Django manage.py commands slow; zlib issue suspected

Django manage.py commands slow; zlib issue suspected

When developing Django apps on my local machine (a OSX 10.8 MacBook),
running Django commands (through the manage.py interface) is extremely
slow, much slower than on an identical laptop at work. At work, running
python manage.py runserver is essentially instant, but on this machine
running even python manage.py --help takes between 15 and 30 seconds to
complete.
I suspect this to be an issue with my mac's installed zlib module, because
of the following: running Python in verbose mode shows the message
# zipimport: zlib available
being printed close to a thousand times before any manage.py command will
complete. The time which it takes all of these messages to be printed is
roughly equal to the time difference in running manage.py commands on my
local and work computers.
I'm thinking I have some kind of circular import, but I'm not really sure
what direction to go in solving it.
The above problem surfaces both when zlib is installed through Homebrew,
and when only the system default module is in place.
Here is an example of the typical output from running python -v manage.py
--help on my machine.
Thanks for your help!