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Archive >> October 2002
UN Children’s Television Workshop
A New Zealand production features in the International Children’s Television Festival in Manhattan this month. The Kiwi entry in the UN sponsored exhibition, The Dress-Up Box Wonder, was written…
Dr Grant, I presume?
Sam Neill has hinted he will reprise his role as Dr Grant in Steven Spielberg’s fourth Jurassic Park installment. The Queenstown-based actor is sufficiently impressed by the script that…
Intrepid Botanist Remembered
NZer Betty Molesworth Allen, OBE-awarded botanist and explorer, has died aged 89. Allen made her career in some of the harshest regions in the world; from the rainforests of Borneo, to…
Something old something new
Multimedia artist Lisa Reihana commended at the 2002 Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art for her current “work in progress,” Digital Marae. The large-scale photographs dramatise female mythological figures in an exploration…
Giving new meaning to wildlife
NZ production The Most Extreme has proved a hit with international Animal Planet viewers. The series, made by Dunedin-based Natural History New Zealand, involves a countdown of the world’s…
Bolger on Water
In a letter to the Times, ex-PM Jim Bolger cites the role of water in global tensions. Warning against letting War on Terror overshadow basic human needs, Bolger advocates a government-led…
Magic + Maths = Inspired Teaching
Ken Ring has taken his own special brand of mathematics to the UK. The former teacher is now president of the New Zealand Society of Magicians – a career change reflected…
Walker Talks Trends
In a bid to understand the fashion industry’s “pandemic schizophrenia,” SMH picks the brain of Kiwi style guru, Karen Walker. “It’s all about zig-zagging. If it was white last…
Concord Dawn high-flying in Asia
” bass-heads into a mind-boggling frenzy” were Kiwi act Concord Dawn on their recent tour of Asia. The DJ/producer duo of Matt Harvey and Evan Short have already established…
America’s Cup: Billionaires and Espionage
“Yacht racing has been compared to tearing up $10 bills while standing in the shower. In the case of America’s Cup racing, make that $1,000 bills.” Time Magazine delves into…
Kiwi Scientists Search for Merrick’s Ma
Joseph Merrick (the Elephant Man) is still drawing crowds. This time round, Merrick’s deformities are attracting genealogists and scientists, rather than circus-goers. A team of NZ researchers wants to find living…
South Pacific sounds
NZ group Te Vaka has made the list of nominees for next year’s BBC Radio 3 Awards for World Music. The Polynesian ensemble, led by Opetaia Foa’i, describe their…
Elevator Not Included
NZ runners Jonathan Wyatt and Melissa Moon won the men’s and women’s categories at the World Towerthon in Malaysia. The event involves an 800m run from the Kuala Lumpur Tower entrance,…
King of Greece Honours King of Sailing
Sir Peter Blake has been posthumously awarded the prestigious Olympic Order for his services to sport. Honorary IOC member, the former King Constantine of Greece, presented the award to Blake’s wife,…
Sun Sets on “The People’s Horse”
NZ mare Sunline, Australasia’s grand lady of racing and a champion that uniquely inspired anthromomorphic devotion, ended her five-year domination of Australian tracks with a brave final run at October’s Cox…
Booker Prize: end of an era?
Observer critics liken this year’s Man Booker Prize win to that of NZ’s Keri Hulme on “that unforgettable night in the mid-80s.” Yann Martel’s The Life of Pi won…
“Musician Who Revitalized Maori Culture”
Dalvanius Prime, pioneer of Polynesian soul and hip-hop, has died aged 54. Prime developed his own take on American soul by merging its ballad form with traditional Maori vocal…
#57 Taking New Zealand To The World
Edge Message #57 from Brian Sweeney, producer NZEDGE.COM
TO NEW ZEALAND EDGE GLOBAL COMMUNITY:
NZEDGE.COM has just hit the million page download milestone since inception. 28,000 NZ Heroes stories downloaded in…
I can’t believe it is butter
A preservative-free spray-on butter invented in New Zealand won a top prize at the Sial International Food Fair in Paris. The bi-annual event is renowned for its trends and…
Sex in the City (of Sails)
Are you looking at us? Rebecca Weinberg, Emmy-Award winning stylist from Sex and the City, was a headlining guest at New Zealand Fashion Week. Weinberg crossed the Tasman in…
“That’s the way it is:” broadcast legend bows out
Brian “Hendo” Henderson, Channel 9 Australia’s “stalwart newsreader” for the last 46 years, has announced his retirement. Born and bred in Southland, NZ, Henderson started out on Dunedin radio….
