Roll up the red carpet, they need it in Toronto

world (n)
The earth.
The universe.
The earth with its inhabitants.
The inhabitants of the earth; the human race.

pre·miere or pre·mière(n)
The first public performance, as of a movie or play.

Ah, those were giddy times back in July, when the chill winter mists hanging over the Whanganui cleared and the poor folks stopped in their daily toil to read the word from their beloved leaders.

On July 21st they picked up their hand-set daily bulletin and saw to their amazement that their raw, humble settlement was to host a World Premiere. (This was, remember, before Hollywood was even invented.) “Roll out the red carpet .... city to host River Queen premiere” screamed the headline that glorious day. “Roll out the red carpet – Wanganui will hold the world premiere of the River Queen” said the scribe’s story.

The very next day there was more. As the citizens queued outside their local newspaper office in the pouring rain, the billboard went up: “River Queen gets $150,000 premiere grant”. They waited for the warm newsprint to be handed out, hot off the press and with trembling hands read “Wanganui District Council is to contribute $150,000 toward the world premiere of River Queen in Wanganui - once it knows when and where the film can be screened.”

Today, with spring in the air and blossom on the trees, their daily bulletin answered that question. 'Tis... TORONTO! The crowd fell silent. Nobody had heard of Toronto. Was it perhaps a Maori settlement buried deep in the impenetrable bush up the river, they wondered.

Some of the artistic types reminded their fellow citizens they’d warned them not to listen to that snake-oil salesman - christened by a scribe in faraway Auckland as the Queen of the Whanganui - who had come to town the previous year promising to put their humble town on the map.

All along the rough-sawn walls of the newspaper office, tattered and fading billboards reminded them that that the River Queen waka was as good as sunk the day the hoity-toity mob from City Hall jumped on board.

River Queen premiere date soon

Back to drawing board for premiere plans

Temuera Morrison wants world premiere in Wanganui

River Queen figures corrected

No blunder: Council pushing for River Queen premiere

Council blunder may sink River Queen premiere

NZ director axed from River Queen

Dismissed director returns to helm of 'River Queen'

Cursed Film 'River Queen' Suffers Another Setback

So they sighed and went about their toil, as honest folk do to this day ...and it's said that if one listens closely just as the early mist rises off the Whanganui, one can hear an ethereal sobbing emanating from the direction of City Hall.

'Tis the ghost, some say, of the old settlement's credibility, weeping for having lost to those arty Toronoto types, them and their cursed shoe museum.

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