Best Kiwi New Zealand Beauties Actresses
Top known Kiwi Actresses from New Zealand (in no particular order)
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Pamela Stephenson was born on 4 December 1949 in Takapuna, Auckland, New Zealand. She is an actress and writer, known for Superman III (1983), History of the World: Part I (1981) and Not the Nine O'Clock News (1979). She has been married to Billy Connolly since 20 December 1989. They have three children. She was previously married to Nicholas Ball.- Director
- Producer
- Actress
Anna Wilding is a leading and award winning creator in feature film, television, music video and photography. Anna Wilding is cited in print media as "truly multi talented" and "iconic" for her work behind the lens and on screen and stage. Anna Wilding is an award-winning director, actress, writer, producer and still photographer. In addition Anna founded a known film company in London - Moving Horse Pictures, and runs Kalon Film Group LLC and Broader Horizon Entertainment LLC . Anna Wilding is a dual American citizen. Ms Wilding's work has contributed to over $1.5 billion in the global box office.
Ms Wilding is known in America and internationally . Anna works in both the studio and art house feature films, documentaries, television, streaming , cable business, music video's and tours solo art exhibits in galleries and Museums.Ms Wilding directed and/or co-produced major music videos for major rock stars and record labels. Anna is a leading movie industry consultant.
In 2015-2017, Ms Wilding pivoted and served as Chief White House Correspondent including on-air broadcaster and Presidential photographer. Anna took some of the most well known and acclaimed images of President Obama White House. Her photographic work appears in magazines, newspapers . Her acclaimed "Celebrate Hope-the Obama Collection" photography exhibit tours as a solo exhibit with multiple month long showings in major art galleries . Ms Wilding's photographic and fine art work tours worldwide from Rome to Hong Kong to Los Angeles and hangs in Collections worldwide.In 2021 Anna made the first ever authentic President Obama ,Mrs Michelle Obama, and President Biden NFT's. Many of Anna's images have gone viral.
"Anna's Obama Images make me think ... I call it 'Obama Classicism" after the great masters ... Raphael and Leonardo DaVinci."-said one Collector of Anna Wilding's work noted cinematography luminary Sherman Woody Owens A.S.C and former chair of USC Cinematography
Anna judged in the Australian Atom Film and TV Awards in 2013, 2014, 2017, and 2018 and served on the SAG (Screen Actors Guild) nominating committee 2021
Anna has often fought and negotiated for female equality and pay parity in Hollywood. On October 10, 2017, Anna broke her silence in mainstream media about her experiences with Harvey Weinstein where she had said "No" to his advances and the effect on that on her contracts as actor. Her interviews went viral. Ms Wilding was interviewed for an extensive exclusive 30 minute segment with Vinnie Politan on Court TV in 2020. Anna had been on the record in prior years speaking out and against the "casting couch".
Around 2006, Wilding it is well known that stood up and spoke out at a Directors Guild event in New York about the lack of female directors following yet again, another all male panel. In 2007, Wilding was also specifically and formally thanked for her important and powerful consultant producer work on all three "Lord of the Rings" films by producers and New Line studio executives Mark Ordesky and Bob Shaye.
Ms Wilding, as a film executive and in house producer and founder was nicknamed "Queen of the Independents" by industry insiders in the height of of independent art house motion pictures in the late1990's when Fox Searchlight, Paramount Screen Gems, Sony Picture Classics all started to some into existence to accommodate this new independent era of commercial filmmaking .
