International Bright Young Thing

Anna Paquin talks dogs, dorm-living, Degas and “living long distance” with the Independent. Currently studying art history – between films – at Columbia University, Paquin will next be seen…

Weta Digital Uncovered

The Wellington-based animation team behind the Lord of the Rings‘ award-winning visual effects were one of the main attractions at the annual Siggraph exhibition in San Diego, California. Established…

For him (and her)

First we were treated to the infinite variety of feminine experience in The Vagina Monologues; now actress and playwright Geraldine Brophy has penned the masculine equivalent. She describes The…

Kiwi snaps up award

NZer Antony Rieck was named Photographer of the Year at the annual Florida Association of the American Institute of Architects design awards held on August 2. Rieck, who has…

The everyman of pop

NZ-born pop star, Daniel Bedingfeld, shares his thoughts on friends, family, and musical inspiration in an interview with the Guardian. An artist of chameleon-like musical abilities, Bedingfeld has been…

Sydney set in stone

Wellington-born Sydney Goodsir Smith is to join the ranks of Scottish poets immortalised in stone outside Edinburgh’s Writer’s Museum. The Makars’ Court attraction is the Scottish equivalent of Westminster…

Ted Man Walking

Kiwi baritone Teddy Tahu Rhodes is the Weekend Australian’s cover-boy for his lead role in opera Dead Man Walking, which opens shortly at Adelaide’s Festival Theatre. The opera is…

Third Culturist Boyd nets Nabokov

Brian Boyd-edited Nabokov’s Butterflies, an exploration of Nabokov’s obsession with butterflies that posits Nabokov’s scientific pursuit of lepidoptry as a way of understanding the author more completely, hailed…

Soul Sister

NZ-born Carla Werner’s debut album – Departure – proves a moving experience for New York Daily News reviewer, Jim Farber. ” have a compellingly confessional quality … Werner…

Land of the long black shadow

The Stedelijk Museum curated Colin McCahon retrospective – ‘A Question of Faith’ – reviewed in the Weekend Australian, prior to its opening at the Ian Potter Centre in Melbourne’s…

A View from Down Under

A forum for ex-pat NZ, Australian, and South African amateur filmmakers living in London – the UpOverDownUnder film festival – is now in its third year. Over…

Sarah-Kate Lynch’s Sure-to-rise Kitchen

Ex-NZ Women’s Weekly editor, Sarah-Kate Lynch, interviewed in Canada’s National Post about her first novel – Blessed are the Cheesemakers. The tale of a cheese-making couple and their musical…

Datsuns apply the brakes

The Datsuns made their debut appearance at Ozzfest in July – looking, in their words, like a group of “Nancy-boys” amidst a sea of metal. Rolling Stone had a…

The Poetry of Exile

Displaced artists and writers from around the world gathered at Auckland University in July for a 3-day conference examining the link between exile and creativity. Organised by Professor Mike…

Central Park Sounds From the Edge

A diverse showcase of NZ music was held at New York’s Central Park Summerstage on July 13. ‘New Zealand Sounds’ brought together the “catchy and hummable” tunes of Greg…

Return of the Native?

As Whale Rider premieres in the UK, the Guardian ponders its impact as NZ and Maori cinema, and the cultural factors at play. “longside the celebration in New Zealand’s…

Something to Sing About

Singing star Jonathan Lemalu gave a recital at London’s St Lawrence Jewry church as part of the City of London’s New Generations series. Financial Times: “In the English-language repertoire…

Edge Polish

Saatchi & Saatchi global CEO Kevin Roberts interviewed in Poland on the future of advertising and how Saatchis has triumphed through the recession (Advertising Age named it Global Agency…

Weta’s Secrets Revealed

Te Papa’s record-breaking Lord of the Rings exhibition opens at London’s Science Museum in September – it’s only European showing before travelling to Singapore, Sydney, and Boston. The exhibition…

The Magus and His Protégés

“Do creative writing courses work? Judge for yourselves.” The Guardian’s literary gossip column reports on the findings of a recent NZ Listener poll naming the country’s top 10 authors…

The first, second, and third Noel

The trio behind Kiwi comedy act The Four Noels – James Pratt, John Forman, and Jesse Griffin – interviewed in SMH. The group formed in 1996, without any strictly…

Tried and true formula with a new direction

An impassioned performance by The Datsuns at London’s Shepherds Bush Empire earns them (another) rave review in the Guardian. “Amid the hand-clapping, singing, and Dolf’s stage diving, Christian balances…

Narnia to Aotearoa

The multi-million dollar production of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe is now likely to be shot substantially in NZ, following the government’s decision to allow a tax-exemption…

Sing Bravo Bravo

Whale Rider praise swells in both broadsheet and tabloid reviews on its UK premiere. Daily Telegraph: “Bereft of name actors, supersaturated colours and egregious product placements, it shows…

Tali tumeke

MC Tali, Roni Size’s edge in the machine, profiled in Guardian review of the dance tent at mud/music fest Glastonbury: “The most notable is Tali, the female hotshot from…

Kiwi ads bug Cannes

Kiwi ad agencies excelled at last month’s International Advertising Festival in Cannes. Grey Worldwide Auckland won the Outdoor Grand Prix for its innovative insect-eye-view Kiwicare bug spray campaign and…

Glamour Girls

A photographic exhibition by NZ artist Fiona Clark is creating a stir at Sydney’s Mori Gallery. Go Girl – a series of portraits of NZ’s transgender and transvestite community…

The many faces of Cliff Curtis

Tribune feature on Cliff Curtis tracks his career trajectory from Once Were Warriors to Whale Rider. While the two movies appear vastly different in subject and style, Curtis is…

