Afleveringen
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Australian Gina Chick is a self-proclaimed wild woman. She and Anika Moa talk about communing with nature, connecting with yourself and living with discomfort.
Watch the video version of the episode here and read more about the episode here.
Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details
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Acting royalty, Jennifer Ward Lealand tells Anika Moa about the ins and outs of being an intimacy co-ordinator and using her stage to promote te reo Māori.
Watch the video version of the episode here and read more about the episode here.
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Zijn er afleveringen die ontbreken?
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Hohepa Thompson – aka Hori – an artist and activist, tells Anika Moa about how he turned his biggest regret around and now spreads the word about te reo Māori with love and laughter.
Watch the video version of the episode here and read more about the episode here.
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Television journalist Miriama Kamo talks with Anika Moa about facing the trauma of her early life at TVNZ and the possibilities for her future.
Watch the video version of the episode here and read more about the episode here.
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Actor Jodie Rimmer has recently finished up a season of the solo show Nicola Cheeseman is Back. She chats with Anika about her life on stage and how the sex just gets better with age.
Watch the video version of the episode here.
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Shihad lead singer Jon Toogood chats with Anika Moa about his covid crisis and coming out the other side.
Watch the video version of the episode here and read more about the episode here.
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Ramon Te Wake is a trail-blazing producer, director and writer. In this episode of It’s Personal she talks about the difficulty of growing up trans but also of her determination to make a place for herself.
Watch the video version of the episode here and read more about the interview here.
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Morgana O’Reilly dishes on the hotly anticipated third season of White Lotus, in the latest episode of It’s Personal with Anika Moa. Morgana and Anika also get personal about their bodies, from learning to love their figures through to foot fetishes.
Watch the video version of the episode here and read more about the interview here.
Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details
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Author, journalist, and broadcaster Guyon Espiner swaps notes with Anika on tough interviews, living with diabetes, and life in general.
Guyon Espiner is one of New Zealand's best-known broadcasters.
Recently his non-fiction book The Drinking Game was long-listed for an Ockham Award and he's about to launch a new podcast called 30 with Guyon Espiner.
Watch the video version of the episode here
"I love interviewing people. It's so much more than just a list of questions, isn't it? You're thinking about how am I going to tell this person's story? I love that about interviewing. And I love the surprises and I love the connection with people."
Dinner table debates
"I was the youngest of three boys. The older two were pretty loud and did their thing. But my dad used to host these dinner table debates, so it was quite serious. Like he had a topic of conversation. It'd be about politics or the Springbok Tour or our anti-nuclear movement or something, probably from the age of 8, 9, 10, certainly through those years and a bit older. And that's where I developed this interest in politics and I guess the media and just stuff that was going on in the world. You had to have your facts straight."
"just wanted us to engage and debate and talk about the world. And I think because he worked a lot and was really busy and didn't engage with us for some of that time. The dinner time in those days was the time where you had your korero, you had your wananga, basically."
Writing and Politics
"Sport was a huge thing for me, and it was cricket and soccer for me in those days. But then my first big memory of what my future might look like was... we had a short story writing competition. I was 15 and I still remember the English teacher, who was pretty hard-ass, we were all a bit scared of her. She slammed mine down on the desk and said 'You could be a writer'."
"I've never forgotten that. And my whole career has been based on writing. I still am a writer, whether it's writing for radio or television or a book or a script or whatever. And I am a writer, and I place a lot of that back to that point where someone said to me, 'I've got faith in you, you could do this', and someone you respected and trusted their judgment. And so from quite an early age, mid-teens, I was going to be a writer. At first, I was going to be the next Stephen King or something, but eventually that rolled into journalism…
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Country musician Tami Neilson tells Anika how she ended up singing a duet with music legend Willie Nelson, and the two discuss life as a working musician and living on the road.
A brush with death in early 2023 gave Tami Neilson fresh perspective on her life and career, she tell Anika Moa about her "come to Jesus" moment and they discuss the realities of being a working musician.
Watch the video version of the episode here
Realising her indigenous heritage
"On my dad's side of the family I have Ojibwe blood and Ojibwe heritage, which is beautiful, really special. But in Canada, as most colonised countries, it's very complicated. Our people were very oppressed and had horrific things happen, as everyone has seen in the news over the last few years. And so my grandmother was raised on Wasauksing nation in Ontario and when she was just young, her mother, who was indigenous, died in childbirth. So her father, who was German, then took her and her sisters to southern Ontario and left the reservation. She spent most of her life trying to hide the fact that she was indigenous, even though she was very clearly, visibly indigenous. It was not something she liked to talk about. She came from a generation where it was illegal for indigenous people to gather in a group of more than three people. So you couldn't sit and have a coffee together in a restaurant."
