For 18 seasons of the IPL, former New Zealand fast bowler Danny Morrison has been one of the most recognisable and beloved voices of the tournament. Cheeky, irreverent, with a sense of humour all of his own, he has turned commentary into a full-throttle performance. But behind the antics - and there are plenty - is a man who recognised early what T20 needed, and came to embody the experience of franchise cricket. In a freewheeling chat during a rain-interrupted IPL game, Morrison spoke about entertainment, evolution, and why he's not toning it down anytime soon.

This is going to be fun. You know what today's subject is, Danny?
Wild weather.

You got half of it right. Today's subject is just you. It's the Danny Morrison special.

Every single year of the IPL, along with MS Dhoni and Virat Kohli and Rohit Sharma, there's one more thing in common. That's you. Danny Morrison's done every single year of it.
Sorry. Yeah, it's a bit scary for the youngsters, I feel for you.

I want to go back to the beginning. You remember the first time you thought, maybe I can give commentary a try?
Well, Martin Crowe was taking over as the executive producer at Sky Sports' cricket department in New Zealand. And he said, "Look, I need someone to host a magazine show. I want you to do this weekly thing called The Cricket Company." And I said, yeah.

Look, because when I was a youngster I went and did some pantomime. My mother is from a thespian background. She was doing a drama diploma in 1978, and I was 12 at the time. So I got that exposure and [experienced] that world of people in her sort of clique, if you like. And it was interesting. So for me, the early years of IPL, of getting dressed up and having fun with it [would have] worked for me even back then. And I'm talking late '90s, very late '90s.

Sky took over the television rights in '99. So Marty, God rest his soul, was executive producer. And so I started with a bit of that. And slightly prior to that, I'd done a little bit of commentary when it was at TVNZ. But also before that was Martin Crowe's Cricket Max, which was ahead of its time. It was T20, it was still 40 overs, but he broke it down and he had four breaks, like Test cricket. He was wanting to keep the beauty of the game together, the historical side of it. So four innings. And so if Sachin Tendulkar got out for nought, you could see him again, because he'd come out in the next innings.

Play 02:55

'It was this whole new cricketainment - cheerleaders, the DJ, and the music going on'

Since you brought up your background from before broadcast, let's go into that. Tell us a little more about the impact that exposure to the arts and culture had on you. Were you the kind of kid who went to school and was into drama and always in the public eye?
Not so much with drama, because at school it was more about sport, in a way. But when I was seven, my sister was turning five, my parents and my uncle took us to [see] the Rolling Stones, Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones, in 1973.

So that was big for me. It was a huge impression, going as a seven-year-old to Western Springs [in Auckland]. It was an afternoon concert, so it was great, mum and dad could take me.

And then going to the theatre, doing pantomime. I did that on a Saturday morning instead of sport for a year, I suppose, and mum was doing the drama diploma. She would take me to the Maiden Theatre at Auckland University, and we would do pottery and make stuff, we'd have to do stand-up and things, and get out of our comfort zone. It was almost like doing an apprenticeship for what was coming, post-playing days, and being in front of the camera and dressing up and having fun, and just being a little irreverent, and it just, it suited me, it was different, like some of my pitch reports.

Jeremy Coney was certainly like that, the great wordsmith. He did stuff like that too, and it worked, and we were at Sky together, and there were different things he would do more of, and I'd host that magazine show.

I think a lot of us think, "Does Danny put on this act because that's just what the demands of entertainment are?" But this goes back to little Danny being open to being a comedian at times, trying something different, being irreverent. Did it just come naturally to you?
Yeah, [it's in] the DNA, probably, if I look back on it. There are some crazy people in my family, my father's side and my mother's. Once we'd seen the Stones live in '73, I would then have a scarf on, and it was part of, like, the pantomime show that I would do, and my sister would do some other little act, but I'd be impersonating [Mick Jagger] - the song would come on, "Brown Sugar" by the Rolling Stones, and you'd be miming to that and strutting up and down and putting the show on. Mum would encourage that. And then [I would do it when] people would get together, like for family weekend gigs or a barbecue and all that sort of thing. We did that in those mid-late '70s, it was great.

