July 2018 Archives

Andrew Niccol’s Truman Show 20 Years On

Andrew Niccol’s Truman Show 20 Years On

Jim Carrey, Peter Weir, New Zealand-born screenwriter Andrew Niccol, Laura Linney, and Sherry Lansing thought their paranoid dramedy The Truman Show seemed absurd – until life began to imitate art. In the 1990s, as Canadian…

Anna Paquin: “You Don’t Do It for Fame, Finance or Glory”

Anna Paquin: “You Don’t Do It for Fame, Finance or Glory”

“Sitting down with Variety’s chief film critic Peter Debruge, Paquin discussed the release of her newest independent movie at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival in the Czech Republic.” Tara Bitran reports for

Ali Smith Marvels at Katherine Mansfield’s Letters

Ali Smith Marvels at Katherine Mansfield’s Letters

New Zealand novelist Kirsty Gunn was in London recently listening to Scottish author Ali Smith talk about Katherine Mansfield. Gunn’s article about the event appears in The Scotsman. “ talk, hosted by the

Two NZ Comedians Part of Netflix Global Comedy Event Series

Two NZ Comedians Part of Netflix Global Comedy Event Series

Netflix “is launching an international stand-up comedy event series that will feature 47 comedians from 13 regions”. New Zealand comedians Urzila Carlson and Cal Wilson are part of the line-up. Anita Bennett reports for…

Taika Waititi Reveals Details of ‘Jojo Rabbit’

Taika Waititi Reveals Details of ‘Jojo Rabbit’

New Zealand “director Taika Waititi has revealed more details of his upcoming projects Jojo Rabbit and Bubbles.” Orlando Parfitt reports for Screen Daily. “Waititi told Screen at the Karlovy Vary Film…

World’s Largest Group Fitness Provider Turns 50

World’s Largest Group Fitness Provider Turns 50

“Marking half a century in the fitness industry this year, the family behind Les Mills, the world’s largest group fitness provider, have shared their remarkable story of struggle, success and striving for a fitter…

Leave No Trace Trailer

Leave No Trace Trailer

Kiwi Thomasin McKenzie stars in Leave No Trace as Tom, who lives off-the-grid with her father Will. The film was directed by Debra Granik and has received a lot of…

Israel Adesanya Might Be the UFC’s next Superhero

Israel Adesanya Might Be the UFC’s next Superhero

Nigeria-born New Zealander Israel Adesanya “is one of the ‘The Last Stylebender’ … It’s a reference to Avatar: The Last…

Cellist Yuuki Bouterey-Ishido Exhilarates

Cellist Yuuki Bouterey-Ishido Exhilarates

“On the last flaming day of June, a packed Lancaster Town Hall stood at the end to acclaim another Haffner Orchestra’s triumphant summer concert. The star of the show was a new up-and-coming young…

NZ Passport Ranked 7th Most Powerful

NZ Passport Ranked 7th Most Powerful

New Zealand has been placed on rank #7 – tied with the Czech Republic and Malta – in this year’s Henley Passport Index, which ranks “all the world’s passports according…

Rocket Lab to Open Second Launch Pad

Rocket Lab to Open Second Launch Pad

Silicon Valley-funded space launch company Rocket Lab is planning “to open a second launch site in the United States to complement its remote New Zealand pad.”  Charlotte Greenfield reports for

Ashleigh Young Turns a Lyrical Eye

Ashleigh Young Turns a Lyrical Eye

“When I uprooted my family from Seattle this year to move to Wellington, I knew little of the foreign, faraway place beyond its reputation for grey days and great coffee,” Maggie Trapp writes for…

EDGE #322: “Visionary Agent” Harry M Miller, Wayne Pivac to Succeed Warren Gatland, NZ Inside Stories + Yellow Is Forbidden + +

EDGE #322: “Visionary Agent” Harry M Miller, Wayne Pivac to Succeed Warren Gatland, NZ Inside Stories + Yellow Is Forbidden + +

