News of New Zealanders via Global Media

Cricket Legend Bevan Congdon Leaves True Legacy

Cricket Legend Bevan Congdon Leaves True Legacy

Motueka-born Bevan Congdon, who captained New Zealand to its first Test win over Australia in 1974, has died a day short of his 80th birthday in Auckland. In total, Congdon played 61 Tests and captained…

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…

Politicians Must Earn Back Trust Says Ardern

Politicians Must Earn Back Trust Says Ardern

Jacinda Ardern is not your average prime minister, Times political journalist Alice Thomson quickly learns. The second prime minister after Benazir Bhutto, in 1990, to be pregnant while running a country, is down to…

New Zealand the Perfect Place to Shape Ed Hillary

New Zealand the Perfect Place to Shape Ed Hillary

“I ended up in boat-drunk summery Auckland because I wanted to figure out, 10 years after Sir Edmund Hillary’s death, how the first person to climb Mount Everest ever happened. I promise that is…

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…

While Away the Weekend in Auckland and Northland

While Away the Weekend in Auckland and Northland

From breathtaking golf courses to pristine waterways, there are many amazing ways to enjoy New Zealand’s northernmost tip, Tourism New Zealand promotes in gallery format on Britain’s Guardian news site. “Legendary underwater explorer Jacques Cousteau…

World’s Loneliest Bird Nigel Dies on Mana Island

World’s Loneliest Bird Nigel Dies on Mana Island

Nigel, a handsome gannet who lived on a desolate island off the coast of New Zealand, died suddenly last week. Wherever his soul has landed, the singles scene surely cannot be worse, Karin Brulliard…

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…

London’s Frame Gym Finds Private Equity Backing

London’s Frame Gym Finds Private Equity Backing

Frame gym, founded by New Zealander Joan Murphy, 36, (pictured right) and Briton Pip Black, 35, offers pay-as-you-go membership and classes, from ballet-inspired barre workouts to kitsch 1990s-style aerobics – imagine headbands, neon and…

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…

Trouble Brewing Collaborates for Chinese New Year

Trouble Brewing Collaborates for Chinese New Year

Singapore-based craft beer microbrewery Trouble Brewing, founded by New Zealander Joseph Barratt, has teamed up with a local illustrator for a specially designed bottle, which contains beer styles such as its Summer Ale, Dutch…

PM Talks about Her Particularly Public Surprise

PM Talks about Her Particularly Public Surprise

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern talks to Guardian contributor and Spinoff editor Toby Manhire about her surprise pregnancy and why she won’t stay quiet on sexism. “I did think about her quite a bit…

British and US Migrants Flock to New Zealand

British and US Migrants Flock to New Zealand

The number of American and British residents choosing to live in far-flung New Zealand has risen sharply since the election of Donald Trump and the UK’s Brexit vote, according to new migration figures. The…

Celebrating 125 Years of the Female Vote in NZ

Celebrating 125 Years of the Female Vote in NZ

New Zealand Minister for Women Julie Anne Genter recently called for communities across New Zealand to celebrate women fighting and gaining the right to vote, 125 years ago. “New Zealand was the first country in…

Country Swelters Through Hottest Ever Month

Country Swelters Through Hottest Ever Month

January was the hottest month ever recorded in New Zealand, according to figures released by the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA), and experts say climate change is one factor. The heat has…

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…

New Zealand Food Experiences You Can’t Replicate

New Zealand Food Experiences You Can’t Replicate

“Known for its active volcanoes, Maori history and a landscape that swings between farmland, forest and foreshore, New Zealand’s North Island upholds its reputation for adventure. But look beyond Auckland’s restaurants and Wellington’s coffee…

Not All Fast Cars for Racer Brendon Hartley

Not All Fast Cars for Racer Brendon Hartley

You may have seen his wedding photos on social media recently, but Toro Rosso’s Brendon Hartley, 28, generally steers clear of the public eye – at least by F1 driver standards. The Formula 1…

New Zealand Fourth Best Democracy in The World

New Zealand Fourth Best Democracy in The World

New Zealand has been named the country with the fourth best democracy in the world in a new report ranking countries by how functional their political systems are. According to the report by The…

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…

British Actress Tackles Wilds of the South Island

British Actress Tackles Wilds of the South Island

Throughout British actress Jenny Agutter’s career, she writes in an article for the Telegraph that she has been “fortunate enough to be transported through time – whether to post-war Britain and the Sixties in…

Tips for Top Times to Visit New Zealand

Tips for Top Times to Visit New Zealand

Whether you want to hike, sun on the beach, or sip wine (or all three) Travel + Leisure magazine recommends taking note before planning your trip to New Zealand. “New Zealand is a dream destination,”…

Why the Tech Elite Love New Zealand

Why the Tech Elite Love New Zealand

This year, Rocket Lab plans to blast a 56-foot vehicle into orbit on a mission to revolutionize access to space. The rocket “was manufactured in Auckland and will launch from New Zealand’s Mahia Peninsula,”…

Neville Crichton has Transformed Sailing Industry

Neville Crichton has Transformed Sailing Industry

New Zealand born and bred, Neville Crichton’s humble beginning on a farm in the South Island is a far cry from where he is today, 72 years later. Crichton is the executive chairman of one…

Trainer to World’s Fastest Drivers is Rob Wilson

Trainer to World’s Fastest Drivers is Rob Wilson

When the world’s top drivers need coaching, they turn to coach and veteran pro driver, New Zealander Rob Wilson. At his “second home”, the Bruntingthorpe Proving Ground airfield in rural Leicestershire, England, the great…

Ollie Dale Aims to Help Solve Earhart Mystery

Ollie Dale Aims to Help Solve Earhart Mystery

Auckland filmmaker Ollie Dale is joining former US Navy intelligence officer Guy Noffsinger to investigate how Pan Am flight 229 inexplicably vanished over the Pacific in 1938 – and how the plane’s disappearance may…

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….