As an actress in 1993, she played the newsworthy "battered wife" (Gail) ever seen on prime time New Zealand television on the long running, award winning Shortland St. Clips of her work on the show were exhibited at that year's TV Awards; the show won for Best Drama TV Series. As an actress Anna was first discovered by Disney casting as a teenager in New Zealand . Anna cut her teeth in professional theater picking up awards for improvisational theater , performing at Second City as guest performer , as well performing in classics such as Midsummer's Night Dream off Broadway
Wilding directed and starred in the theatrically released and popular award winning and critically acclaimed hit feature documentary film (Warners/WEA) Buddha Wild Monk in a Hut. (as Narrator/Presenter and Director, Writer and Producer. Anna's additional responsibilities also included cinematography). The film qualified and was considered front-runner for the Oscars, is archived at Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences by official invitation, played out of competition at Sundance, and was nominated for and won an award in Best Feature Documentary USA by Kids First and the Coalition Of Quality Media -a collection of major US studios; the film played for over 60 days in cinemas. Other notable films directed by Wilding include "Pop Culture Punk Art", which was selected for Cannes SFC 2010, and "White Sands", and the feature documentary "Faultline" 2014, about the New Zealand earthquakes which screened and sold to institutions around the world. Ms Wilding later released it as a public service given the value of knowledge for active crisis zones.
From ages 10-15 she was a competitive tennis player. Headlines read at the time, "Wilding Keeps the Flag Flying." Wilding won her first tournament at the age of ten after hitting balls with a stick against a shed in a country paddock. Her family could not afford the trip to Florida to train with Bolitteri. She was first discovered as an actress by a New Zealand agent and then discovered by visiting Disney casting directors at the age of 16, who urged her to pursue an acting career internationally. Anna left for Australia and the USA in her teens to do that, working successfully on TV in comedy shows, feature film, and professional theater in New Zealand and Australia and then London and the USA. Professional theater shows included: Heloise and Abelard, Dazzle (at Auckland Town Hall), Midsummer's Night Dream (off-Broadway in New York), and When Harry Met Sally (Pasadena Arts Center, Los Angeles). Wilding has undertaken several guest star appearances including performing live at the televised Celebrity West Coast New York Tony Awards 2000 in the USA and stand up in 2019 .
Among other major music videos Wilding directed and/or co-produced for artists ranging from Rolling Stones to UB40, Stanley Jordan, and David Parker in the 1990's. In 2005, her long-form music video "Rebel In Me" (made for the International Songwriter of the Year 2004-World Music Awards-Moana and the Moa Hunters) was nominated for 2005 Los Angeles Femme Film Festival and played to rapturous applause in a packed house in downtown Los Angeles. Wilding's music videos have been seen on extensive play at MTV, VH1, etc.
Wilding won her first acting award as "Best Actress" at the International Theatre festival at the age of 19 for the comedy "The Patience of Silence", a play which she also wrote, directed and produced. Anna is known for her improvisational skills . She was professional Theatresports (improvisational comedy) player and won the "Audience Favorite Award".
Before traveling to USA, Wilding took up an acting scholarship she had won at the prestigious VCA in Melbourne, a winter program studying with a renowned New York method coach. Wilding was 1 of 25 actors, selected by American nationwide auditions to the former National Shakespeare Conservatory New York program (Yale) where she studied directly under one of Meryl Streep's tutors. This was a serendipitous turn as Wilding had often been compared to a young Streep in range. Wilding's audition was held at the old Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles (former home of the Oscar telecasts) as exciting moment, coming from NZ Anna hopes to never forget.
Wilding moved to Los Angeles by herself at the suggestion of casting directors. Wilding did not have a mentor in Hollywood, and worked three jobs in production and editing houses at one time, to support herself. Anna collaborated on major music videos and long form rock documentaries with major pop and rock icons and earned producer positions in key production houses leading to directing and producing major rock music videos for major artists.
Wilding, unwilling to deal with the "casting couch", still prevalent in those years, put her acting career on hold multiple times. She worked and enjoyed the challenge of the craft and business aspects of production. She continues to work in both freelance and executive ranks of the mainstream movie and film business.
Anna was soon an executive on several high profile independent film companies including Moving Horse Pictures out of London. Anna made an industry name in production and in-house producer and Exec positions in the mid-late 1990s in the mainstream commercial independent feature film scenes in LA and London. Anna Wilding had a hand in many significant and award winning films and projects.Industry insiders nicknamed her the "queen of the independents". As an executive of production companies in the 1990s, she was one of the first women in recent Hollywood history to fight for equal pay, and opportunity in Hollywood. It was rarely forthcoming and it is a fight that continues by women in Hollywood to this day.