Steely Dan: Morrison has his business face on at the 2018 Under-19 World Cup © Getty Images

When you did Test cricket, I'm sure at the time you thought, there's no costumes that I can put on, there's no being irreverent here. The way Test cricket was done in the '90s, for any commentator coming up at the time, they would have thought that's how you do it: the way Richie Benaud, Bill Lawry, Tony Greig did.
Greig and Lawry, to be fair, were such pioneers, and particularly had that style where they could be quite exuberant. I wasn't, and so I felt Test cricket was quite intimidating. I sat back and let - we used to call it the [Ian] Smith and Crowe show. Those two were dominating in that, and there was a bit of Jeremy Coney, Gavin Larsen and those guys. So, for me, I needed to find my way a little bit, and I think white-ball and Marty Crowe's Cricket Max style worked for me a little bit better then.

But don't get me wrong, I love Test cricket. I've done a lot in the UAE over the years, and come to India at different times, and then in Sri Lanka or Bangladesh or the West Indies, so I've enjoyed that side of it. I've followed the Black Caps around when they toured, and then being a neutral with Pakistan [in the UAE] - 2009 to pretty much 2018. I enjoyed that a lot, going there and working on Test match cricket, with Tony Greig for a couple of years when he was still around, 2010-12. Good fun.

Did you feel with Test cricket that there was something you wanted to do there, but the platform or the stage wasn't quite right?
To be fair, I was young then, and so it was a bit like [being] in the [New Zealand] team, again, with the Smith and Crowe show. Those guys, they were the generals, and you didn't upset them, and we were foot soldiers, right, we're privates. So the hierarchy that was there, you felt that at times, and you really minded your p's and q's and couldn't be what you are today - a bit more exuberant.

In the early years of IPL broadcasts in India, you did so many things that are still in the memory of fans: Danny wearing a turban, Danny having fun with characters on the field - cheerleaders or ground staff, or anyone really. Did the idea for all that come from you?
Well, when you think about it, it's quite a different genre in a way, because it was on Sony [then] and now it's on Jiostar, right? Just quite a different outlook, that's simply what it was really.

I suppose at the start of it, and because of Lalit Modi and what he wanted to see with his American, if you like, background. He was at Duke University, I think, and his [exposure to] American sports, the cheerleaders, the razzmatazz - it became cricketainment. So that worked well for those first few years, where Bollywood married cricket, right? And it was a great combination of that, whether it was Gaurav Kapur and the guys on the sideline, and the female presenters - you had Ramona Arena doing the YouTube Funtube feed, and all of that.

Play 03:39

Danny Morrison reacts to old photographs: "MS Dhoni said, 'Danny, mine's grown back. I don't think yours has got much hope'"

So you could dress up and ham it up a little, because the crowds were going off, and it was this whole new cricketainment - cheerleaders, the DJ, and the music. It was just this: boom! And thank goodness, good on you Lalit Modi, who brought this to town. Extraordinary.

How much of what we see of you on television was thought out well in advance, and how much of it came together minutes before you went on air?
I remember Archana Vijay and Shibani [Dandekar] - they were two main presenters - and there was sometimes a bit of a theme around it, and that would be subtly choreographed. [And then] it was just free-license time and you had to freewheel and just roll with it. You had producers that would bounce their idea off Archana. "Could we go with that?" And we did. So that side of it was a lot of fun, because you had a bit of free license, and they could choreograph stuff and weave it together and make it work.

I've got a couple of photographs, if you want to go down memory lane. I think you look exactly the same.
Same haircut.

Just have a look at this one [photo of Morrison in a turban, with a fake beard stuck on]. How about that?
Well, I got into a lot of trouble with that.

You did?
So what happened is that I was doing stuff there for Sony [on the sidelines] with Pallavi [Sharda, presenter], and we're having great fun, and I even asked the bosses. They'd glued this [beard] on, and the turban and everything. It was going to be difficult to then take it off, and then re-put it on, given that I had to do the world feed coin toss. So that's why it got seen. I remember the Fleet Street press, being what they're like, they gave me a lot of stick. They said, you know, Danny, the black-and-white minstrels went out in the '70s, and were sort of like, "How dare you? You're a Caucasian male and doing this sort of thing." Which was, you know, Sony wanted that, and they [UK press] couldn't quite understand that - this is what we're doing for locals here in India, it's the Indian Premier League for goodness' sake, and let's have some fun with it. So it felt almost like quite a different genre than it is today.