News of Global New…

Discover Mudbrick Vineyard

Discover Mudbrick Vineyard

Meet Nick Jones from Mudbrick Vineyard and find out more about Waiheke – New Zealand’s “Island of Wine” in this short video from Tourism NZ. The clip is part…

Soprano Claire Egan Makes Violetta Her Own

Soprano Claire Egan Makes Violetta Her Own

Understudies rarely get the opportunity to have their names in bright lights, but a sequence of mishaps at the UK’s Longborough Festival Opera gave New Zealand-born soprano Claire Egan, 34, a starring role in one…

Meeting Jenny Dobson a Pioneer of the Médoc

Meeting Jenny Dobson a Pioneer of the Médoc

Jenny Dobson is a New Zealander considered to have been one of the first female cellar masters in the Médoc and who was subsequently nicknamed the ‘queen of red wine blending’ for her consultant…

Wayne Pivac to Succeed Warren Gatland as Wales Coach

Wayne Pivac to Succeed Warren Gatland as Wales Coach

“Scarlets head coach Wayne Pivac will succeed Warren Gatland as Wales coach on a four-year deal.” BBC reports. “Gatland is stepping down after the 2019 World Cup in Japan and…

Richard Hadlee’s the Best Bowling of All Time

Richard Hadlee’s the Best Bowling of All Time

New Zealand cricket legend Richard Hadlee has claimed top spot in ESPNcricinfo’s ‘Top 25 Bowling Performances of All Time’. ESPNcricinfo blogger Anantha Narayanan provides a table current up to the West Indies-Sri Lanka St Lucia…

Frolicking Right Whale Charms Wellingtonians

Frolicking Right Whale Charms Wellingtonians

A huge southern right whale frolicking in Wellington harbour brought the capital’s waterfront to a standstill last week as locals skipped work to catch a glimpse of the animal. Southern right whales used to be…

Robert Whittaker Named Fighter of the Year

Robert Whittaker Named Fighter of the Year

Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) middleweight champion, New Zealand-born Robert Whittaker has been named International Fighter of the Year at the World MMA Awards in Las Vegas, United States. The honour follows a 12-month period that…

Wellington Paranormal Trailer

Wellington Paranormal Trailer

Wellington Paranormal is the first of a handful of continuations of Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement’s What We Do in the Shadows and debuts on TVNZ 2 on July 11. Watch…

Trans-Tasman Tussle Over Deportation

Trans-Tasman Tussle Over Deportation

The cancellation of Australian visas on the grounds of “character” has soared since December 2014, when the government amended its immigration law. Last year, more than half of those visas belonged to New Zealanders,…

NZ Most Perilous Place for Seabirds

NZ Most Perilous Place for Seabirds

“Seabirds are more at risk of dying due to plastic in New Zealand than anywhere else in the world, new research presented to parliament has shown.” Eleanor Ainge Roy reports for

Thomasin McKenzie a Force of Nature

Thomasin McKenzie a Force of Nature

Might Debra Granik’s latest film launch New Zealand actress Thomasin McKenzie into the same stratosphere as the Oscar-winning Jennifer Lawrence? Vanity Fair investigates. Granik’s work feels like a salve to the kinetic blockbuster that fuels…

Get Summery with Emilia Wickstead and Matches

Get Summery with Emilia Wickstead and Matches

Auckland-born designer Emilia Wickstead’s summer-ready capsule collection – a collaboration with Matches Fashion – is recommended by Singapore Tatler. “British-based Wickstead, 34, creates her first vacation collection in partnership with e-retailer

Kayaker Paddles from Australia to New Zealand

Kayaker Paddles from Australia to New Zealand

“Scott Donaldson has arrived in New Plymouth after spending two months at sea, covering 2000km,” as reported in The Guardian. “The 48-year-old has become the first person to kayak the…