Wilding founded the registered charity Wilding Foundation in New Zealand and it ran from 2009-2018. In February 2011, Wilding started an emergency relief fund-raising appeal for victims of the earthquake in her hometown of Christchurch. She returned to NZ to work on the ground voluntarily for the charity over a year.- Actress
- Producer
- Soundtrack
Anna Paquin is the first millennial to have received an Academy Award nomination for acting, and the first to win.
She was born on July 24, 1982 in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, to Mary (Brophy), an English teacher from Wellington, New Zealand, and Brian Paquin, a Canadian phys-ed teacher. Anna moved to her mother's native country when she was four years old. Her first acting job ever was at age nine in the movie The Piano (1993), which was shot in New Zealand. At age 16, she relocated to Los Angeles where she completed her last two years of high school (graduating in 2000). She then moved to New York where she attended Columbia University for one year. Between 2001 and 2004, she worked almost exclusively on stage in both New York and London. In 2007, Anna was cast in HBO's True Blood (2008), which concluded shooting its seventh and final season in 2014.- Actress
- Writer
- Director
Kerry Fox was born on 30 July 1966 in Wellington, New Zealand. She is an actress and writer, known for Shallow Grave (1994), Bright Star (2009) and Cloudstreet (2011). She has been married to Alexander Linklater since 2004. They have two children. She was previously married to Jaime Robertson.- Actress
- Producer
- Writer
Rena Owen is an international award-winning actress, and one of only six in the world and the only female to date to have worked with both filmmaking legends George Lucas and Steven Spielberg during her illustrious career that spans 35 years working in theater, television, film and voice work.
One of nine children, born and bred in the Bay of Islands, New Zealand (NZ) to a Maori/Welsh father and a European mother, Rena was first published at age eight when she won a national children's poetry contest. Throughout her youth she was active in the Maori Culture Club, high school musical productions, and community theater events. Despite knowing her talents laid in creativity, the arts were not considered a viable career.
At 18, she moved to Auckland to pursue a nursing career, and qualified as a general and obstetric nurse (SRN). In 1983 she went on her overseas experience, a common Kiwi pursuit and landed in London. Awed by the huge city and the bright lights of the entertainment world, the temptations that came with it easily seduced the naive 22-year-old but this life changing period led her back to a creative career.
Rena trained at the Actors Institute of London in the mid-1980s. During her formative years she worked in all aspects of theater. The first play she wrote, The River That Ran Away, was produced by Clean Break and directed by her mentor, award-winning British actress Ann Mitchell, with Rena in the lead role. It enjoyed a successful London tour and was later published by NZ Playmarket (1991). Other UK highlights include Voices from Prison with the Royal Shakespeare Company, and the award-winning Outside In, which debuted at the Edinburgh Festival.
Upon her return to NZ in 1989 Rena acted in two one-hour dramas for Television NZ's series, E Tipu, E Rea. A first of its kind, the series was written, acted, directed and produced by Maori people. In constant pursuit of learning and honing her craft, she continued to work extensively in theatre acting, writing, directing and working as a playwright. Rena was a founding member of the reputable Taki Rua Theatre Company.
She wrote and recorded short stories for Radio NZ, wrote and starred in the critically acclaimed stage play Daddy's Girl whilst playing reoccurring roles on NZ TV series Betty's Bunch and Shark in the Park. Rena was a rare recipient of a Dame Te Atairangikaahu (the NZ Maori Queen) Literary Award and Scholarship in 1991.
The Kevin Reynolds/Kevin Costner film Rapa Nui in 1993 was her first film role followed by the leading role in the cult classic NZ film Once Were Warriors. Her electrifying performance garnered her universal rave reviews. David Denby declared, "Owen's performance is classic!" Roger Ebert proclaimed, "You don't often see acting like this in the movies. The two leads bring the Academy Awards into perspective." Ruby Rich called her "The Bette Davis from Down Under" while Thelma Adams wrote, "Owen has the looks of Jeanne Moreau, the raw emotional power of Anna Magnani & a slim athleticism all her own".
