News of New Zealanders via Global Media

Producer Obeisant Busy at His Catalogue

Producer Obeisant Busy at His Catalogue

Music producer Sebastian Gawlik, aka Obeisant, is an artist from New Zealand who got a mighty push in 2017 when he was discovered by the Critical label and included in their Binary series, electronic music site Your…

Keala Settle Praised for Oscars Performance

Keala Settle Praised for Oscars Performance

“When she found herself center stage at the Oscars Sunday night” Singer Keala Settle “brought down the house with” her performance of ‘This Is Me’, “bringing an entire theater of Hollywood luminaries to their…

Gibbs Farm – An Insta-Worthy Travel Experience

Gibbs Farm – An Insta-Worthy Travel Experience

“Social media has enabled people to travel brag as soon as the vacation starts.” The most common themes are food, landscapes or landmarks, cityscapes, beaches and drinks. Posing with unique art installations at Gibbs…

Thor: Ragnarok’s Hidden New Zealand and Australia References

Thor: Ragnarok’s Hidden New Zealand and Australia References

“There are fans who are going to want to come back for more just to notice every detail that New Zealand director Taika Waititi stuck in”  Thor: Ragnarok, writes Luke Y. Thompson in an…

Jon Stevens Takes Best Of Tour to NSW

Jon Stevens Takes Best Of Tour to NSW

“After a career spanning decades, rock musician Jon Stevens has finally taken time to reflect on his greatest hits — and take them on the road” with his ‘best of tour’ around Australia. The…

With FAKY Anna Sawai Is Broadening Her Horizons

With FAKY Anna Sawai Is Broadening Her Horizons

Loads of acts around the world are proving that the pop game is now a truly global one, and FAKY continues to show the rising appeal of modern-day Japanese pop with their latest English…

Magnetic Marlon Plays Brilliant Tiny Desk Session

Magnetic Marlon Plays Brilliant Tiny Desk Session

“Marlon Williams is a handsome devil with a heart-stopping voice, who writes songs about vampires and horror films. This 27-year-old, New Zealand-born, Melbourne-based singer is also a teller of tales,” tastemaster Bob Boilen writes…

At Home with Newsreader Kay McGrath

At Home with Newsreader Kay McGrath

For a woman who has appeared in living rooms across Queensland almost nightly for 30 years, Channel Seven newsreader New Zealand-born Kay McGrath is a little uncomfortable in her own. “I wish I hadn’t put…

Vicki Lee Takes Music of Vera Lynn Across Sussex

Vicki Lee Takes Music of Vera Lynn Across Sussex

Palmerston North singer Vicki Lee, 64, is touring Sussex, England in February with her tribute to the life and music of centenarian Dame Vera Lynn, known as the ‘Forces’ Sweetheart’. The show began life in…

Staring Down the Barrel with Aldous Harding

Staring Down the Barrel with Aldous Harding

Aldous Harding’s sophomore album Party has every right to stake its claim as the best album of last year, according to Melbourne-based lifestyle website Broadsheet. The power of Harding’s voice was only hinted at…

Boy Fans Will Love The Breakers and Upperers

Boy Fans Will Love The Breakers and Upperers

If you enjoy contemporary New Zealand comedies like Boy, What We Do in the Shadows, and Hunt for the Wilderpeople, then you should put this Taika Waititi-executive produced title The Breaker Upperers on your radar, recommends…

Superorganism’s Harry Lets Us in on Band’s Mystique

Superorganism’s Harry Lets Us in on Band’s Mystique

Signing to Domino Records mid-2017, the fun pop eight-piece Superorganism has since kept a pretty exclusive profile, playing only a handful of shows throughout the entire year. With the release of their self-titled debut…

Maryanne Redpath at Helm of Berlinale’s Generation

Maryanne Redpath at Helm of Berlinale’s Generation

Within 10 years, former artist, teacher and filmmaker New Zealand-born Maryanne Redpath has turned the Berlinale youth section Generation into one of the most popular strands of the film festival, with a gem-packed programme…

Robyn Malcolm on Cleavage and Credibility

Robyn Malcolm on Cleavage and Credibility

It is something of a surprise to see New Zealander Robyn Malcolm looking positively restrained, wearing a conservative skirt and blouse, for her role as Maxine Pavich in the new ABC television drama series…