Yellow Is Forbidden Auckland Premiere

Yellow Is Forbidden Auckland Premiere

After premiering to fantastic reviews at Tribeca Film Festival, New York, Pietra Brettkelly’s Yellow Is Forbidden will be shown in Auckland at the upcoming New Zealand International Film Festival. “Kiwi director…

Ink Artist Steve Butcher’s Latest Eerily Lifelike

Ink Artist Steve Butcher’s Latest Eerily Lifelike

Irish UFC fighter Conor McGregor has been immortalised in a brilliantly detailed tattoo by famed ink artist, Aucklander Steve Butcher. Butcher spent 12 hours on the eerily lifelike tat on a…

Where to See Aurora Australis in NZ

Where to See Aurora Australis in NZ

Away from the main cities, New Zealand’s “velvety black skies are a milky swirl of celestial galaxies story,” writes Kate Springer in an article for CNN. “And then there’s the…

“Visionary Agent” & “Theatrical Producer” Harry M Miller

“Visionary Agent” & “Theatrical Producer” Harry M Miller

“One of Australia’s most well-known music and entertainment promoters, Harry M Miller, has died, aged 84,” writes Sam Buckingham-Jones in an article for The Australian. “By his side were his…

Dance Prodigy Joshua Guillemot-Rodgerson in Houston

Dance Prodigy Joshua Guillemot-Rodgerson in Houston

The past year has been a whirlwind of events for professional ballet dancer Joshua Guillemot-Rodgerson, Jonathan Guildford writes for Stuff. The Christchurch-born ballet prodigy has started his first professional job with the Houston Ballet company…

Ethique’s Brianne West Challenges Beauty Industry

Ethique’s Brianne West Challenges Beauty Industry

Self-taught green entrepreneur New Zealander Brianne West launched the zero-waste personal care brand Ethique to challenge the clean beauty industry to live up to its name. The company wants to stop millions of plastic…

New Netflix Show for Tickled’s David Farrier

New Netflix Show for Tickled’s David Farrier

“If you’re a weird-documentary fetishist, you’re probably already obsessed with Tickled, an unbelievably strange saga featuring underground ‘tickle cells’ and a scheming, shadowy figure who spends thousands of dollars to ruin people’s lives,” Andrew…

New Zealand’s Inside Stories Food & Beverage Film

New Zealand’s Inside Stories Food & Beverage Film

NZ Story Group have created a selection of NZ stories, which underpin the values of Kaitiaki, Ingenuity, and Integrity. The Food & Beverage Film showcases the unique attributes that sets New…

Activewear Brand Dead Studios Impresses Influencers

Activewear Brand Dead Studios Impresses Influencers

Activewear is expected to outsell luxury fashion within two years, and Australian labels are expanding aggressively and gaining recognition around the world, impressing celebrities and influencers alike. New Zealand-founded Dead Studios is riding the…

Bioethicist Josephine Johnston on Egg-Freezing

Bioethicist Josephine Johnston on Egg-Freezing

Australia’s first dedicated egg-freezing clinic opened late last year, promoting the procedure as an insurance policy against infertility. But does it represent hope, hype or heartbreak? Some call the egg freezing drive a feminist…

New Zealand’s Inside Stories

New Zealand’s Inside Stories

New Zealand Story Group have created a selection of New Zealand stories, which underpin the values of Kaitiaki, Ingenuity, and Integrity, to share with the world.” “New Zealand already has a well-deserved reputation for outstanding…

EDGE #321: Happy 4th of July; New Zealand World’s Second Safest Country, Social Enterprise Empowering Women Refugees + Taika Waititi’s Wellington Paranormal + +

EDGE #321: Happy 4th of July; New Zealand World’s Second Safest Country, Social Enterprise Empowering Women Refugees + Taika Waititi’s Wellington Paranormal + +

