Jacinda Ardern Implores Nuclear Weapons States
“Our world is at greater risk of nuclear catastrophe than at any time since the height of the cold war. Growing superpower tensions and two decades of stalled progress on arms control have pushed…
Tag Archives: Guardian (The)
Margaret Urlich a True and Rare Talent
Auckland-born Margaret Urlich, an Aria award-winning singer and one of New Zealand’s most successful musicians, has died at her home in New South Wales’ Southern Highlands, aged 57. Michael Sun of The Guardian looks…
Inspirational Dancer Rodney Bell Tours Meremere
The love of Rodney Bell’s life is his lightweight titanium wheelchair. It is his partner in dance and an extension of his body, allowing him to weave into his performances the elements of earth,…
Conchord Bret McKenzie on His Serious Solo Debut
He has written duets for man and Muppet, parodied Morrissey in The Simpsons, and become Hollywood’s go-to for bringing ‘heart’ to the movies. Now Academy Award-winning Wellington musician Bret McKenzie, 46, is ready to…
Why Is Jacinda Ardern More Popular Overseas?
In 2017, Jacindamania swept the world. A young, charismatic New Zealander led the Labour party to victory. But lately, Ardern and the New Zealand Labour government have slumped in the polls. In this episode…
Country Queen Tami Neilson at Her Imperious Best
“She’s laden with every music award her adopted homeland New Zealand can muster, but the queen of Kiwi country deserves a wider audience,” The Observer’s Neil Spencer writes in a review…
High Praise for Lorde’s London Night Out
Lorde is Kitty Empire’s ‘Artist of the Week’, The Guardian reviewer deeming the pop singer’s sold-out Alexandra Palace concert a “magnificent night out”. “By turns tearful and rocking out, the New Zealand star is on…
Chantelle Nicholson’s Apricity Airy and Elegant
New Zealander Chantelle Nicholson’s new London restaurant Apricity is “staffed by mellow, thoughtful, industrious types who genuinely care about how the restaurant scene affects our planet”, Guardian critic Grace Dent writes. “This is an airy,…
The Boys Star Karl Urban On New Superhero Status
Although Amazon’s The Boys is an ensemble show, Stuart Heritage writes for The Guardian, with a sprawling collection of superheroes and antihero vigilantes, New Zealander Karl Urban has emerged as the show’s lead. His…
How the Soldiers Who Met Harold Gillies Recovered
A history of pioneering first world war plastic surgeon Harold Gillies gives due weight to the stories of the men he treated, The Guardian’s Wendy Moore writes in a review of a new book…
Taika Waititi Portrait Wins Packing Room Prize
Sydney-based artist Claus Stangl has taken out one of Australia’s top art honours with his portrait of Academy Award-winning director Taika Waititi, The Guardian reports. Stangl won the packing room prize, a sub-category of the…
Author Meg Mason in Running for Women’s Prize
Sydney-based New Zealander Meg Mason, American Louise Erdrich, and Turkish-Briton Elif Shafak are among the contenders for this year’s Women’s Prize for Fiction, offering an ‘escape’ from global crises, Lucy Knight reports for The…
Yuki Kihara Celebrates Samoa’s Third Gender
Representing New Zealand at the Venice Biennale, the Samoan-New Zealand artist is foregrounding Samoa’s fa’afafine and transgender communities, and the climate crisis hidden from tourists, Jinghua Qian writes for The Guardian. Curated by Natalie…
Fiordland Bookseller Ruth Shaw’s Extraordinary Life
New Zealander Ruth Shaw has embodied many roles throughout her life: pig farmer, navy deserter, solo sailor, illegal gambler, environmentalist, chef to archbishops, psychiatric patient, failed escort. She’s been arrested twice and married four…
Ali Smith Discusses Mansfield, Woolf and War
In a piece for The Guardian, Orwell Prize winning author Ali Smith looks at how the first world war forced writers Katherine Mansfield and Virginia Woolf to rip up convention – and asks if…
Becky Manawatu’s Auē an Enthralling Bestseller
Things have gone right for New Zealand author Becky Manawatu. “Spectacularly,” Tina Makeriti writes in a review for The Guardian. “Unusually for a first book, Auē won New Zealand’s most lucrative fiction prize, the…
Andrew Barnes is Revolutionizing the Work Week
Andrew Barnes is speaking to Guardian journalist Tess McClure from one of his vineyards on Waiheke Island. On the scale of a globe, it’s a speck of land off the coast of a dot,…
In Awards Month Jane Campion Profiled
Ahead of the Baftas and Oscar ceremonies later this month, New Zealand film director Jane Campion and her director of photography, Australian Ari Wegner, discuss their nominations, filming through the pandemic – and what…
Mainstream Cottons on to Talented Melanie Lynskey
After 30 years of critical acclaim, but not mainstream fame, New Zealand-born actor Melanie Lynskey is getting noticed and it feels very, very strange to her. Her show, Yellowjackets, has steadily become a hit….
