Dear Radio New Zealand Limited,

I've been fascinated by your extensive coverage of the Barbie movie (2023) - pre-theatrical release, release and post-release. I'm interested to know why the public broadcaster was so interested in it.

1. Please provide all inward correspondence/communications to RNZ from the makers, distributors or promoters of the Barbie movie. Please also provide all outgoing correspondence from RNZ relating to the movie.

2. Please provide a list of all the radio news bulletins (dates/times) where a story was featured relating to the Barbie movie or related Barbie topics (e.g. a collector of Barbies made the news).

3. Please provide a list of all the radio segments, and digital stories, that featured the Barbie movie.

4. Please provide any details of any benefits that RNZ or its employees received in highlighting this movie to RNZ listeners/viewers.

Yours faithfully,

Gareth Watkins

Kia ora George,

Thanks for your quick reply. There were a couple of responses that I want to clarify.

1A. Your response to my first request "Our film reviewer received no information from the "Barbie" distributors and it appears nothing was emailed to our general address." My original request was not limited to the distributor, or to the RNZ film reviewer and general RNZ email address. I asked "Please provide all inward correspondence/communications to RNZ from the makers, distributors or promoters of the Barbie movie." This would include any information sent to news or digital channels by any means - email, message, fax.

1B. I also asked "Please also provide all outgoing correspondence from RNZ relating to the movie." Can you confirm no outgoing correspondence from RNZ occurred?

2. You gave no response to my second request, "Please provide a list of all the radio news bulletins (dates/times) where a story was featured relating to the Barbie movie or related Barbie topics (e.g. a collector of Barbies made the news)." Retrospective radio bulletin information is not available on your website, just the current bulletin. Could you please answer this request - and treat it like the request was received today (noting there's been more Barbie coverage since initial contact).

Look forward to hearing from you,
Gareth

Yours sincerely,

Gareth Watkins