Tag Archives: Deadline

Niki Caro Holds Reins Tight in The Mother

Niki Caro Holds Reins Tight in The Mother

“The Mother is a mutha of an intimately scaled action film, a violent female-centric drama about a hardened combat veteran who has great difficulty adapting to being anything other than a…

Alex Liu Receives MGM Film Script Deal

Alex Liu Receives MGM Film Script Deal

MGM and The Black List have named Auckland-based Alex Liu, 30, as the third recipient to receive a two-step Guild minimum open script deal as part of their two-year feature film script writing partnership,…

Emmy Haul for Peter Jackson’s Beatles Doco

Emmy Haul for Peter Jackson’s Beatles Doco

The Beatles: Get Back producer-director New Zealander Peter Jackson has shared the Emmy for Outstanding Documentary or Nonfiction series with Paul McCartney, Ringo Starr, and fellow producers Yoko Ono Lennon, Olivia Harrison, Clare Olssen,…

Peter Jackson Has Hand in Beatles Duet

Peter Jackson Has Hand in Beatles Duet

Paul McCartney and his late Beatles songwriting and singing partner John Lennon haven’t sung together in 53 years, but thanks to New Zealand film director Peter Jackson, they got the next best thing recently…

RuPaul’s Drag Race Heads Down Under

RuPaul’s Drag Race Heads Down Under

Emmy-winning production company World of Wonder is bringing RuPaul’s drag queen reality series to New Zealand and Australia, and it will be appropriately titled RuPaul’s Drag Race Down Under, Dino-Ray Ramos reports for Deadline. RuPaul…

London Tattooist Nikole Lowe Inks Wallpaper

London Tattooist Nikole Lowe Inks Wallpaper

New Zealand-born tattooist Nikole Lowe, 47, who lives in London and runs studio, Good Times Tattoo, has taken her skills in a new direction – wallpaper design. After the studio was closed by Covid-19,

Why Everyone Wants A Piece Of Shift72

Why Everyone Wants A Piece Of Shift72

Many film companies have taken a battering during the pandemic. The opposite is true of New Zealand-based video streaming platform Shift72, which has grown by 400 per cent. Andreas Wiseman reports for Deadline. Business for…

Taika Waititi Explains Our Sense of Humour

Taika Waititi Explains Our Sense of Humour

New Zealander Taika Waititi is now one of Hollywood’s hardest working filmmakers with a slew of projects in development, writes Joe Utichi, who interviews the director for entertainment news site, Deadline. Wherever he goes…

Rose Matafeo to Star in Taika Waititi Exec Produced ‘Baby, Done’

Rose Matafeo to Star in Taika Waititi Exec Produced ‘Baby, Done’

New Zealand comedian Rose Matafeo will star alongside Harry Potter star Matthew Lewis in feature comedy Baby, Done, which is exec produced by Taika Waititi. The film is directed by Curtis Vowell (Fantail). Nancy…

Ava DuVernay’s ARRAY Picks Up Merata Doco

Ava DuVernay’s ARRAY Picks Up Merata Doco

American director Ava DuVernay, of A Wrinkle in Time fame, has acquired the Sundance Film Festival (SFF) documentary MERATA: How Mum Decolonised the Screen. The pick-up by DuVernay’s film collective, ARRAY…

Taika Waititi Speaks at Toronto Master Class

Taika Waititi Speaks at Toronto Master Class

“I dreamt of becoming a filmmaker in my 30s, it was an arranged marriage,” New Zealand director Taika Waititi told the audience at a recent Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF)…

What We Do in the Shadows Gets TV Reboot

What We Do in the Shadows Gets TV Reboot

A long-in-the-works half-hour television comedy based on the 2014 mockumentary horror film What We Do in the Shadows, co-written and co-directed by and starring Jemaine Clement and Taika Waititi, is slated to premiere in…

Stefania LaVie Owen Cast in Dick Cheney Biopic Casts

Stefania LaVie Owen Cast in Dick Cheney Biopic Casts

Kiwi actress “Stefania LaVie Owen has joined Christian Bale, Steve Carell, Amy Adams, and Bill Pullman in Annapura’s Dick Cheney biopic, titled Backseat, written and directed by Adam McKay,” as reported on

Keisha Castle-Hughes in Negotiations for FBI Crime-Drama ‘Manifesto’

Keisha Castle-Hughes in Negotiations for FBI Crime-Drama ‘Manifesto’

New Zealand actress Keisha Castle-Hughes is in negotiations for Discovery Channel’s high-profile FBI drama Manifesto, as reported in Deadline. Castle-Hughes “will play Tabby, a street agent who partners with FBI special agent Jim…

Cliff Curtis Joins Warner Bros’ Shark Pic ‘Meg’

Cliff Curtis Joins Warner Bros’ Shark Pic ‘Meg’

New Zealand actor Cliff Curtis has joined the cast for Warner Bros’ Shark Pic ‘Meg’, as reported in Deadline. The film is based on Steve Alten’s 1997 novel, Meg: A Novel of…

Jono Kenyon To Star in Shonda Rhimes ‘Toast’

Jono Kenyon To Star in Shonda Rhimes ‘Toast’

Kiwi actor Jono Kenyon has landed the male lead in Toast – ABC’s hybrid comedy pilot from Shonda Rhimes and Betsy Beers’ Shondaland – alongside Grey’s Anatomy alumna Tessa Ferrer. “So excited to announce my next project! Lead role in an…

Peter Jackson-Backed Movie Museum Wins Approval

Peter Jackson-Backed Movie Museum Wins Approval

“Hobbits, Orcs, Ents and maybe even some Na’vi are getting their own museum in New Zealand’s capital city,” writes Nancy Tartaglione in an article for Deadline. The project – a combined movie museum…

Star-Studded Everest Film Re-Treks Fatal Expedition

Star-Studded Everest Film Re-Treks Fatal Expedition

The story of Christchurch mountaineer Rob Hall’s tragic 1996 Everest expedition in which he, a fellow guide, and two clients perished, is being made into a film by director Baltasar Kormakur, and will star…

Bevan’s Gold Win

Bevan’s Gold Win

Queenstown-born film producer Tim Bevan (standing left in picture) took the stage with fellow cast and crew at the 70th Golden Globes Awards for Best Motion Picture, Musical or Comedy for Les Misérables. The…

Army Band humour

Army Band humour

New Zealand’s Army Band will perform at the 6th anniversary of the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo in August. Major Leanne Smith, director of music for the 28-piece Band said they can’t wait to perform…