Peter Jackson’s Beatles Epic Unmissable
“Nonplussed coppers, 60s London panoramas and the fab four very much alive … Peter Jackson’s film is moving and unmissable,” according to Guardian reviewer Peter Bradshaw, who rates the series five out of five…
Wānaka’s Nico Porteous Takes Gold in Beijing
Nico Porteous has dropped the curtain on New Zealand’s greatest Winter Games, overcoming the elements and a field of established champions to win the Olympic freeski halfpipe title, Bryan Armen Graham writes for The…
Rower Hamish Bond Retires After Three Olympic Golds
Dunedin-born Hamish Bond, 35, has announced his retirement from rowing, bringing down the curtain on a glittering career during which he became the first New Zealand man to win gold at three consecutive Olympics,…
Commentator Niki Bezzant Writes on Menopause
An edited extract from New Zealander Niki Bezzant’s book This Changes Everything: The Honest Guide to Menopause and Perimenopause, was recently published in The Guardian. “For centuries the symptoms of menopause were documented, but women…
The Power of the Dog Among Worthy Globe Winners
Jane Campion’s “handsome, complex and brilliant” western The Power of the Dog won best picture (drama) and best director at this year’s Golden Globes, along with best supporting actor for “the excellent” Kodi Smit-McPhee,…
Newcastle United Sign Striker Chris Wood
New Zealand striker Chris Wood has readily admitted he never envisaged a club triggering the £25m release clause in his contract at Burnley but, once Newcastle United activated it, he felt powerless to say…
Predator Free 2050 a Force for Nature
“Across the world conservation groups, researchers and volunteers are working to combat the key drivers of biodiversity loss identified by scientists,” Max Benato writes for The Guardian in a story that looks at “five…
Rose Matafeo Arguably Breakout Star of 2021
After winning a New Zealand international comedy festival award for stand-up in 2007, at the age of 15, Rose Matafeo has conquered just about everything she has ever attempted, Stuart Heritage writes for The…
On the Hunt for Lost South Island Kōkako
Birdwatchers around the world are being called on to turn detective and help in a search for some of the rarest birds on Earth, including New Zealand’s South Island kōkako, last seen in 2007. The…
Antarctic Explorers’ Logbook Found at MetService
“Priceless” artefacts linked to Antarctic explorers Ernest Shackleton and Captain Robert Falcon Scott have been unearthed in a surprise discovery within a dark storage room of New Zealand’s meteorological service, Eva Corlett reports for…
Angela Tiatia Shows at Massive Matisse Exhibition
In the accompanying exhibition to the Art Gallery of New South Wales’ new blockbuster exhibition Matisse: Life & Spirit, contemporary artists, including New Zealander Angela Tiatia, re-contextualise, challenge and complicate the modern master’s art…
Film-Making Set Jane Campion Free
New Zealand’s “trailblazing director” Jane Campion speaks to The Guardian’s Sean O’Hagan about how the #MeToo movement inspired her first feature in more than a decade, “revisionist western”, The Power of the Dog. That it…
Peter Jackson Takes Us into the Locked Beatles Vault
Ahead of his epic series Get Back, the New Zealand director Peter Jackson reveals the secrets of 60 hours of intimate, unseen footage of the Fab Four – and why it turns everything we…
Wagner’s Ring Cycle Gets Bold Samoan Rework
Here is an insane undertaking: a small London-based arts collective, Gafa, run by singers of Samoan heritage, putting on a complete Ring cycle – four vast operas, almost 15 hours of music – in…
What’s On Thomasin McKenzie’s Cultural Radar?
Wellington-born actor Thomasin McKenzie, who plays the lead in Edgar Wright’s Last Night in Soho, is interviewed for The Observer’s regular column, ‘On my radar’, one person’s snapshot of their current cultural life. Acting since…
Cricketing Pioneer Grace Gooder an Unsung Hero
Auckland-born Grace Gooder took six English wickets in one innings, yet was never picked for New Zealand again. Instead, she became a psychiatric nurse and spent her life caring for prisoners. In a story…
Monica Galetti Has Always Loved the Kitchen
Samoan-born New Zealand chef and Masterchef: The Professionals judge Monica Galetti talks about the making of an umu and how to use Marmite with The Guardian’s Tim Lewis, and discusses her move from the kitchen…
You Can’t Stop Sonny Bill Williams From Shining
A star in rugby union and league, and now a professional boxer, Auckland-born Bill Williams, 36, reveals his inner torments and tells The Guardian’s Donald McRae what drives him on. “I get pretty emotional talking about it,…
Alien Weaponry Standing Up for Māori Culture
The New Zealand metal band Alien Weaponry have gone global thanks to their forthright Māori-language songs, which confront colonial history and ongoing inequality, Matt Mills writes for a feature in The Guardian. Once named “the…
Could Additive Kowbucha Reduce Methane Emissions?
