's really easy to get into a situation where things get out of hand or, or people are manipulating you.
RW: When I first met you, you were extremely glamorous. You were tall and thin, you were a model and you had entry into this social scene. But you were also very Becky.
You worked extremely hard, you had at least two part-time jobs all the way through uni. You wrote in your diary like a maniac. You wrote poetry, you played your guitar, you sang and you did all kinds of unexpected things. But you were very much in this kind of scene at the same time by way of modelling. I guess I’m wondering if you felt misrepresented from who you were just because of your looks?
Caroline: I see what you're saying. And the answer to that is probably yes. But at the same time, I knew what I had and I knew how to use it as well. So there are two sides to it. The looks and the glamour and all of that, it did give you an entry into a pretty exciting world, which you were a part of too. Your fashion aspect – Kate Sylvester [when it was Sister, Rebecca worked there from 1996] – working there would've opened lots of doors to you as well.
I think you do use it and it's super fun and exciting, but at the same time, there was a whole part of me that was invisible to people because I was judged on being a tall, thin, glamorous person. So a certain amount of misrepresentation, yes. But a part of me used what I had to have a fun life. I was quite torn as to which version of me I was and which version of me I was going to choose to be. I write because I have to get things out of me and I write because I think I've got things to say and I write to make sense of things and I write to connect. That's probably why I came to my writing later in life.
RW: I know you read the article on Pavement that was on The Spinoff a few years ago, and I feel like we had a chat about it at some point. We were living this great life and there was kind of collateral damage around us. Do you see Zoe as part of that?
CB: Having owned a model agency for 10 years, the one I used to model for in the early 2000s, it was certainly something that I thought about a lot. Even up until recently I worried – did I do enough to protect my girls? Did I do enough to make sure that they weren't put in those situations?
It was actually at the fashion week reunion [farewell to founder Dame Pieter Stewart] last year that I talked to a couple of my former models, and I asked them - did you ever feel that you weren't protected? Did you ever feel that I didn't do enough to look after you? And one of them said, ‘you were like my second mum, I could talk to you about anything. I never felt at risk’. The other one pretty much said the same.
That really meant a lot to me because it had been playing on my mind, did I do enough? Maybe there'll be situations where some models would say, no, you didn't. But for the most part it would seem that I managed to take care of them. It was a big responsibility as a young woman.
RW: What would you have done if a model had come to you and said, ‘a photographer’s used a picture of my boobs without telling me?’
CB: I would've called a lawyer. I would've certainly tried to get a retraction of some kind. But I can't blame my agency for what happened to me because I don't know if I was with the agency yet or if I was just doing it because we had friends that were involved with the magazine too.
RW: You were scouted by Glenn Hunt [co-founder of Pavement who famously scouted models, including Penny Pickard, around the High St area in the 90s].
CB: Glenn and Gwen [Isaac, his girlfriend at the time]. Remember beautiful Gwen?
RW: Yes, she's got her film [Ms. Information, a doco on Dr Siouxsie Wiles] premiering soon at the NZ International Film Festival.
CB: I was around 17. Which is not super young for a model. [Penny Pickard was scouted at 14]. It was a strange time, being a six foot tall 16 year old. For a long time I’d been really self-conscious about being so tall and skinny. So when [modelling] came along it had value, it was an asset and it gave me confidence. I'm really thankful for that in a way.
RW: When I met you working the Levene's checkouts I was new to Auckland from Hamilton. You were so warm and friendly and naughty and fun, but really inviting. Anyone that's moved to Auckland will know that it's not the most inviting city and people aren't always welcoming.
CB: We connected straight away. We had the same level of excitement about the world. You wanted to have a great time, but you also had a great intellect and I think we clicked on that level too.
RW: We both had quite serious sensibilities. We were quite square, deep down.
CB: I've always known where the boundaries are. That’s why I never like to stay up all night and see the sunrise. I've got a natural handbrake I reckon.
RW: In your Newsroom article you wrote about slapping a guy one time when he touched your breasts. You've obviously always had those boundaries despite growing through times where life was not as, um, black and white.
CB: I'd sort of forgotten a lot of those instances. You mentioned the diary writing before, I've still got all of those diaries and when I went back and flicked through them all (which was uncomfortable and fascinating all at once). I couldn't believe the number of comments that I'd made in my diary about being touched by men; being disgusted at some points and taking it in my stride at others. It was really strange looking back and seeing how common that was at the time.
RW: There's a really uncomfortable scene in the book where Becky is nearly raped and people in her social world are very nonchalant about it.
CB: We didn't know to speak up [back then]. The main thing we always did as a friend group is we always stuck together. You don't leave a friend. That got us all out of so many situations. That’s certainly advice I’m going to give my children.
Most of us were pretty lucky that we escaped fairly unscathed. I mean, I'm sure every woman has a story. But when I look back, I just think, wow, we just didn't have a voice. We didn't know we could have a voice.
As a result of Golden Days, that article that I wrote and my appearance at the Auckland Writers Festival, I’ve had so many women coming up to me and saying ‘thanks for writing that, it's really important. This happened to me back in the day’. So we can only teach our girls to speak up, right?
RW: And our boys to be better.
CB: Exactly.
RW: It's interesting because I've got so much nostalgia for those 90s days. I worked in High St, a few doors down from [nightclub] The Box. It was the absolute best of times but there was such a dark side. Reading the book and seeing those characters in there, they could be an amalgamation of any number of creeps that were out there.
CB: Seeing that whole nostalgia about the 90s, including the Lost Nightlife of Inner-city Auckland Facebook Page – seeing that and how everyone was like, ‘woo woo, it was so cool’. But I felt that everyone was sort of gilding those times because it was a great time, but bad stuff happened. It really did. And we just didn't talk about it. We didn't think we could. So part of what I wanted to achieve with Golden Days was to scrub some of that gold off and make sure it's clear that it wasn't all fun and frolics.
Golden Days by Caroline Barron $38 (published by Affirm Press)