News of Global New…

Rare ISS Moon Shot Captured by Josh Kirkley

Rare ISS Moon Shot Captured by Josh Kirkley

Auckland amateur astrophotographer Josh Kirkley captured a shot so unusual the cameraman can be heard gasping as he films clip. Kirkley describes his “shock” at capturing footage of the International Space Station (ISS) crossing…

New Zealand’s Inside Stories Ingenuity Film

New Zealand’s Inside Stories Ingenuity Film

NZ Story Group have created a selection of NZ stories, which underpin the values of Kaitiaki, Ingenuity, and Integrity. The Ingenuity Film showcases the “unique way New Zealanders think and problem…

Billy Apple in Hong Kong and in Focus

Billy Apple in Hong Kong and in Focus

To present 21 works in Hong Kong, spanning approximately six decades (1962–2018), is an unusual occasion for Billy Apple, a groundbreaking New Zealand-born artist whose pop-infused conceptual practice is mostly acknowledged in New Zealand,…

Photojournalist Susan Skinner New US Citizen

Photojournalist Susan Skinner New US Citizen

After many years of photographing the Carmichael Independence Day Parade in Sacramento, California, newly naturalised US citizen, Susan Maxwell Skinner will this year ride in its first division as Grand Marshal. “4 July has always…

New Zealand’s Inside Stories Global Film

New Zealand’s Inside Stories Global Film

NZ Story Group have created a selection of NZ stories, which underpin the values of Kaitiaki, Ingenuity, and Integrity. The Global Film celebrates New Zealand’s unique contribution to the world…

J-Law-Like Rise of Thomasin McKenzie

J-Law-Like Rise of Thomasin McKenzie

This January, Winter’s Bone director Debra Granik returned to Sundance, to premiere her follow-up narrative feature, Leave No Trace. And she again brought with her a precocious talent in a role that could be…

Jacinda Ardern What the Global Left Needs Now

Jacinda Ardern What the Global Left Needs Now

The future of the left is bright if it looks like Jacinda Ardern and American political activist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, according to Guardian Australian columnist Van Badham. As a political communication, Ardern’s recent handheld Facebook Live…

100% Pure New Zealand: A Welcoming Journey

100% Pure New Zealand: A Welcoming Journey

New Zealanders are known for welcoming tourists and locals alike into their beautiful country. Watch Tourism NZ’s latest ad “A Welcoming Journey” here to see and hear more about the…

Taika Waititi & Jemaine Clement’s Latest: Wellington Paranormal

Taika Waititi & Jemaine Clement’s Latest: Wellington Paranormal

“Police officers try to solve New Zealand’s most absurd paranormal and supernatural cases in Waititi and Clement’s new comedy series  Wellington Paranormal,” which is the first of a handful of continuations of Taika Waititi…

Matt Arbuckle to Exhibit at Melbourne Art Fair

Matt Arbuckle to Exhibit at Melbourne Art Fair

Auckland artist Matt Arbuckle is one of six artists featured in Grazia Australia as “most exciting emerging artists exhibiting as part of the Melbourne Art Fair.” Nicholas Carolan reports. The Melbourne…

Maori Hāngi in Rotorua One of World’s Top Experiences

Maori Hāngi in Rotorua One of World’s Top Experiences

A Maori Hāngi in Rotorua has been recognized as one of the world’s best experiences in TripAdvisor’s Travelers’ Choice Awards for Experiences. Travel Daily News reports. “Experiences are often the highlight…

Slow Down With Low-Key Drama ‘Leave No Trace’

Slow Down With Low-Key Drama ‘Leave No Trace’

“Purposefully slow cinema can be a welcome respite from the craziness in both our world and multiplexes,” writes Linsey Bahr in an article for The Daily Democrat. “That is exactly…

NZ Wine Wows With Surprises

NZ Wine Wows With Surprises

“’The speed of change in New Zealand wine leaves me breathless,’ writes Elin McCoy after visiting the country for tastings earlier this year.” McCoy reports for Decanter. New Zealand always seems…