Adrian Ramsay: Making Your Dream Home A Reality

Adrian Ramsay: Making Your Dream Home A Reality

“The idea of the dream home is something we all have. But what most of us don’t is someone to realise it for us. Consider then the genius mind of Adrian Ramsay, who prides…

Artist Francis Upritchard Describes Balata

Artist Francis Upritchard Describes Balata

A festive crowd of art-lovers gathered at Lux Art Institute in Encinitas, California recently for the opening of a show by the first of its 2018 resident artists, London-based New Zealander Francis Upritchard. Upritchard’s odd…

Unknown Mortal Orchestra Begin Promotion of New LP

Unknown Mortal Orchestra Begin Promotion of New LP

The follow-up to New Zealand band Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s 2015 album Multi-Love, their fourth studio album, Sex & Food is out on 6 April. Bandleader Ruban Nielson described the impetus behind the album, saying he wanted to…

Anna Paquin Does Some Detective Work in Bellevue

Anna Paquin Does Some Detective Work in Bellevue

New Zealander Anna Paquin plays Detective Anna Ryder in the Canadian television series, Bellevue. “Paquin, whose onscreen presence guarantees an otherworldly, alienating grace, is doing more work than is first apparent,” Variety TV critic…

Sriwhana Spong Considers Monuments to Oppression

Sriwhana Spong Considers Monuments to Oppression

“A quiet but intensely powerful exhibition at San Francisco nonprofit gallery Kadist refutes the idea that we can shed the pain of the history of oppression by turning away from it,” Charles Desmarais writes…

Inspiring Cancer Story Written by Petra Kotrotsos

Inspiring Cancer Story Written by Petra Kotrotsos

Wellingtonian Petra Kotrotsos is not your average 21-year-old, according to Melbourne-based Greek community newspaper Neos Kosmos. A video blogger and aspiring filmmaker, she’s also a cancer veteran, having been through various treatments since she…

Opuio Releases Striking Ginger Lizard Video

Opuio Releases Striking Ginger Lizard Video

New Zealand-born Melbourne-based producer Oscar Davey-Wraight, aka Opiuo, has released the official video for his brand new single Ginger Lizard, which is taken from his forthcoming EP, Syzygy 01 scheduled for release on 2…

Conductor Michael Joel Directs Fine Concert

Conductor Michael Joel Directs Fine Concert

Under the direction of New Zealand-born conductor Michael Joel, the Lakeland Sinfonia “presented a programme that was well-suited to their strengths,” according to the Westmorland Gazette’s Adrian Mullen in a review of a recent…

Ice Sculptor Tatiana Zimina Competes in China

Ice Sculptor Tatiana Zimina Competes in China

New Zealander Tatiana Zimina has recently returned from northeast China where she competed in ice and snow sculpting with her partner and two friends in the annual Harbin International Ice and Snow Sculpture Festival. The…

Marlon Williams Leads Fertile Lyttelton Music Scene

Marlon Williams Leads Fertile Lyttelton Music Scene

There is nothing like some personal trauma to fuel the muse of a songwriter. Acclaimed New Zealand troubadour Marlon Williams, 27, can attest to that, and the results are etched deeply into the grooves…

New Zealand Captured in Dreamy Infrared

New Zealand Captured in Dreamy Infrared

Interested in producing images on “the fringe of the otherworldly,” California-based landscape photographer Paul Hoi creatively combines science fiction with psychedelia. Using a camera modified for full spectrum infrared, Hoi transforms familiar visuals into…

Shotover Tech Wizards Score Early Oscar for Aerials

Shotover Tech Wizards Score Early Oscar for Aerials

Queenstown design engineers John Coyle, Brad Hurndell, Vikas Sathaye and Shane Buckham have scored a jump on Margot Robbie, Daniel Day-Lewis and Meryl Streep a month before the Oscars. The group has just been…

Aaron Jeffery Gets into the Head of Chopper Read

Aaron Jeffery Gets into the Head of Chopper Read

A quirk of fate could have changed the path of Australian film history and seen New Zealander Aaron Jeffery play Chopper Read nearly 20 years ago. “I auditioned for the original Chopper movie,” Jeffery, 47,…

Tape Face Gets Stuck Into Vegas

Tape Face Gets Stuck Into Vegas

New Zealand silent comedian Sam Wills, aka Tape Face, is to embark on a three-year residency in Las Vegas. The Harrah’s casino has custom-built a cabaret venue for his mime show at a reported cost…