Once Were Warriors was voted one of Time Magazine's top 10 films in 1994. It garnered over 30 international awards and screened in 66 countries. Rena won Best Actress awards at the Montreal, Oporto, Seattle, San Diego Film Festivals & the Cannes Film Festival's Spirit Award. While in NZ she was awarded the Benny Award for Excellence in Film and the Toastmasters Communicator of the Year Award.
She returned to the Theater to act in Stephen Berkoff's plays East West and Kvetch. Rena earned a Best Supporting Actress nomination for her role in the NZ TV series Coverstory, was a series regular in the Australian Network 10 TV drama Adrenalin Junkies from 1996-98, played a leading role in Garth Maxwell's When Love Comes and a supporting role in Rolf De Heer's critically acclaimed Dance Me To My Song that was in competition at the 1999 Cannes Film Festival and earned her an Australian Film Institute (AFI) Best Supporting Actress nomination.
In 2000, Rena set up a base in Los Angeles. She played beloved Taun We in George Lucas's Star Wars: Attack of the Clones followed by a cameo role in Steven Spielberg's Artificial Intelligence (A.I). She guest starred on Gideon's Crossing & played a reoccurring role in WB's Angel. Lucas cast her again as Nee Alavar in Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith. She went on to play supporting & cameo roles in multiple international films. Highlights include An All American Girl, Veronica Decides To Die, Nemesis Game, Alyce Kills, Vincent Ward's acclaimed Rain Of The Children and A Piece Of My Heart.
During 2010-2020, Rena played a 3 month role on NZ's longest running TV series, Shortland Street, and won the Best Supporting Actress Award at the 2011 Aotearoa Film & Television Awards (AFTA). A reoccurring role in the award-winning Australian TV series East West 101 earned her a Best Supporting Actress nomination at the Australian Academy of Cinema & Television Arts and a Best Actress nomination at the Monte Carlo International Television Festival in 2012.
Cast as a series regular, Rena played the matriarch opposite Brian Cox's patriarch of a multi-ethnic crime family set in the Torres Strait Islands, Australia for an ABC TV series fondly nicknamed 'The Sopranos in thongs!' The Hollywood Reporter voted The Straits as one of the top 10 TV series to binge watch in 2013. Once Were Warriors, the film that launched her international career was voted the number one film of all time in NZ in 2014. Rena starred in a NZ documentary celebrating the film's 20th anniversary called Where Are They Now?
Rena played a supporting role in the New Zealand film The Dead Lands which enjoyed a Special Presentation Premiere at the Toronto Film Festival, garnered rave reviews, and sold to multiple territories. In the USA she played a supporting role in the indie film The Well, recurring roles for A&E's TV series Longmire and Sundance's TV series The Red Road, the coveted role of Glaeser in Vin Diesel's movie The Last Witch Hunter directed by Breck Eisner, and the ghostly villain in the indie film Without a Body.
Rena was cast as a series regular in Freeform's hit TV series Siren which enjoyed 3 seasons during 2016-2019. During the hiatus she played a military major in the Australian film Escape & Evasion, was a series regular in Stan Australia, and ABC's mini series The Gloaming, and played the recurring role of Heveena in Seth MacFarlane's TV series The Orville.
During the coronavirus lock-down, Rena played the lead in Whina, a NZ film to be released in 2022, a supporting role on the NZ TV series VegasNZ, and also renewed her Star Wars role as Taun We in the Bad Batch. In 2021, she completed work on season 3 of The Orville, and was thrilled to be cast as Sarge in Netflix's animated series Super Giant Robot Brothers (2022).
Throughout her remarkable career besides television and film, Rena continues to work in theater globally, and has served on multiple international film festival juries. She also enjoys being a mentor and public speaker when time permits.
