Three New Zealanders: Ngaio Marsh

This final chapter of a three-part documentary series about famous New Zealand writers centres on internationally acclaimed crime-writer and Shakespearean director Dame Ngaio Marsh. Marsh is interviewed in her later years and recalls writing her first murder mystery in England and how family and close friends inspired her boundless creativity. Former students and friends call Marsh a nurturer of talent while a cast of Blerta regulars including Geoff Murphy, Ian Watkin and Bruno Lawrence re-enact scenes from her most successful novels. Three New Zealanders was produced by John Barnett's company Endeavour Films.

Here is this governess in a gentile Canterbury home reading to a little girl, not of fairies or well-behaved Victorian heroes but of King Lear, Shakespeare at his most cataclysmic speaking of cruelty.

– Narrator, on Ngaio's childhood being read to by Ms Ffitch

Key Cast & Crew

Geoff Murphy

As: Darts Player

Beaver (Beverley Morrison)

As: Bar patron

John Bach

As: Hamlet

Keith Hawke

Camera

Bruno Lawrence

As: Various Roles

John Barnett

Producer