Man of the Series
Kiwi paceman Shane Bond wins Player of the Cricket World Series, taking an astonishing 21 wickets against Australia and South Africa. Sir Richard Hadlee rates him “the quickest bowler New Zealand has ever produced providing the…
News of New Zealanders via Global Media
Rings Cleans Up Awards
Lord of the Rings wins Best Film, Best Debut, and Best Actor at the Empire Awards 2001. “It was the greatest experience of our professional lives, going to New Zealand and working with Peter Jackson…
Royal Chill
Saatchi & Saatchi CEO Worldwide Kevin Roberts, accompanies Britain’s Princess Anne to Antarctica to celebrate the centenary of Scott and Shackleton’s discovery expeditions, and to launch the New Zealand Antarctic Heritage Trust’s 10 year project to conserve…
The B-list of Baaad Has an Axis to Grind
International relations satire: bitter after being snubbed for membership in the “Axis of Evil”, peer-conscious nations rush to gain triumvirate status in what becomes a game of geopolitical chairs: “Spain, Scotland and New Zealand established the…
Speaking in tongues
Applauded young Aotearoa actress Madeleine Sami, dodges questions about her involvement with Rings star Elijah Woods (“we kind of hung out and went to the movies a bit”), a day after Woods confesses he’s…
Xena tackles Vagina Monlogues
Warrior Princess Lucy Lawless learns “new respect for the vagina, for the power and sacredness of it”, as she stars alongside Madeline Sami and Danielle Cormack in Auckland Theatre Company’s staging of the feminist…
Supermarket nirvana: Gisborne Woolworths
Street-Porter lauds fusion master Peter Gordon, bemoans some antipodean executions of the theory, but finds solace in Woolworths: “I purchased sun-dried tomatoes, olive and rosemary focaccia bread, and locally made Camembert. Have you picked…
“Names Will Never Hurt Me?”
Deputy PM Jim Anderton tells the Australian Government to stop its “insults”, after Aussie Defence Minister Robert Hill dubs New Zealand “Tasmania”. “For God’s sake”, Anderton says,”we’re the closest neighbours to each other, so we need to…
These Limbs Were Made for Climbing
Kiwi mountaineer Mark Inglis successfully completes the journey to NZ’s highest peak, Mt Cook, without a piece of kit he’d come to take for granted on all previous expeditions – his legs. “With my artificial limbs…
Rugby Great
Grant Fox is named by The Guardian’s Eddie Butler as one of the ten greatest fly-halves in the history of rugby union.
Hem Femme
“She may be the most successful designer New Zealand has ever produced”. NYNZer Rebecca Taylor featured in extensive portrait in Vogue (Australia). Click here. And acclaimed in an emerging designers post-Sept 11 fashion…
I Can See Your Heart Beat
Auckland University’s Bioengineering Institute leads ground-breaking new research into heart and lung modeling and software development. Led by Dr Peter Hunter, the team of in silico biologists translate human organs “into thousands of mathematical equations and millions…
This Sporting Life
Ben Willis, ex-King’s College and NZ Academy player, is carving out a career as a rugby pro playing off the bench at half back for Leinster, as well as turning out for Ireland A. Unison profiles…
Stand and Deliver
NZ Post held up as successful post-liberalisation model which British Post could try to emulate. As a “beacon of public service in a privatised world”, NZ Post has remained dominant because, “it has the…
Love Trolley Champ
Competing on an indoor erg (affectionately known as the ‘love trolley) Georgina Evers-Swindell wins the Crash-B World Indoor Rowing Championship with a time 0.6 sec off her world record. The win caps off a huge year…
Man with the Hook
NZ-born Sam Chisholm, the man who spent more time in the boxing ring than class room at King’s College, who then went on to become deal maker and right hand man for both Kerry Packer and Rupert…
NZ Schoolboys Take England to the Wall
“No one can decide who is the best rugby team in the world at present, largely because the two main contenders, England and NZ, circle each other without actually engaging On the evidence at Twickenham…
East to the Edge
A book exploring the distinctly Japanese art of Kabuki has been “beautifully translated into English” by New Zealander Kirsten McIvor. Kabuki Today throws open the door to the mysterious world of the ancient theatrical…
Bollywood or bust
Lush locations, talent and technology make NZ an ideal shooting location for Bollywood. Its almost monsoon season down under with the production schedules over-flowing, “the total number of song and dance routines filmed in…
Middle Earth homestay
“I just want to stay in NZ making my stuff.” PJ interviewed by PBS’s Charlie Rose. Listen to the interview here for a fascinating conversation as Peter Jackson talks candid camera for an…
Record Tourism Numbers
“Despite the global downturn New Zealand still welcomed a record number of international visitors for the 2010 1,909,391 people visited, a 6.9 percent increase from the previous year”.