Braindead as Outrageous as it is Brilliant

Braindead as Outrageous as it is Brilliant

Peter Jackson’s 1992 “gore-fest” Braindead has been named one of the 30 most violent films ever made by entertainment website GamesRadar+. The list also includes Irreversible, Evil Dead and Cannibal Holocaust. Alex Avard writes for the…

KJ Apa to Star in Romantic Comedy The Last Summer

KJ Apa to Star in Romantic Comedy The Last Summer

New Zealander KJ Apa is coming back to the big screen. Teen Vogue reports that the Riverdale star recently got a part in the new movie The Last Summer, a romantic comedy that centres…

Kimbra’s Third Album Primal Heart Out in April

Kimbra’s Third Album Primal Heart Out in April

Ahead of a recent show at Chicago’s Conchord Music Hall, New Zealand singer, songwriter and producer Kimbra, 27, spoke with Jim Ryan of ChicagoNow about her third studio album Primal Heart, its theme of…

War Correspondent Kate Webb Read Her Own Obits

War Correspondent Kate Webb Read Her Own Obits

She was sitting on the steps of her hotel, in the middle of Saigon, when the military jeeps zipped by, headed toward the sound of gunfire. So that’s where Kate Webb headed, too. “I…

Mark Bridgwater’s Breathtaking Outdoor Shot

Mark Bridgwater’s Breathtaking Outdoor Shot

Christchurch commercial and adventure sports photographer Mark Bridgwater’s shot of fellow New Zealander, skier Charlie Lyons flying down the slopes at Temple Basin in Arthur’s Pass, was recently included in a Guardian selection of…

Author Ruth Park Knew Writing Was Life Itself

Author Ruth Park Knew Writing Was Life Itself

Auckland-born Ruth Park and Australians Gwen Harwood, Dorothy Hewett, Christina Stead, writers born more or less as the 20th century dawned, followed their flame, each woman, as Queensland-based literary scholar Ann-Marie Priest sympathetically shows…

Vampires Get Their Teeth into Some Small Screen

Vampires Get Their Teeth into Some Small Screen

A television reboot based on Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement’s 2014 smash hit mockumentary What We Do in the Shadows has landed a pilot-production order at American channel FX. According to the Hollywood Reporter, the…

Writer and Engineer Ben Sanders Ups the Stakes

Writer and Engineer Ben Sanders Ups the Stakes

For a couple of days a week, Ben Sanders, 28, is a mild-mannered New Zealand engineer; the rest of the time he’s dreaming crimes and mayhem on the mean streets of the United States….

Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie’s New Role Enigmatic

Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie’s New Role Enigmatic

Among the most anticipated films of this year’s Sundance Film Festival has been Winter’s Bone director Debra Granik’s Leave No Trace, starring 17-year-old New Zealander Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie. Leave No Trace had its world premiere…

Lorde at Home with Billboard Magazine

Lorde at Home with Billboard Magazine

For a minute, it’s easy to forget that Lorde is over 13,800km away, at home in New Zealand, Billboard journalist New Yorker Brooke Mazurek writes for the magazine’s latest cover story. Before their Skype connection…

Mark Burry Recognised in Australia Day Honours

Mark Burry Recognised in Australia Day Honours

The Council of the Order of Australia has recognised New Zealand architect and educator Mark Burry, 60, in the 2018 Australia Day Honours list. Melbourne-based Burry was appointed an Officer of the Order of Australia…

Peter Jackson Brings WWI to Life With New 3D Film

Peter Jackson Brings WWI to Life With New 3D Film

“A new 3D film by director Peter Jackson is set to bring the First World War to life in a way never seen before,” writes Laura Lambert in an article in

“This Giant Papier-Mâché Boulder Is Actually Really Heavy” Excels On A Shoestring

“This Giant Papier-Mâché Boulder Is Actually Really Heavy” Excels On A Shoestring

“With an affection for nerd culture that is inversely proportional to its budget, this lo-fi sci-fi comedy is destined for laugh-filled late-night viewing,” writes Kimber Myers in a review in the

Julia Croft Strips the Layers Off Sexual Stereotypes

Julia Croft Strips the Layers Off Sexual Stereotypes

In If There’s Not Dancing At The Revolution, I’m Not Coming, New Zealander Julia Croft performs a striptease and dissects the objectification of the female body in pop culture. Croft took the show to…