"I always knew my heritage, but did not have the opportunity to really explore it being raised in a very fundamental Christian household. It wasn't really until I left Canada and came to New Zealand and seeing how intertwined everything in New Zealand is with indigenous culture. They couldn't defeat the Maori and so they had to coexist. They had to find a way, even though it was still oppressive. Whereas in Canada we were defeated. It was not ever considered to keep that culture in our government, in daily life. Coming here made me yearn more for knowledge of my indigenous ancestry in Canada."
Her life on the road
"Growing up in a motorhome touring across the United States and Canada for the better part of a decade, I used to look at kids who grew up in the same house with a picket fence and a dog and had all the same friends their whole life. To me, that's so exotic. Whereas people are like, wow, your life was so incredible, you got to grow up touring with your family and living in this motorhome, in a tour bus. And that seems exotic to the average person, but that was my normal. So for me, normal is exotic."
2023's turning point…
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Actor Grace Palmer has hit the big-time with a role on the American sitcom Animal Control. She talks about learning her craft on Shortland Street, her social media presence, and controlling her IBS.
Grace Palmer has hit the big time, with a leading role on the Fox sitcom Animal Control. She talks to Anika about her humble beginnings and living the dream.
Watch the video version of the episode here
Her early life
"Jason is very fun. And he's kind of like an older brother father. He was with my mum from when I was two, so I don't remember a life, like, without him. And my dad's always been super present as well. And they get along and it's great."
"Mum's a lot. She's such a powerhouse. But I think her being so awesome and being that woman, there is, uh, an element of pressure to be, like, an achiever. She was really big on us being super involved at school and doing lots of extracurricular activities and doing well at school. I think because she grew up in Hornby and had a very different childhood, that she wanted us to utilise all of the opportunities that were available to us and to be grateful for them and to do well. I'm grateful to have had her as a mother, for sure, but, yeah, I wouldn't say it was like a chill childhood."
"I did a lot of weird stuff, um, one of which was talk to myself endlessly. I vividly remember being in the back of a car and I'd pretend I was dying and that I had to have this little shot of this thing to save my life. And so my parents would just be, like, living their life normally, and their kid is in the back just, like, curled up. always see me walking, just talking to myself and doing full scenes.
"My auntie was in The Sweet Adelines, which is like a singing group and they were doing this performance at the Christchurchn Town Hall. They were like, 'Do you want to do a little performance in between our show?' and I was like, 'Of course'. So I did a Kath and Kim reenactment where I played Kath AND Kim, but I was like turning and talking to myself. But I was dressed only as Kath, which was a little bit strange for people. Half the audience thought I was deranged and then half the audience was like, 'She's iconic'. It was quite weird though. When I look back on it, I don't think that's what The Sweet Adelines signed up for."
Shortland Street…
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Casketeer Kaiora Tipene and Anika talk about life, death, and some of the weirder burial requests Kaiora has received.
The final season of the popular reality TV show The Casketeers, which follows the staff of Tipene Funerals as they go about their important mahi, played out late last year. Star of the show, Kaiora Tipene, talks to Anika about life in the funeral industry.
Watch the video version of the episode here
Becoming TV stars
"When we realised that that was the finale for The Casketeers there was so much that came back to me. I'm always thinking of the grieving whanau that we cared for, who shared their journey with us, the kaimahi of Tipene Funerals and also with the show. I'm just blessed that they were willing to share those vulnerable moments with the motu and also with the world."
"When we were asked if a camera could follow us my husband disagreed with the whole thing, in the beginning. It took him a while to come round. What we noticed was social media was evolving and whanau were sharing certain moments of huimate. And so we knew that if we were going to do this, we had to do this our way and we had to show them how we manāki the tūpāpaku. So it's definitely something that we were a little bit iffy about at first, but we had to trust those who created that format to ensure that the loved ones were always dignified and whanau were always still having their moment with their loved one."
"I look back now, and when you're sitting with a new group of people, introducing yourselves. I'm a lawyer. I'm a doctor and then you come round to yourself and you say, well, I'm a funeral director. There was always some type of awkwardness there when you did inform people of your profession. I like to believe now, over time, since the show has aired, it's demystified. People have come up to me and said, 'I just want to thank you for what you do. You've helped me through my grief. I can now talk openly with my whanau about what I want for my tangi'."