Art for Masses
LATimes cover story on art for the people in Chinatown, LA, features NZ artists and curators, including an exhibition at the Lord Mori Gallery, curated by Tessa Laird and Joyce Campbell, “featuring work…
NZ Biologist Battles in Spice Wars
Michael Pearson, a biologist at the University of Auckland, has isolated six different viruses threatening to destroy the world’s second most lucrative spice – vanilla planifolia. “We are the world experts on vanilla virus … that is…
Wading into a Globalisation Debate
Prospect (“Britain’s intelligent conversation”) hosts a debate between prominent LSE economist NZer Robert Wade and Martin Wolf over whether global inequality and poverty are actually getting worse. Wade: “At the heart of our disagreement, I think, is…
Taste Sensation
Award winning vineyard – Goldwater Estate – Praised for its 2001 Dog Point Sauvignon Blanc: “This impeccably crafted wine offers a complexity and excitement equal to the finest Sancerre of the Loire Valley, but with a flavour…
Chopper
Jason Wynyard, New Zealand’s World Champion Axeman, along side countryman and defending champion Dave Bolstad, is featured in an article previewing the STIHL Timbersports Series. “Lumberjacking: the epitome of sportsmanship… gain an understanding…
Diabetes Breakthrough
Diatranz of Auckland claims it has conducted a successful trial that could eventually provide a cure for 15 million people around the world with type 1 diabetes who currently need daily injections of insulin. The Mexican…
Crowe: Edgy Actor
Front-running for repeat Oscar victory Crowe would rather have a beer according to this excellent Independent profile that plays on Rus’s ANZAC roots, “Like the classic guy from Down Under, he’s very happy to…
Dead chuffed
The A-list from the cinematic, corporate and consulate worlds turned out for a deliciously irreverent Sam Neil tribute honouring his 25 years in film and his contribution to New Zealand, Australian, and American culture…
Down-underwear
New Zealand-edged designer Collette Dinnigan (trained at Massey University Design School, formerly Wellington Polytechnic) enlists Dane Helena Christensen to model her new ‘supersexy’ collection of underwear, ‘Wild Hearts’ for Marks & Spencer. The collection…
I See Red
A New Zealand company, Knights of NZ, wins the contract to make the Australian Olympic team’s opening ceremony coats for the upcoming Winter Olympics. Worth more than $3000 each, the coats are made from 100 per…
Gilding the Director
Peter Jackson is nominated for the Best Director award as judged by the Directors Guild Association. Jackson, however, doesn’t seem very interested in taking home any coveted gold trophies: “Its the icing on the…
Strutting in their genes
New Zealand’s “young kid band with famous fathers”, otherwise known as Betchadupa, tours Australia for the Big Day Out series. Frontman Liam Finn bears the iconic surname of Split Enz and Crowded House…
South Sea’s Start-up
Stephen “Warehouse” Tindall, (Forbes: “the Sam Walton of the South Pacific”) backs NZ technology innovation in Red Herring. Citing do-it-yourself Kiwi advances in biotech, multimedia and software (the world’s leading agricultural bio-tech research and the…
Coach Blackadder
Former All Black captain, Todd Blackadder, takes his first step into international coaching with the announcement that he will be joining the Scotland Under 21 set-up.
Values Party – BYO
Don’t miss Marlborough’s “tangy, medium-bodied, cranberry-dried” Saint Clair 2000 Doctor’s Creek Pinot Noir. “Perfect with poultry or perhaps salmon, it epitomizes the remarkable values coming out of New Zealand”.