Dancer Brendan Cole Readies for Belfast Shows

Dancer Brendan Cole Readies for Belfast Shows

Ahead of his shows at the Waterfront Hall in Belfast this March, Strictly Come Dancing star New Zealander Brendan Cole, 41, tells Belfast Telegraph journalist Stephanie Bell why he is no longer the bad…

NZ Actress One of Sundance Festival’s Breakout Stars

NZ Actress One of Sundance Festival’s Breakout Stars

Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie has been named one of the five breakout stars of the Sundance Film Festival in an article in The Hollywood Reporter. The New Zealand actress is starring in Leave No…

WWII Love Story by Heather Morris Reviewed

WWII Love Story by Heather Morris Reviewed

Out of one of the worst periods of human history comes an inspirational story, a beacon of light amidst the dark ruins of the Holocaust. For three years before his death in 2006, Lale…

Martin Henderson Reveals He’s Yet to Master Accents

Martin Henderson Reveals He’s Yet to Master Accents

He’s the Auckland-born actor best known for his role on American drama Grey’s Anatomy. But despite the show being filmed and set abroad, former Shortland Street heart-throb Martin Henderson, 43, admits he is yet…

Superyacht designer Ron Holland Pens Memoir

Superyacht designer Ron Holland Pens Memoir

“Given that his single-masted creation M5 is too tall to pass beneath Ron Holland had trouble holding a ‘personal memoir’ to 400 pages…

Otago Band Albion Place Head Across the Tasman

Otago Band Albion Place Head Across the Tasman

Dunedin-based indie-rockers Albion Place had a big 2017, with the group’s debut album Mascuzzi Jacuzzi released in December, and their Australian summer tour about to begin. The release of Easier in May and If This…

Praise for Anthony McCarten’s Darkest Hour

Praise for Anthony McCarten’s Darkest Hour

Written by New Zealand-born filmmaker, Academy Award-nominated Anthony McCarten – best known for the screenplay he wrote for The Theory of Everything – Winston Churchill biopic Darkest Hour “is an expertly crafted history lesson…

Mural of Whero O Te Rangi Bailey Explained

Mural of Whero O Te Rangi Bailey Explained

Canadian artist Kevin Ledo is known for his impressive murals of portraits, and this time it’s a portrait of Whero O Te Rangi Bailey, a Maori elder from Parihaka in Taranaki, originally photographed by…

Top 2018 Comedy Acts Include Two NZ Favourites

Top 2018 Comedy Acts Include Two NZ Favourites

Flight of the Conchords and Rose Matafeo are two “uproarious” comedy acts Guardian readers are recommended to buy tickets for this year, included alongside the world’s biggest standup Chris Rock and fellow American Maria…

Outsider Fair Preview of Susan Te Kahurangi King

Outsider Fair Preview of Susan Te Kahurangi King

“As the Outsider Art Fair (OAF) – which opens 18 January, and runs through 21 January – rolls into town, the specialised sector it celebrates has plenty to crow about,…

Hollywood Directors Like Niki Caro a Force

Hollywood Directors Like Niki Caro a Force

Never in the history of Hollywood has more than one female filmmaker been at the helm of a feature with a budget of USD$100 million or more – until now. On the heels of…

Beulah Koale’s Role Breakout Performance of ‘17

Beulah Koale’s Role Breakout Performance of ‘17

New Zealand actor Beulah Koale’s role in the 2017 film Thank You For Your Service has been deemed a “breakout” performance of the year by industry publication Variety. “As more people discover this quiet gem…

Anthony McCarten on the Challenge of Churchill

Anthony McCarten on the Challenge of Churchill

Darkest Hour depicts Winston Churchill in the crucial weeks that defined him as a wartime leader. Screen Daily’s Jeremy Kay talks to writer-producer, New Plymouth-born Anthony McCarten and Working Title’s Eric Fellner about taking…

There Are English Trees in Neil Finn’s Garden

There Are English Trees in Neil Finn’s Garden

A recent Guardian reader-curated playlist about trees includes songs from the Beach Boys, Esperanza Spalding, the Shamen and Crowded House. “Since time immemorial trees have provided people with shelter, food, lumber and even medicine. They…