How they got into the business…
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Actor Claire Chitham and Anika talk about health, wellbeing, and living with a chronic illness. Claire was diagnosed with Crohn's disease as a teenager and talks about its impact on her life.
From Waverley to Aurora and beyond, Claire Chitham has graced our screens for decades now.
She's also recently written a book about wellness, detailing her discoveries while on her own health journey, after being diagnosed with Crohn's Disease as a teenager.
Watch the video version of the episode here
On Outrageous Fortune
"I think it was a reflection of a side of New Zealand that we all, a) recognize about ourselves, but b) actually love about ourselves. It's the grubby, basic side of you that we all have. And I think the thing that was wonderful about watching the Wests was that it was a family unit that was bound by blood above all else. So there was absolute, commitment and love there in a family way. But it was a group of people that were allowed to behave badly, and they lived outside of society's sort of norms, and they were allowed to break the rules, and we got to watch them break the rules."
"When I got Aurora, and I'd done a lot of theater, and I'd been doing some other things, and I'd become a Pilates trainer, because I was terrified I was never going to work in this country again. And I remember getting the audition and going, this one's mine."
"I remember the first scene that I shot was so difficult and embarrassing. Even though I was 26, which now sounds really young, I was surrounded by 18 year old lingerie models and I was having to model in the Hoochie Mama underwear contest. I was having to basically dance like a stripper on stage in front of a lot of people. And I remember the director, Mike Beesley, coming up to me at the end when we'd finished shooting that scene, and he was like, nobody's going to be thinking of Waverly now, babes."
On being diagnosed with Crohn's Disease
"I was, twelve. I was complaining of pains and my mum thought that I was starting to get my period so she had me on the Ponstan, which was an anti-inflammatory. I'd eat and then I can still intensely remember the feeling of the pain that would start to occur in my gut. And I would go away and crawl and lie down on my side in a bed with my knees pulled up to my chest and hide from people while the pain passed."…
Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details
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Comedian Tom Sainsbury talks making movies, his social media characters, and the two children he helped bring into the world.
Tom Sainsbury is a man of many faces, from his social media characters to his true crime podcast host persona and more recently feature film maker and star.
He talks to Anika Moa about the trajectory of his life on screen and the personal highlights and lowlights along the way.
Watch the video version of the episode here
Grassroots beginnings
"People assume it was a lot tougher than it was. The thing is that there's a thriving amateur dramatic society in Matamata. So pretty early on, I kind of discovered this as an avenue and found my people."
"I auditioned for drama school and failed miserably. I was just so ill prepared. And I argued with the person doing the audition about the acoustics of the place. Like why did I do that? My soul still cringes about it."
"I worked the traps and I would hang out with all these actors, lots of them still doing acting now. But they were all very kind of serious about it and they held up Robert De Niro as their kind of hero and stuff like that. And it wasn't until and I thought maybe this isn't for me this acting style. And it was twice to hang out with your Morgana O'Reilly's and your Madeleine Sami's and stuff.
The move into podcasts
"I've spent a lot of time listening to true crime podcasts. So, like S Town, Serial, those kind of ones. I was so aware of the tropes, I was like, this would be great for a parody. So I've done Small Town Scandal, where I play all the characters in the town, and it's solving the mystery of who killed the main character. His uncle's the richest man in town, and his body's found kind of torn up by automated lawnmower"
Feature Films
There's a competition called the 48hour film competition and we won it in 2016 and then again in 2018. So we had this kind of prize money that we could do something with and it would have been a really good short film, but we were like, let's make a feature film. And so we started writing it back then, and then just slowly and surely, once you get other people involved and suddenly you've got deadlines, suddenly a film is getting made. and then we finished it in 2022, but we decided to kind of hold it and release it as part of the New Zealand Film Festival.
Social Media…
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Anna Pillay and Anika Moa swap ADHD stories - a condition that affects around 5 percent of our population. Anna was 50 years old and had three neuro-diverse children before she was diagnosed.
Anna Pillay was 50 when she was diagnosed with ADHD, Anika was nearly 40 when she received her diagnosis. The two reflect on what having the condition has meant for them.
Watch the video version of the episode here
Anna's life with undiagnosed ADHD
"I found it hard to make friends. I found it hard to relate to people. I had loads of social anxiety. I had a really great childhood, but I had lots of kind of little sad internal feelings going on. I was a bit kind of attention seeking. I was a real little liar, I was a fantasist when I was a little kid. So that was probably quite a sign.