Etihad’s Andrew Fisher Breaks Fastest Trip Record

Etihad’s Andrew Fisher Breaks Fastest Trip Record

New Zealander Andrew Fisher, 42, who works in Abu Dhabi as Etihad’s vice president of fleet planning, has broken the world record for flying around the world in the shortest time on scheduled commercial…

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…

World Cup-Winning Coach Graham Henry Joins Auckland

World Cup-Winning Coach Graham Henry Joins Auckland

The mastermind of the 2011 Rugby World Cup success, Sir Graham Henry, has returned to the side where he first came to prominence joining provincial side Auckland to assist head coach Alama Ieremia, the…

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…

PM’s Pregnancy Sparks Knitting Movement

PM’s Pregnancy Sparks Knitting Movement

New Zealander Heather McCracken, who is based in the United States, has kicked off the knitting movement #KnitForJacinda inspired by the news that Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern is pregnant. Ardern recently announced that she and…

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…

Rocket Lab Launches the Humanity Star

Rocket Lab Launches the Humanity Star

The glittering Humanity Star satellite, which may be the brightest object in the night sky, serves no purpose other than to “make people look up and realise they are on a rock in a…

NZ Women’s Fund Launched

NZ Women’s Fund Launched

“In a country celebrated for women’s leadership and where women were first to win the vote, it’s surprising to find a shortage of philanthropic funds by women, for women,” reports an article published in…

How the Queen Was Almost Killed On Royal Tour Of New Zealand In 1981

How the Queen Was Almost Killed On Royal Tour Of New Zealand In 1981

“A new report reveals how the government of New Zealand attempted to conceal just how close a young man came to assassinating the Queen during a diplomatic trip to the country in 1981,” writes…

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

Dreams of Packing up Troubles and Moving to NZ

Dreams of Packing up Troubles and Moving to NZ

“Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to move away from the US and go to another country where hitchhiking is normal and I can have as many pet sheep as I want,”…

“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

Uninhabited Tiritiri Matangi Where Birds Thrive

Uninhabited Tiritiri Matangi Where Birds Thrive

Tiritiri Matangi – a 75-minute ferry ride from downtown Auckland – is one of several offshore islands that New Zealand has turned into sanctuaries for its native birds. The Independent’s David Whitley visits Tiritiri…

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…

Roger Shepherd Shares Love for Korea’s Mountains

Roger Shepherd Shares Love for Korea’s Mountains

Roger Shepherd, 52, a former police officer from New Zealand who has lived in the rustic southern county Gurye near Mount Jiri since 2011, said Korean mountains have plenty of hidden delights. Shepherd, 52, is…

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…

Speed Flyer Jamie Lee Skims Beauteous Landscapes

Speed Flyer Jamie Lee Skims Beauteous Landscapes

One of the world’s top speed flyers New Zealander Jamie Lee, 25, was recently filmed zooming down the hills surrounding Lake Wanaka just inches from the ground. Taking off from a hilltop with a running…

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…

Aviva Fixer Mark Wilson on First Five Years in Role

Aviva Fixer Mark Wilson on First Five Years in Role

In 2013, New Zealander Mark Wilson, an insurance turnaround specialist hired from Hong Kong to fix a then-troubled Aviva, was wondering how he could overhaul its Irish business in a very difficult market. “When I…

New Zealanders Wary of Impact of Tourism

New Zealanders Wary of Impact of Tourism

The number of New Zealanders worried about the impact the booming tourism industry has on the country is growing rapidly, according to a new survey. The survey, commissioned by New Zealand’s tourism industry, found that…

Houston Half Marathon Win for Jake Robertson

Houston Half Marathon Win for Jake Robertson

Distance runner New Zealand-born Jake Robertson, 28, the new Aramco Half Marathon champion, didn’t know for sure he would be running in Houston, United States until a week prior to the event, when race…

PM Jacinda Ardern Plays down Her Pregnancy News

PM Jacinda Ardern Plays down Her Pregnancy News

Jacinda Ardern, who became New Zealand’s prime minister in October, attracted international attention when she denounced television interviewers who had asked whether she planned to have children if elected. Ardern, 37, told a television…

New Zealand’s Glory From a Train Window

New Zealand’s Glory From a Train Window

Thirty years after the TranzAlpine was launched, Observer journalist Susan Grossman boards one of the world’s most scenic trains in Christchurch, before completing her trip on the North Island’s Northern Explorer. “Completed in 1908, after…

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…