A Beautiful Mind
Wellington-born Russell Crowe, who last year won an Oscar for his lead role in Gladiator, pulls off the second biggest win of his career – a Golden Globe for best actor, in A Beautiful…
Master Blasters
Explosive all-rounder Chris Cairns plays “one of the great one-day international innings in the 22-year history of the game When he is on song, no oval in the world is big enough to contain him”….
“All the world’s a stage”
24-year-old Aucklander, Miles Lattimer-Gregory, hits the big time in London’s West End, with the company he founded, the British Touring Shakespeare Company opening its season of Hamlet and the Twelfth Night at the Westminster…
School of Hard Knocks
Jonah Lomu talks to The Independent about growing up on South Auckland’s mean streets. “I lost an uncle; decapitated in a shopping centre, and a cousin who was stabbed. That’s when my mother said I was…
Heckler Good-humoured
500 e-mails, several severed subscriptions, and a visitation by one J.Lomu later, Graham offers an open apology. Planting tongue firmly in cheek, he concedes amongst other things that Split Enz are indeed better than Midnight…
The Peoples’ Choice
“New Zealand’s most revered sportsman”, Michael Campbell, finishes a gallant second at the NZ Golf Open, five strokes ahead of world No 1 Tiger Woods. Back in the clubhouse, Campbell announces he will allocate to children’s charities…
Lessons From the Kiwi Experience
The Scotsman praises “small, proud” New Zealand – “the more the government intervenes in industry the less enterprise and boldness there is. By rolling back the frontiers of the state New Zealand has discovered enormous energy and…
Asian Free Trade Zone
Japan is keen to envelop New Zealand and Australia into its vision for an Asian free-trade zone in both trade and investment, and beyond into technology, education and tourism.
The Crowe Road to Oscar Success?
Russell Crowe is named Actor of the Year by the Broadcast Film Critics Association for his lead role in A Beautiful Mind. Crowe has won the award for the last three years.
“Fair-dinkum” Kiwi tops the pops
NZ-born musician Daniel Bedingfield, 21, tops the UK pop charts with Gotta Get Thru This – recorded on rudimentary equipment and a computer in his south London bedroom. “The track is absurdly brilliant, as…
“Cook Me Some Eggs James”
NZ-born Lee Tamahori, is charged with the license to uphold pop-cultural iconography, as he undertakes the directorship of the 20th James Bond installment, taking over from another Kiwi Martin Campbell. “To me the Bond film is…
Truly, madly, deeply explicit
New Zealand actor Kerry Fox visits Sydney to promote her controversial new film, Intimacy and offers this boyfriend-friendly pronouncement on her method: “Its not sex. It’s not lovemaking. It’s pretend”, says Fox of the…
Tiger Tamer
13-year-old New Zealander, Jae An, becomes the youngest ever male to play a professional golf tournament, and then the youngest golfer ever to make the cut, when he lines up alongside Tiger Woods at the New…
Commanding Performance
Grant Dalton and his crew hold second place in the Volvo Ocean Race, as the event “reaches its spiritual home”, Auckland. “The World’s premier yachting capital”. according to the Volvo Ocean race website.
One Love
Anna Kournikova, “the tennis temptress whose courtships tend to garner more attention than her shot selection”, completes her 99th WTA tour singles event – the Auckland Classic – in the same way she ended the previous…
Fans Flock to Tolkien Trail
“Thanks to a bunch of elves, orcs and hobbits”, New Zealand is “one of this year’s most fashionable tourist destinations”. Experts believe the trilogy will boost NZ’s tourist industry by a third. On the edge we’ve always…
Front line truck stop
War correspondent Margaret Moth heads to another of the world’s trouble spots, this time Kabul, Afghanistan. Along the way, while searching for a truck waylaid picking them up at Bagram air base, Moth and CNN…
Counting Down and Counting Up
The 31st America’s Cup is 13 months away, but the Hauraki Gulf is already a hive of activity as 1 syndicates prepare to battle for the Auld Mug. And Government puffs up Team NZ’s sails with…
Madcap Pamela bestselling biographer
New Zealand-born Pamela Stephenson, practicing psychotherapist and ex-comedian (part of the anarchic foursome who made the seminal and career launching comedy Not the Nine o’clock News – along with Rowan Atkinson, Mel Smith…