"I cruised through school to a certain level and then I got to a point where I had to really be able to remember things and perform in exams and I just couldn't do it. And so I would panic. I would not do the work and I wouldn't retain the information. Then I would just absolutely freak out. And then I just screwed them all up."
"I just thought that I was a bit shit and a bit of an underachiever. People would be like, 'Oh, you're so bright. How come you're doing this? Why haven't you done this? Why didn't you go to university?'
"From looking at my son and from learning about his autism and from learning about Lola's stuff, that was when it started going, 'Oh, hang on a minute. I wonder, if there's something going on with me'. And then I started reading about ADHD and there were all of these things that I thought were just dumb shit that I did and thought that actually other people seemed to think in the same way. And so that's when I thought, right, I'm going to make an appointment."
What ADHD looks like for Anna
When I was explaining it to the psychiatrist, I said it was like I always have 50 tabs open on my computer in my brain and I can't focus on which one I'm going to do next and I don't know which one to click and I'm noticing all notifications coming at me from everything and then I just freeze."
"I buy ridiculous things in the middle of the night and then I have to phone shops and beg them to cancel my purchase. I ordered 200 individually wrapped things of mints. Like, I was in a shop. And then, like, strange trousers that were one size fits all trousers and I didn't even know what was arriving. 500 individual sachets of coconut sugar arrived one day…
Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details
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Australian musician Jen Cloher, who is of Ngapuhi and Ngati Kahu descent, talks to Anika about embracing her whakapapa and finding her authenticity in the music industry.
Jen Cloher is a pretty big deal in Australia, where she's released half a dozen albums and won lots of awards, including Best Solo Artist at the 2023 Music Victoria Awards. She was also nominated for a 2023 Aria Award.
But she is less well-known here in New Zealand, the home of her Māori whanau. She talks to Anika about finding her roots and being authentic in the music industry.
Watch the video version of the episode here
Jen's start in the music industry
"The major labels were starting to lose their power. They still had power. They were still giving out deals. But we slowly started to see the digital world rise up and it took a lot of power away from those gatekeepers. So it was an interesting time, for artists and particularly, wahine takatapui to navigate those worlds. And I think I just came through at a time where I was able to find independent partners in the music industry. Had it been 10 years earlier, I probably would have been signed to Sony or EMI, if they'd even look at me. I think that I'm not an easy face or body to market into a predominantly heteronormative landscape. So, I think my intersection with the music industry was well timed in order for me to even get a look in."
Her music
"There's always been a storytelling, quite a personal sort of approach. There's always been a very folky element. It's been 20 years. Twenty years of writing music, of being a part of different communities. As I gained more confidence, I'd always loved rock. I'd grown up listening to rock. Perhaps I didn't have the chops to pull off those rock signifiers. But as I became more confident as a musician, I was able to relax into bringing that side forward more."
"I love Velvet Underground and Patti Smith and just so many bands, I guess, from that sort of like, New York, 70s era, that sort of came through as well. So I think it's just been like an evolution. And where I am today is, I just feel like everything that I write and perform obviously comes through so much influence. But also it's my story. It's always my story. That's what I've always lent on."
'If you're authentic, you are timeless'…
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Robyn Malcolm is one of New Zealand's best-known actors. She discusses creating her latest age-appropriate role in After the Party and how she's navigated solo-parenting, menopause, and mental health setbacks.
In this episode of It's Personal, Robyn Malcolm talks to Anika Moa about her latest role in After the Party and how she's managed menopause and mental health setbacks as she continues to break barriers in the entertainment industry.
Watch the video version of the episode here
Finding her place
"I wasn't finding my tribe in Ashburton, that's for sure. I was doing a lot of music, so I was disappearing into music a lot, into classical music. And I painted and I was disappearing into that. So I liked disappearing into a creative world. And, I also wasn't very happy with myself at the time, who is at that age. So I liked disappearing into other people.
"There was a moment I entered into a talent quest when I was 14, and I made people laugh. And I remember, you know, how those very key moments in your life, it's like you can remember the smell of things. You can remember detail. And I remember I played Miss Piggy. I remember looking out and everyone was pissing themselves. I was on my bicycle, and it was a warm northwesterly in Ashburton, and the sun was down, and I had my Miss Piggy wig on a polystyrene wig block on the handlebars. And I just remember that bike ride, and I laughed all the way home. I was so happy. It was just glee. It was pure glee that I had managed to galvanise an entire room with laughter."
