I played the yellow Power Ranger on TV. I was floored by how much the show means to people

When I was a little kid in New Zealand, one of my absolute favourite shows was Mighty Morphin Power Rangers. I would sit in front of the TV after school enthralled by the colours, the karate and the deafening ’90s guitars. It was a weird show frankly; a bunch of American teens used magical coins to transform into spandex-clad Deliveroo drivers and fight rubber monsters sent down from the moon. I adored it. I wanted to be a Power Ranger more than anything. And then a few years later I got my wish. 

When I was 18 I was cast as the Yellow Ranger in the 14th season of Power Rangers. It was a big surprise, partly because I had no idea the show was even still going, let alone that it was being filmed in my own backyard. Power Rangers was banned from our TVs during the ’90s for being ‘too violent’, then ironically production moved to New Zealand in the early 2000s to make more. Take that, concerned parents!  

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But it was also unexpected because the Power Rangers I remembered were all muscled Americans with granite jawlines and sick martial arts skills. I was a scrawny ginger boy who had spent high school studying improv and still had one of my baby teeth. Surely I wasn’t Power Ranger material? It was then explained to me that in this season, one of the Power Rangers was going to be a little nerdy guy who was obsessed with fantasy and magic. Turns out I was born to play the role! 

Power Rangers Mystic Force (the 14th season was basically Power Rangers meets Harry Potter) filmed in Auckland during 2005. As far as I was concerned I had hit the big time. I lived in a hotel and got chauffeured around the city, just like Macaulay Culkin in Home Alone 2! 

On set I had a chair with my name on it and someone would bring me hot chocolates whenever I asked, just like Macaulay Culkin on the set of Home Alone 2, probably! 

Filming the show was a blur. One day we would be flying on a green screen dragon, the next we would be fighting a venus flytrap DJ that turned people into vampires, the next we would be trying to reverse an evil wish that had drained all the colour out of the world. Power Rangers is filmed at a fast pace, and all the footage of robots fighting is just bought from the Japanese version of the show. As a result a lot of the time we honestly had no idea what was going on. I don’t know how good a performance I gave, but I did get really good at jumping in the air in slow motion while an enormous fireball exploded behind me. 

Then after six months of work, filming was done. Production started preparing for the 15th season of the show, which would have an all-new cast, and nobody in New Zealand even knew Power Rangers Mystic Force existed. It felt like I had just taken a weird summer job and now it was time to get back to normal life. I moved into a normal flatshare, got a job at a bakery (turns out if you live at a hotel for six months Culkin-style, it will eat into your TV star money in a big way) and got on with my life. Power Rangers became something I felt a bit silly about. 

Years later, in 2019, I moved to the UK – perfect timing to do so! – and out of the blue I got an invite to appear at the Coventry Comic Con as one of their celebrity guests. I thought celebrity was a bit of a stretch, but I was always curious to go to a Comic Con and supposedly Power Rangers had this amazing fanbase all over the world. Plus who could pass up a free trip to Coventry? I got a lift from the train station by one of the volunteers, who asked me to film a video for his daughter. “Is she a fan of Power Rangers?” I asked. “I dunno!” he replied cheerfully, “Maybe!” 

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The experience of the Coventry Comic Con was very surreal. It was held in a convention centre that was also booked that day for a wedding, so you’d be wandering the corridors passing people dressed as Pikachu or Mario, and then turn a corner to see the bride waiting nervously to walk down the aisle.

The big drawcards for the convention were a woman who had played one of the little girls in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang and Hunter from Gladiators, but as I took my seat next to a stack of printed-out-pictures of me as an 18-year-old in spandex, a man stepped up to me. “Hey I recognise you,” I braced myself for the onslaught of praise and admiration. “Were you eating alone at the TGI Fridays last night?” 

In the end I met a few lovely Power Rangers fans, signed a few photos, and shared a taxi ride with the guy who voiced the robot dog in Doctor Who. All in all a good time at my first convention, even if I was pretty sure I didn’t want to make a career out of it, no matter how viable the robot dog made it sound. 

Then a few months later I was invited to another convention, this time slightly further than Coventry. It was the annual Rangerstop Convention in Orlando, Florida, held specifically for Power Rangers fans and Power Rangers stars. 

It was a three-day event held in a big hotel, and I remember the first morning walking through the lobby and people were staring at me. It was like I had murdered someone and was covered in blood. But no, this is what it feels like to be a real celebrity, I guess? Someone yelled out my character’s name, “Chip! It’s you!” And a teenage girl suddenly crash-tackled me with a hug, her parents trailing behind, phones out and filming.

That weekend I got to meet hundreds of Power Rangers fans, old and young, many who had travelled halfway across the country to be there. There were lots of Power Rangers actors there too, including some of my old pals from Mystic Force, but I quickly realised the convention wasn’t really about us. It was a place for friends to catch up, to connect and share their love of the show and all things nerdy.

I saw a lot of Power Ranger tattoos. I listened to one guy’s Power Rangers-themed death metal band. Another gave me a handmade replica of my character’s helmet. One fan got the Red Ranger from my season to help propose to his girlfriend in front of our tables. 

One boy would come by our table every hour or so to breathlessly tell us facts about Power Rangers Mystic Force. We literally couldn’t get a word in. At the end of the weekend, an older lady came over and told she was the boy’s grandmother, and they’d driven for two days to get to the convention. “He’s very chatty,” I said. She got emotional, and told me that this was the most she’d ever seen him talk.

“He never talks,” she said, “Never. Not even to his family. But he loves Power Rangers. I watch it with him and that’s how we spend time together.” I was floored. 

I knew Power Rangers was popular, but until that convention I never grasped quite how much it means to some people. 

After that weekend I felt very lucky to be a small part of it, even if it was just a weird summer job I did when I was 18. It also felt great to be back in a hotel for a few days. I just really feel at home in them, ya know? 

Nic Sampson will be performing Yellow Power Ranger at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe until 25 August at Assembly Roxy, Outside (17.45pm).

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