Agriculture is the largest anthropogenic source of this gas, accounting for about 40 per cent, leading innovators to offer new solutions to tackle its bovine source. “You’re seeing much more industry involvement,” director of…
Director Jessica Hobbs Wins Emmy for The Crown
At the recent International Emmy Awards, held in New York, Christchurch-born director Jessica Hobbs won for best directing of a drama series, for her work on The Crown. Eva Corlett reports on the win…
Long-Legged Penguin Fossils Add to Rich Record
The discovery of a complete fossilised ancient giant penguin skeleton in the upper Kawhia Harbour, Waikato is helping scientists fill in some gaps in natural history, Sofia Quaglia reports for The Guardian. Scientists have concluded…
ABs Top Rankings with Win over Pumas
New Zealand snatched South Africa’s world No 1 ranking and placed one hand on the Rugby Championship trophy after subjecting Argentina to a second successive heavy defeat in Brisbane, Reuters reported in an article…
Aoraki Mt Cook Reveals Last Images of a Mountaineer
Two decades ago Richard Stiles escaped an avalanche on Aoraki Mount Cook, but friend Steve Robinson wasn’t so lucky. Now the mountain has given up some of its secrets, Tory Shepherd writes for The…
An Excerpt From After the Tampa by Abbas Nazari
Fulbright winner Abbas Nazari was one of 433 refugees rescued by New Zealand from the Norwegian cargo ship, Tampa, in 2001 after leaving Indonesia in an unseaworthy boat with his Afghan family. Twenty years…
Andrew Dominik on 20 Years of Chopper
Few would be unfamiliar with Chopper – both the criminal, and the movie. The former is Mark Brandon Read, the notorious Australian gangster, bestselling author and serial shit-spinner, who committed many crimes and claimed…
Allbirds Puts a Label on Fashion’s Climate Impact
Allbirds’ sustainability lead Hana Kajimura talks to The Guardian’s Nadra Nittle about why the company, founded by New Zealander Tim Brown and American Joey Zwillinger, uses carbon labelling to raise consumer awareness about the…
New Zealand Olympians Triumph in Tokyo
New Zealand is basking in the glow of its greatest ever Olympic medal haul, departing Tokyo with 20 medals – seven gold, six silver and seven bronze, and a new champion, Lisa Carrington, who…
New Zealand Ships Covid Vaccines to Tokelau
Tokelau, one of the most inaccessible atolls in the world, has just received 12 precious boxes of vaccine delivered by the New Zealand Defence Force, Lagipoiva Cherelle Jackson writes for The Guardian. Inside the boxes…
Older New Zealanders Join Climate Change Fight
On his early morning bike rides to school, David Yockney would deliberately seek out the crunch and splash of the ice-hardened puddles. It was a winter joy he loved, and one he took for…
NZ Speed Flyers Swoop in Extreme Sport Doco
New Zealand speed flyers Jamie Lee and Malachi Templeton are two extreme-sports thrill-seekers who feature in the documentary, Reset, which is directed by Frenchman Thierry Donard, considered “the Fellini of adventure film-making”. “Speed flying,” according to…
England Football Looks to Owen Eastwood
In a Guardian article, UK-based lawyer turned performance coach New Zealander Owen Eastwood (Ngāi Tahu), who has been working with the England football team, explains his role in building a sense of belonging and…
Obscure Podcast Get Flushed Rated Highly
“Many is the podcaster who talks crap, but New Zealander Pete (perhaps understandably, he prefers not to share his surname) gets down and dirty with actual effluent in Get Flushed,” Fiona Sturges writes in…
New Zealand Wins the ICC Mace Beating India
“India’s revered superstars failed to dazzle on ‘D-Day’ as New Zealand’s canny operators and their classy skipper Kane Williamson deservingly walked away with the inaugural World Test Championship title after a composed eight-wicket win…
Lorde’s Just Scratching the Surface of Her Powers
Lorde is back and the world’s media is clamouring for interviews. This latest is from The Guardian’s deputy music editor, Laura Snapes, who speaks with the pop star about her forthcoming third album Solar Power,…
Photographer Robin Hammond Hands Camera to Refugees
New Zealander Robin Hammond has spent two decades crisscrossing the developing world and telling other people’s stories, Guardian correspondent Lizzy Davies writes. For his latest project the award-winning photographer has embarked on a paradigm…
Lorde’s Sunny New Single a Lesson in Patience
“Lorde has said she was ‘waiting for the right moment’ to release her comeback single, Solar Power, and opted for 11 June to coincide with the year’s only solar eclipse,” Laura Snapes writes for…