Her motto is "Love what you do and do it to the very best of your ability!"- Actress
- Producer
- Art Director
Keisha Castle-Hughes was born on 24 March 1990 in Donnybrook, Western Australia, Australia. She is an actress and producer, known for Whale Rider (2002), The Nativity Story (2006) and Star Wars: Episode III - Revenge of the Sith (2005).- Actress
- Soundtrack
At sixteen years old, Melanie Lynskey dazzled the film world with an audacious debut in Peter Jackson's revered psychological crime picture, Heavenly Creatures (1994). Her electrifying portrait of Pauline Parker - high school misfit whose fierce rapport with her only friend (a pre-fame Kate Winslet) spirals dangerously out of control - was deemed "perfect" (Richard Corliss, TIME) and secured the humble New Zealander a Best Actress trophy in her motherland. Following a three-year interval spent studying at university and relocating to Los Angeles, Lynskey made a welcome return to the silver screen when she was cast as Drew Barrymore's sweet-natured stepsister in Andy Tennant's 'girl power' twist on the Brothers Grimm fairy tale, Ever After: A Cinderella Story (1998). Parts in But I'm a Cheerleader (1999), Coyote Ugly (2000), Snakeskin (2001), Sweet Home Alabama (2002), Shattered Glass (2003), and Clint Eastwood's Oscar-nominated war epic Flags of Our Fathers (2006) came next.
In the consequent years, Lynskey emerged as one of the industry's most celebrated character actors, picking up plaudits for a host of appearances in prestige vehicles such as Sam Mendes's Away We Go (2009), Jason Reitman's Up in the Air (2009), Steven Soderbergh's The Informant! (2009), Tom McCarthy's Win Win (2011), Stephen Chbosky's The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012), and Adam McKay's Don't Look Up (2021). Prolific supporting roles - opposite the calibre of George Clooney, Matt Damon and Leonardo DiCaprio - aside, spotlight turns in Hello I Must Be Going (2012), Happy Christmas (2014), The Intervention (2016) - for which she scored a Special Jury Prize at Sundance - and the genre-bending I Don't Feel at Home in This World Anymore (2017) have equally proved her mettle as a dynamite leading lady.
Since entering the annals of 21st century popular culture with her riotous embodiment of Rose - on the toweringly successful Two and a Half Men (2003), where she appeared for over a decade as Charlie Sheen's duplicitous admirer - Lynskey has injected her scene-stealing prowess into a multitude of small-screen gigs: among them, HBO's exalted tragicomedy Togetherness (2015), which showcased her "sublime" (Vanity Fair) depiction of a dissatisfied stay-at-home mom; macabre Stephen King spookfest Castle Rock (2018), where she headlined as pill-popping psychic Molly Strand; and all-star political period piece Mrs. America (2020), in which she joined forces with Cate Blanchett. For her spellbinding work on Showtime's Yellowjackets (2021) - where she's front-and-centre as Shauna, a suburban housewife consumed by horrific secrets - Lynskey collected the coveted Critics' Choice Award for Best Actress in a Drama Series (2022), with Rolling Stone's Alan Sepinwall describing her turn in the runaway cult smash as the "dark, messy, charismatic part she's been waiting her whole career to play".- Thomasin Harcourt McKenzie was born in Wellington, New Zealand, to actress Miranda Harcourt and director Stuart McKenzie. She is the granddaughter of actress Dame Kate Harcourt and Peter Harcourt. Peter's family founded the real estate company Harcourts International in Wellington. She has an elder brother and a younger sister, actress Davida McKenzie. She completed her secondary education at Samuel Marsden Collegiate School in 2018. After a good role in The Hobbit: The Battle of Five Armies, she rose to critical prominence with the lead role in Debra Granik's 2018 drama film Leave No Trace. After supporting roles in the 2019 films The King, Jojo Rabbit, and True History of the Kelly Gang, as well as the 2021 thriller Old, she played the lead role as Eloise, a wide-eyed woman from Cornwall in Edgar Wright's psychological horror film Last Night in Soho.