Morrison caught a fair bit of flak from the press for dressing up in a turban and beard once in the early years of the IPL © BCCI

I want to focus on how you managed to become such a popular commentator. You come to the Wankhede Stadium and you go "Bollywood!" And you make Shubman Gill "Shubbers". It's the lightest things, and if anyone else tried doing it, they'd look silly. And yet it works with you.
Well, a lot of it was tagged as Danny-isms. And a couple of mates back in New Zealand would say, "You've gone down that path of quite 'blokey' commentary."

For me, it's a bit like sitting like this [and having a chat with] the likes of dear old Robin Jackman, who's no longer with us, same with Marty Crowe, and as Ian Smith said, part of what this is about is having a conversation. You want to make it conversational. In a way, you're engaging your audience and letting them in, so they feel like part of it.

Because, as some great old doyens have said to me, at the end of the day it's about the fans. If the fans aren't entertained, or coming to watch the match, then what have you got? And we felt that, man, we've really experienced it during Covid, with empty stadiums. You weren't allowed the music. It was tough doing that in the Caribbean in 2020 - you really noticed what hard work it was, because it lost all that energy and all of that vibe that was the music, the carnival, the fans. Really, they're the ones who own the game, and it's about them.

When you work with other broadcasters, what's your sense of still trying to be you? A lot of commentators do it very seriously, and I'm sure at some point you're looked at as somebody who maybe seems out of tune, but it's that that I, as a fan, have enjoyed, quite frankly. How do you still stay true to yourself today?
I think I'm just honestly who I am, and a lot of people label that "Morrison madness". And I don't mind that, I really don't, because part of my history, from my father's side, is Irish ancestry, so they are a little bit… they're quite wild. So, there is that DNA in you.

Others might go, oh God, Morrison being a little wild, too irreverent. Or, "Can we take him seriously enough?" And colleagues, some of them will probably feel that. And I notice that.

I'll be really honest, they'll probably find it harder to engage [with me] around a serious conversation on cricket, when you're, say, sitting with with your colleagues, maybe five or six of you, discussing something in-depth. And if I'm left out of that conversation, I don't take it personally. They just get on and they do their thing, because they think, you know, he's the entertainer. And I have my own style, and I [have] no qualms about that. That's how I like it, because I think there's enough of an audience that like it. A lot don't like it, and you've got to be thick-skinned because people [on social media] will bombard and want to have a real go at you, because it's different.

Play 01:59

On the commentators Morrison enjoyed working with: "Tony Greig was great to work with, but at the other times he'd tell you off a bit too"

We've seen that in society and different walks of life. If you're a little bit different, then you're going to get hammered, right? But I like staying in my lane and knowing what I'm about.

What does Danny do when he's not on air? Is that similar or dissimilar to what he is like when he's on air? Because we tend to look at the on-screen persona, and we think, oh, is Danny like that at home as well? Is that how Danny orders food on the phone? Is that how Danny talks to, you know, the gardener?
I do shriek a little bit around the home and stuff like that. It's almost like you're letting it out, there's no point holding onto stuff. And my poor wife, she says, "Why?" [Simon] Doully, or Scotty Styris, the Kiwi guys you run into more, they go [to her], "Does he behave like this at home?" She says, yeah, just shrieking and carrying on.

As I get older, people are like, "[You're] definitely going troppo. You're talking to yourself." But we spend a lot of time on the road, on our own, in hotels, either getting ready, doing some research - and you've got stuff sent by producers on what you want to talk about, but then again, there's a lot of time on your own, you know. I'm a movie buff, I really enjoy watching movies, and lots of different genres, and you'll see actors talking to themselves within a scenario - they're chatting to themselves. I've watched great presenters about to do a toss or about to do a pitch report, and they will walk - like, Coney was huge with that, and he would basically be [practising] lines like an actor, and he would go through it, discussing what he'd do, playing it out in his head. So there's nothing wrong with that and a lot of that part is me [doing that].

So how much of a role have movies played in your commentary? Is that where you found your sense of humour? Tell me a little bit about a lasting influence from the entertainment field that you've carried with you.
Yeah and again, people either really like that [sense of humour] or not. And they really do or don't like Jim Carrey. Carrey was big for me and particularly…

It's all making sense.
Yeah, totally, when you look at the faces he pulls and stuff like that. But it was great, like he was in The Mask, Dumb and Dumber, being so crazy and that. So some of his roles… Me, Myself and Irene. I'm a very late '90s man.