The beauty of the stage
"I find it one of the safest places to be. Being a character on stage, telling a story in front of a bunch of people. I don't know. There's something about it that is so, safe. There's something glorious about it. Even if you're playing the villain, because you're in the middle of story. And everybody connects to story in some way, and everybody has their own journey with it, and you're all experienced, because we live lives that are so singular. Right. And when you're in a place of story with other people, it's a beautiful collective experience."
"I liken film and television a bit more to something like painting. So you're making the work before you show it to the audience. And there's nothing you can do once it's out there. It's a real gift. It's like, here it is. This is what we made, and you let it go, and then you go, and you can take it however you want to take it. I can't control whether you're going to like this or not."
After the Party…
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White Ferns captain Sophie Devine tells Anika about life at the top of her game and living with Type 1 diabetes.
Sophie Devine is living her childhood dream of being a professional athlete. In this episode of It's Personal, she tells Anika Moa how she manages as captain of the New Zealand women's cricket team, the White Ferns, while also living with Type 1 diabetes.
Watch the video version of the episode here
Grassroots beginnings
"Like most kiwi kids, I just would be out as soon as the sun was up, playing sport, have to go to school, come back, be playing any sort of sport I can get. I was a little psycho. Like, I just loved getting stuck into it. And from a very young age, probably a little bit too competitive. Like, I remember, I wouldn't have been older than seven or eight, and me and one of my mates had figured out pretty early playing hockey on the grass... one of us would go in where all the kids would swarm around the ball and the other one would just wait by the goal. We'd get the ball, whack it up the top, score goals. We'd be scoring 10 / 15 goals every weekend."
"Yeah, there was no other option. I was going to play sport for New Zealand. I didn't care what sport it was or whatever. That was just it. I couldn't see myself doing anything else."
Getting the call up to represent New Zealand
"I still remember it as clear as day, being at high school and getting the phone call, which, I mean, you're not supposed to have your phones in class, but stuff that. And I remember leaving and having the phone call with the coach at the time and school was a write off after that. I remember just running home, being like, shouting and hollering and stuff like that. It's an incredible honour. It's real cliche but it's honestly like the best feeling ever to have that recognition. And I would be nowhere near here if it wasn't for coaches, mum and dad, brothers and sisters, like umpires, scorers. There's so many people that have impacted me and have allowed me to end up where I am now."
"I was a little psycho" says Devine of her competitive nature
On being captain of the White Ferns
"I'd like to think I do a good job, but I think the great thing about it is there's always something to learn. You can always get better. There's always things that you feel that you can grow and evolve and develop, which I think is really exciting for me."…
Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details
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Singer and Shortland Street star Bella Kalolo bonds with Anika over body image, performing with Chaka Khan, and achieving her quiet dreams.
Shortland Street star Bella Kalolo talks about fat-shaming and smashing glass ceilings as she quietly goes about achieving her quiet dreams in this episode of It's Personal with Anika Moa.
Watch the video version of the episode here
On her singing career highlights
Doing Glastonbury (with a broken tibia)
"We had to cover my my leg with a rubbish bag - every day. Because that's just poos and dirt and urine all mixed up. The spillage that was coming from all of the lavatories was amazing. That wasn't fun. But everything else, like being able to meet Neneh Cherry outside, at the back of her gig it was just amazing."
On meeting John Mayer
"So many people asked me, "what did he smell like?" That was the main question from women. He smelled like a person didn't he? I don't know, he was so nice, not fake nice, he was so lovely."
Performing with Chaka Khan
"The highlight would be Chaka Khan, 100 percent.
"She's headlining the Sydney Festival and I hear that she's going to be at the...I think it was like a dignitaries night. So we were playing at that night. We finished our gig, went back to the greenroom, so I'm towelling my face and then knock on the door and it's the coordinator for the festival. And then he goes there's someone here that wants to meet you... and then he goes Chaka Khan."
"I got called into her little boudoir. She's so f'in cool, she's sitting there with a massive, like, feathered fan, smoking. So I get in there and then we talk, and then we get to the song choice ... she goes, 'I'm Every Woman, do you know it?' I've been singing it since I was like, you know, 19. So then I did it - it's online."
On acting
"I absolutely love where I'm at. And this has been a goal for me. Just one of those quiet goals, you know, that you keep to yourself in your heart. And I remember crossing the bridge kind of near the Greek Orthodox Church, just in town, going over the bridge going, I feel like in my mind I've made it if I get this and then it happened. And then I was like, I kissed a photo of my mom and dad because they've passed away now. So I was like 'we made it, we made it'."
Quiet dreams…
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