High Steaks
NZ beef takes centre stage at New York’s latest meat-lovers’ paradise; Sosa Borella. According to its reviewers – “a group of eager carnivores” – the “grass-fed, free-range beef from…
“I am an Illusionist”
“She is a ball of fire in Chinese pajama pants; she is a whirling dervish, a Nepalese tonka with a million faces, a human mandala.” The work of LA-based…
From Soaps to Splatter-flicks
New York-based Kiwi, Martin Henderson (Shortland Street, Windtalkers), co-stars in October’s US box-office No.1 – The Ring. The thriller is a re-make of the cult Japanese Ringu series, and…
Freudian felines
NZ-based author/psychoanalyst Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson attempts to unravel the feline psyche in The Nine Emotional Lives of Cats: A Journey into the Feline Heart. The “witty, elusive and often…
Vegas Pays Up
Golfer Philip Tataurangi had the first US PGA Tour win of his career at the Las Vegas Classic, beating Australia’s Stuart Appleby by one shot. The 32-year-old pulled out his best…
66 and Still Dancing the ACDC Way
NZ’s “first really iconic out-and-out drag queen” – Carmen Rupe – was honored at the 2002 Gay Games in Sydney. The November 2 opening ceremony at the Sydney Football…
The Resurrection
“If the internet could express emotions, a collective groan of despair would have filtered through a quarter of a million modems with the sudden closure of a site…
Running Man
Lower Hutt born Nick Willis is the University of Michigan’s latest star athlete. Still in his freshman year, he is already the No. 2 cross-country runner on campus. The best seems…
Sir Garfield Todd “A Legend in His Lifetime”
Tributes continue to flow for NZ-born former PM of Southern Rhodesia, Sir Garfield Todd. The Washington Post obituary remembers his “rugged good looks, fluent oratory and lucid memory,” and The…
The Necessary Jester
A recent Victoria University study asserts the value of the office clown. According to its research, humour is “a natural and, maybe, a necessary byproduct of complex social systems such…
Fine print
Kiwi publications took out several top spots at the 2002 Pacific Area Newspaper Publishers’ Association awards in Adelaide, with The Gisborne Herald named “Newspaper of the Year.” Other high…
“Feast feats”
London restaurant Pied a Terre, where Kiwi chef Shane Osborn reigns as “creative genius,” praised in the Observer: “You may wonder how it is possible for a Michelin-starred restaurant…
Hostel Heaven
LA Times‘ Youth Beat offers tips for the budget traveller. “NZ has a reputation for having the world’s best hostels, and one thing that helps to keep the hostel owners on…
Cook Sails into Prime Time
Captain Cook is the inspiration behind America’s latest hit reality TV show. The Ship follows a group of ordinary folks in their bid to sail a replica of the…
Edge Medicine
Gene therapist Matt During and his team of trans-pacific researchers have announced a “significant advance” in their search for a potentially revolutionary treatment for Parkinson’s disease. Published in the prestigious journal Science the…
“Go to the World Girls and Conquer It.”
“Top city dame teaches Brit woman a trick or two”: BBC News series on women in business profiles overachieving NZer and head of City of London, Dame Judith Mayhew.”For a glimpse of…
ABC: Auckland Billionaire’s Club
Warren St. John backgrounds the moguls and money questing for the America’s Cup, pondering at the ‘pet projects’ of sporting tycoons like Larry Ellison: “they have hired the best sailors money…
Warriors
The New Zealand Warriors averted an Australian national emergency by falling at the final hurdle in their proud and historic run to the National Rugby League Grand Final, losing to Sydney…
NZ: High-end Bottom of the World Destination
Turning conventional wisdom upside down New York Times finds that:”isolation, long an obstacle to international tourism, has become a plus in the post-Sept. 11 world. New Zealand, long promoted as clean…
“If It’s Made in Auckland It Looks Like the Future”
Spurred by the America’s Cup (“couldn’t be in a more fabulous setting”) Travel + Leisure checks out the evolving new world styles of Auckland: “The city has evolved over…
The New Organics: Edge Textured
Design bible Metropolis heralds The New Organics: the latest generation of designs drawn from the natural world, including Angela Adams’s new Utopia collection which consists of rugs that are hand-tufted from…
The Future is All Black
Tours to the Northern Hemisphere winter by the The All Blacks, Wallabies and Springboks saw some interesting pre-World Cup square offs with NZ, France and England (!) jostling for …
Auckland Holding its Breath
The 2002 America’s Cup challengers series has begun (click here for BBC, CNN coverage), launched with fanfare on the streets of Auckland. The competing teams paraded through the central…
Brazarre
In the Sydney Morning Herald: “New Zealand’s most uplifting tourist attraction, a brassiere-hung fence in the Cardrona valley in Otago is being restored. Farmer John Lee will wire 400 bras -…
Tokyo Girl
Karen Walker has recently returned from a promotional stint in Japan, where her popularity has reached new heights. After four years, she has more than 50 stockists in over…