My wife and I love that. We like that character in there. So you see that come out of me at times, and in reciting types of lines and stuff. But that's again part of my upbringing through my mother, of different people in that industry, going to watch theatre live in Auckland, sitting backstage and watching it all unfold. It was just intriguing.

What else other than movies and drama has played a big role or been a big influence?
In terms of different sports, my wife, Kim, was a netball player, quite a good one. I used to love taking the kids and going to watch the netball.

Live sport, I've been lucky enough to go to a little bit of tennis back in New Zealand. Never been to an Australian Open, so Kim and I would like to go and do that.

And nature-type things. Kim's got more into hiking with her girlfriends there, but the beach is lovely for us. So we're spoiled in Australia and New Zealand - you're surrounded by water and you can access it quite quickly, whether you have to go for a little bit of a drive or not. So in terms of simple, like, walking, cycling, getting out and enjoying the great outdoors, [we're] spoiled down under.

Do you like peace and quiet?
Yeah, I do, because once you've come to incredible India, and there's a couple of people here in this part of the world, the tooting of the horns… Whether you're in any part of the subcontinent, Bangladesh, Pakistan… just the noise, as you say. So to get back, in a way, it gives you perspective.

And that's the other beautiful thing. You get the perspective of being in the subcontinent, with so many people and cars and tooting and the high activity. But also for me, [it's] the cuisine - I love the food here and I've got more into it as I've come here through the '90s and then into the 2000s. Love it.

I'm going to go back to just some of the things that I enjoy when I hear you commentate, Danny. Sometimes it's not even a line, especially when you're calling and someone's hit a big six. Your standard playbook is, pick an adjective: outstanding, marvellous, massive, whatever it may be.
Big, massive.

Yeah, big, massive…
What about "Ooh-aah"?

That's what I'm getting to. At times, it's not even actual words and it still nails the moment.
And then the other one I like to… because I'm a bit lazy, and self-deprecating, and really should have learnt more Hindi, right? So for me, when someone goes smashing over extra cover, I might go, "Bahut achcha!" [very good] And just throw that in, because it's different.

And I remember during the World Cup, doing like, "Chhakka! [sixer] So you get [a bunch of words to describe a] six - "Maximum!", "It's huge", "It's a biggie!" You know, you're trying to just break it up a little bit.

Natalie Germanos watches Morrison get up close and personal with the pitch in Morrisville at an MLC game © Sportzpics

Also, "smoke!"
"Smoke!" And those are great because they've been around a while, and lots of other guys use them too, which is great because it becomes that vernacular of everyone.

Lots of other guys don't necessarily have the voice skills. Does that come naturally? Or does that go back to your background?
You have to have that. Sometimes even producers go, "Geez, Morrison, you won't be able to come back from that because you'll be at that level [of volume]. And that's exhausting." I think probably as I've gotten older, you tend to be a little bit more mellow. You just have to because [otherwise] you're just going to get knackered.

You know, I remember a game that I shouldn't remember at all, but you're responsible for it - a rain delay in a dull IPL game during the pandemic and nothing was happening. You and KP were on comms together but you kept me watching. What I'm getting to is, when there was nothing happening, you still got a viewer, and his attention.
Nice. Kev, send us a postcard. You've been in the Maldives again? Oh, really? Nice for some…

So with T20, particularly, we've got four or five overs. That's all you've got. Sometimes you have to do a double-up, sure, and you might suddenly be doing eight overs back to back. But most of the time, you've really only got one set or chunk. And so, again, other doyens, particularly Robin Jackman, who I spent a lot of time with early on, he said you owe it to the audience, you owe it to the cricket fan. You may have a bit of a cold, you may have some drama at home going on, but it's nothing to do with them [the fans]. You're here to do work, and you're on for four, five, six, seven overs, and you really need to be there for them and give.

And so he was great. He was brilliant for me as a mentor early on.

Jackers.
Yeah, Jackers was great. That's part of the essence of it. You're only there for a short time. Then you can pop off and have a cup of tea, or maybe ring home and deal with a bit of a drama that's going on in the background.

