Hill’s portrayal of Yosser Hughes in 1982 BBC series launched career that included roles in Titanic and JRR Tolkien epic Bernard Hill, the stage, television and film actor who rose to fame for his unforgettable portrayal of Yosser Hughes, has died at the age of 79. Hill played the unemployed character with the famous “gizza job” catchphrase in Alan Bleasdale’s 1982 BBC series Boys from the Blackstuff. It helped launch a stellar career that included playing the captain of the Titanic in James Cameron’s 1997 film and Théoden, king of Rohan, in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings film trilogy ..read more

Former NSW premier’s threat to sue comes amid debate about whether New Zealand should join pillar two of Aukus pact Australia’s former foreign minister and New South Wales premier, Bob Carr, says he intends to sue New Zealand’s deputy prime minister, Winston Peters, for allegations made about Carr’s closeness to China as debate about Aukus ramps up. Peters called Carr “nothing more than a Chinese puppet” on the national broadcaster RNZ on Thursday morning ..read more

Robyn Malcolm is incredible in this morally complex drama, as a woman who believes she saw her ex-husband sexually assault a minor Some fraught and morally complex spaces are entered in the six-part New Zealand drama After the Party, which is executed with a white-knuckle intensity that almost pushes it into the realm of a thriller. The show is led by an expertly layered performance from Robyn Malcolm as Penny Wilding, a high school teacher who believes she caught her ex-husband, Phil (Peter Mullan), engaged in a sex crime with an intoxicated minor during his birthday party. The easy choice wo ..read more

One of New Zealand’s most beloved actors continues to challenge expectations put on women in hit series she also co-created, After the Party When Robyn Malcolm did a recent shoot for a magazine, they sent her through the proposed cover. She called them immediately. “I said, can you not do that to my face?” Pushing against expectations for women to look and act a certain way – young, carefree, likable – has driven Malcolm her whole career, but especially since menopause. “They took notice, and they put me on the cover with everything as is. They said ‘We just thought everyone liked that’. Well ..read more

Across cities and towns in both countries, crowds gathered at Anzac Day dawn services to remember fallen soldiers and servicepeople Thousands gather for dawn services and marches to mark Anzac Day around Australia ..read more

Without the van, my husband and I had no urgent reason to live in Wellington. The short European adventure we had planned soon became much more One evening in 2008, a group of joyriders stole our van, named The Colombian, from a street outside Wellington, New Zealand. My sister-in-law was the first to notice and she alerted her husband, Ant, who immediately drove off in search of it. When he spotted the van parked on the beach, he called the police, who then gave chase as it drove off. After running a few red lights, the joyriders lost control and smashed into a building. The front of the van ..read more

Bags went missing in Dubai floods, with embassy staff only able to retrieve one instrument and a handful of dress uniforms for defence force musicians Australia’s and New Zealand’s defence forces are once again coming together at Gallipoli – this time to ensure New Zealand’s military band can play on. The band’s luggage was among thousands of bags lost during last week’s Dubai floods, with embassy staff only able to retrieve one instrument and a handful of dress uniforms ahead of the 25 April dawn service in Turkey ..read more

My friend Yorick Blumenfeld, who has died aged 91, was a prolific writer and futurologist with more than 25 books and 2,000 articles to his name. In the early 1960s, at the height of the cold war and worried by the risk of nuclear annihilation, Yorick and his wife, Helaine, travelled to the South Pacific with a group of friends and founded Philia, an international community near Nelson, New Zealand ..read more

Collective of Māori artists wins Golden Lion at Venice Biennale for Takapau, a large-scale installation inspired by woven mats A Māori artist collective’s dazzling, intricate canopy woven from reflective trucking straps has been awarded a prestigious global art prize – the first time a New Zealand artwork has won the award. On Saturday, the jury of the 60th International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale awarded New Zealand’s Mataaho Collective the Golden Lion for best international participation for its work Takapau – a large-scale installation inspired by Māori takapau, finely woven mats ..read more

Proposed ‘fast-track’ law could see conservation concerns ignored and projects once rejected for environmental reasons given the green light New Zealand’s parliament is considering a law that would allow major development projects to bypass environmental approvals – and that should be a cause for extreme alarm. The proposed Fast-track Approvals Bill emerged from the coalition agreements that enabled a centre-right government to form after last year’s election. Nicola Wheen and Andrew Geddis are professors of law at the University of Otago ..read more