Do we like Bret McKenzie?
Our score: 8 out of 10. A clean run on both tests, plus charity work and an Oscar, but the coverage on his values is thin and mostly gentle.
Bret McKenzie is the Wellington lad who became half of Flight of the Conchords with Jemaine Clement. He was a musician before he was a comedian, and he played with the Wellington band The Black Seeds in the 2000s. The Conchords' deadpan, supportive style came from their Kiwi roots, a deliberate contrast to the cocky "status" humour of other comedy duos.
The HBO show only ran two series, but it's still beloved, and he's since built a second career writing songs for screen. He won the Academy Award for Best Original Song for The Muppets, and he's written for The Minecraft Movie too. He's now onto solo albums, including 2025's Freak Out City, and says he plans three in total.
On the harm test, we went looking and came back with nothing. No anti-LGBTQ+ comments, no culture-war grievance, no conspiracy rabbit holes, and no repeated work with people who push that stuff turned up in what we read. If anything, his title track pokes fun at people who eagerly share questionable articles online. To be straight with you, the coverage of his politics is thin, so this is a pass on the evidence we found, not a deep dive.
The good-person side is just as quiet. We found no lawsuits, no allegations from co-stars or staff, and no scandal to tell as a story. That's honestly the whole list, and for a celebrity, an empty drawer is not a bad result.
The good stuff is modest but real. In 2012 he and Clement wrote a charity single for Cure Kids, a New Zealand children's health charity, after chatting with a group of young kids. That same year he put himself up in an Oxfam Fair Trade auction, offering a signed guitar and a fair trade cuppa in Wellington. He said buying Fairtrade is "a simple way of making the world a better place."
Lately he's been touring Freak Out City and acting in New Zealand Spy, a six-episode 1970s spy parody created by Paul Williams. Nothing controversial there, just a Kiwi bloke making silly, gentle comedy and music. He describes his outlook as "a little more optimistic."