Any other mentors, people who had a big influence on your broadcasting career? Could be producers, could be outside of cricket even.
Yeah, and I was fortunate to be working in India doing that. I think IMG had the right set then - Simon Wheeler was a director, and then there was Michael O'Dwyer as a producer.

Morrison counts the late Robin Jackman (second from left) as one of his mentors in the commentary box Graham Crouch / © Getty Images

And other times you've just had good people around you. And that's the other thing that's developed here, that now they're all Indian directors, all of the four units that are here in India. I think there's only two outsiders now: there's Nick Etherton and there's the great Craig Cozier, son of Tony Cozier. So when you look at that, the development of the game here with, you know, audio, cameramen, directors, everything, you can just see how it's morphed. And it's been lovely to be part of that, to see that grow and watch all that happen.

Commentators that you enjoy being on air with most?
I really enjoy, as you mentioned, Jack is there, and he was fabulous. And when I look back at even Greigy [Tony Greig], they could be big bully boys, because they were pioneers, and they were around at an extraordinary time. He was great to work with, but at other times he'd tell you off a bit too, right? And that wasn't bad either.

I've heard stories.
Yeah, exactly, and understandably. I enjoyed that time when those guys were around and sort of helping you, but also then just giving a little… it's almost like schoolteachers giving a little slap, back when you could [slap]. So those guys are great.

And then all the guys that you see now in the IPL circuit, fabulous.

Oh, go on, give me names, Danny.
I do a lot of work with, obviously, contemporaries, the guys I played with, like Doully - I see a lot of Simon Doull, whether it's in the UAE or here. Daren Ganga, Ian Bishop, I see a lot of those guys. Now we see Natalie Germanos, we see Katey Martin here.

I miss Melanie Jones. Mel does a lot down under and in England. I don't tend to work in those briefs. I did the Women's World Cup in 2009 in North Sydney with Mel and then she came to the IPL.

But all of them, they've all got their own lovely little quirks about them and they're different.

I hope you don't mind me calling you a veteran of broadcast now…
Yeah, old, old.

"Having fun and laughter is important because at the end of the day, we can take ourselves all too serious and get too engrossed in it" © Cricket Association of Bengal

And in many ways a doyen of your own style of broadcast.
I just say veteran, really.

I can't think of anyone who did it like you before you, and your Danny-isms. Now I can think of other gifted people with a talent for humour like Graeme Swann…
I think you need to, right? You've got to laugh because it releases those endorphins. And it does something for the human body. And having fun and laughter [is important] because at the end of the day, we can take ourselves all too serious and get too engrossed in it.

And I know life, of course, life is serious, but there is the balance, right? The yin-and-yang thing and the balance of life, and having fun and having a bit of laughter, I think, is key. And certainly Swanny gets that. [He's] another one you enjoy being around because he's got energy and he's full-on.

And some laugh more than others. And some get it more than others. And some are more serious characters. It's just part of their make-up, right?

I think to some degree, you've answered my next question: what are you most proud of or satisfied about from your broadcasting journey, if I have to ask you now?
Probably evolving in this genre that is T20, because others have said, "Oh look, you can't have Morris, they can't have that clown on. What's he doing Test cricket there for?" But in a way, it's a bit like actors just wearing different hats. To me, it's just that.

But people - and that's not slagging on the audience in that view, but because I tend to get a bit pigeonholed that I'm a T20, white-ball specialist, rather than Test cricket. And I don't have a problem with it, no qualms with that. But I'd still like to do some Test cricket. If I have the opportunity to do it, [I'd like to] slow down and do it.

I was just trying to think, in Sri Lanka, 2022, was probably the last time I did a Test match series there. And I enjoy it, because I can still bring a bit of an irreverent cheek to it and have fun with it. Otherwise, it's just so serious and so full-on.

You've got to try and bring a lightheartedness to it. For me personally, my biggest thrill is that you want people to watch the game and enjoy it and have a bit of fun with it.

You know how it is - white-ball players these days are making a lot more than red-ball players. If you're a white-ball commentator, you're flying back private, aren't you?
I've got my own jet, yes.

Raunak Kapoor is deputy editor (video) and lead presenter for ESPNcricinfo. @RaunakRK

© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.

 

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