Laga’aia Lionised

NZ performers feature strongly in Sydney’s highly anticipated production of The Lion King. Vincent Harde plays the lead role of Simba, with Water Rats star Jay Laga’aia as his…

Seriously comic

The Weekend Australian profiles NZ-born and Ilam (University of Canterbury) trained graphic artist Colin Wilson. Virtually unknown in the antipodes Wilson has millions of avid overseas fans and…

Mita takes pride of place

Maori filmmaker Merata Mita was the star guest at Montreal’s 13th First Peoples’ Festival last month – a celebration of the world’s aboriginal cultures. The Cinematheque Quebecoise held a…

Serious as anything

NZ-born Mambo creative and ex-Mental as Anything guitarist Reg Mombassa turns his satiric talents to serious effect for Isle of Refuge, a show of 13 high-profile Australian artists protesting the…

Lady Ngila

“The costume designer deserves a knighthood.” Award-winning Kiwi costumier, Ngila Dickson, receives nameless praise in Empire magazine for her “impressive rendering of 19th century Japan” in previews of Tom…

Henwood plays Burton

Welsh-Wellingtonian actor, Ray Henwood, thrilled Melbourne audiences with his portrayal of theatre legend Richard Burton, in Mark Jenkins’ Playing Burton. The Age: “Henwood’s fine performance, beautifully paced, movingly builds…

Richard’s rocky road

Rocky Horror man, Richard O’Brien, interviewed about life and love in the Times. The weekly column – ‘Love etc’ – invites celebrities to divulge how different relationships have shaped…

That’ll be 2 Gandalfs and a Bilbo, thanks

A series of Lord of the Rings collectors’ coins will be legal tender in NZ by 2004. The gold, silver and cupro-nickel coins are to be struck by the…

Welding the past

Auto da Fay, Fay Weldon’s memoirs spanning her NZ upbringing and early adulthood in London, reviewed in the New York Times. “You hesitate to label Auto da Fay -…

James treatment for Kiwi ‘boys together’ tale

The latest play by renowned British actor and writer Lennie James – The Sons of Charlie Paora – features a group of NZ actors telling a quintessentially NZ story….

Slow burner

Annamarie Jagose’s Slow Water – the tale of a gradual unravelling of English class systems and sexual identities on a voyage to colonial NZ – praised in the SMH….

Euphoria Against the Odds

The world premiere of Jane Campion’s An Angel at My Table was listed as one of the 50 greatest moments in the Sydney Film Festival’s first 50 years of…

In love with Earth’s wild places

Celebrated NZ photographer, Wayne Papps remembered. Papps was best known for his striking images of Antarctica, which he produced as a member of the Australian Antarctic Division. Regarded as…

Built edge

Wellington architect Chris Kelly was a guest speaker at the Royal Australian Institute of Architects’ annual conference, ‘Imagining Architecture’ in June. Part of a select group of “some…

Hunter in denial

Rachel Hunter has won a role in Britain’s eagerly anticipated version of Sex & the City – Denial. The show, which has been at the centre of an international…

Living the High Life

Sir Edmund Hillary received a hero’s welcome in London at an hour-long signing of his books High Adventure and View from the Summit. Dozens of admirers queued in the…

NYNZ – Ihimaera on

Whale Rider author and ex-diplomat to the US Witi Ihimaera interviewed in New York – the city where he penned the story behind the award-winning film. “One morning I…

Queen of the Castle

Exuding star quality while remaining “refreshingly down-to-earth”, Whale Rider star Keisha Castle-Hughes, feted in the New York Post, The State, and the Seattle Times and is…

Rhodes steers latest hit

Kiwi singing star Teddy Tahu Rhodes has a lead role in the latest opera by Academy Award-winning composer Rachel Portman. Portman’s adaptation of the classic French children’s book The…

Music for the soul

Maori music provides “one of the most moving sections” on the Grammy-nominated global project, One Giant Leap. Fronted by ex-Faithless member Jamie Catto, the groundbreaking production brings together artists…

Bollywood Hills

NZ based Bollywood production company – Kuran Films – cottoned on to the the country’s scenic opportunities well before Lord of the Rings. Established in 1993 by Kamal Singh,…

“Snap, crackle and grace”

SMH: “Black Grace, New Zealand’s all-male company of Maori and Pacific Island dancers, is the most engaging and entertaining company to visit Sydney for years. Maybe since the…

A Man of Wealth and Taste: Harry M. Miller

“Should the job go to the vulgar New Zealander who had brought the Rolling Stones to Australia?” Sydney icon, edge arts patron and tour promoter, Harry M. Miller is…

Rings wins double at Saturns

Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers was a multiple winner at the 29th annual Saturn Awards – a joint presentation of the Academy of Science Fiction,…

Jeffs with best

Christine Jeffs’ acclaimed feature, Rain, was included in the second series of the Zahir Raihan Film Society’s Best Films of 2002, joining Philip Noyce’s The Quiet American and Mike…

Spoken word

The old and new schools of NZ literature were represented at May’s Sydney Writers Festival, with eminent man of letters CK Stead and fresh talent Chad Taylor…

KTV: Kinetic Television

Work by pioneering NZ filmmaker, artist, kinetic sculpter and general ‘crazy guy’, Len Lye, is featured in the exhibition ‘A Century of Artists’ Film in Britain’ at the Tate…

Tremain Mines Our Past

The latest offering from award-winning British author, Rose Tremain, finds its inspiration in mid-19th century NZ and thwarted edge expectations: “We will not cling to familiar ways. We will…