Roz Mason
Director Roz Mason has three decades worth of credits on television documentaries and TV series. She cut her screen teeth on TVNZ staples like Fair Go, Kaleidoscope and Crimewatch, before going freelance in the 90s. Subjects Mason has directed range from poets, drama students and assault survivors, to shipwrecks and sword swallowers — plus orangutans and pandas for company NHNZ.
Gary Scott
Gary Scott began his television career as an assignment editor on TV3's news desk, before joining Ninox Films as a writer and researcher. He directed documentaries then joined Wellington company Gibson Group in 2001, where he has produced or executive produced a slew of factual programmes and series, including Kiwis at War, Here to Stay and NZ Detectives.
Don Oakley
As an intrepid young cameraman for the National Film Unit, Don Oakley travelled to remote parts of New Zealand and brought to the screen scenes of the recently-rediscovered takahē, Opo the dolphin, and life in the backblocks. In a lengthy career, he also filmed in the studio and overseas, rising to be chief cameraman of the NFU.
Laurie Clarke
Laurie Clarke began his career in 1983, as an editor for Australia’s ABC. Back home for the birth of TV3, he later spent nine years directing and producing for news show 20/20. Clarke is currently a company director at Top Shelf Productions; his list of credits includes Target, What's Really in Our Food, Making New Zealand, Heritage Rescue, and long-running media commentary show Media Take.
Caroline Girdlestone
Fed up with seeing animals unintentionally mishandled on set, former farm girl Caroline Girdlestone decided to do something about it. Now one of the most respected animal trainers in Australasia, she’s worked with almost any animal imaginable across more than 500 projects – ranging from the cute barnyard animals of Racing Stripes to the horrifying ovine creatures in Black Sheep.
John Anderson
John Anderson got busy directing a run of television dramas in the 1980s, including award-winning Polynesian road movie Mark ll, and two of the final works by playwright Bruce Mason. The onetime actor reinvented himself as a documentary filmmaker in the 90s, then relocated to Kiribati, where he worked on more than 400 films covering everything from climate change to dance. Anderson died in Kiribati on 19 August 2016.
Paul Maunder
An iconoclast with a bent for experimentation, director Paul Maunder brought the mixed flavours of social realism and the arthouse to New Zealand screens in the 1960s and 70s, before shifting stages and leaving the government's National Film Unit, to concentrate on theatre. His second feature Sons for the Return Home (1979) as the first film to dramatise the experience of Pacific Islanders living in contemporary New Zealand.
Jane Campion
Jane Campion is one of the most dynamic — and applauded — filmmakers to emerge from Australasia. Campion's CV includes Cannes-winning road trip Peel, An Angel at My Table, based on the life of writer Janet Frame, and award-winning mini-series Top of the Lake. With her twisted settler romance The Piano (1993), she became the first woman to take the top award at the Cannes Film Festival.
Geeling Ng
Model Geeling Ng found fame after a memorable beach scene with David Bowie in the video for 'China Girl'. Auckland born, of Chinese ancestry, Ng went on to act in 'glitter soap' Gloss and Chinese settlers down under classic Illustrious Energy (1987). Her recent screen appearances include playing boss on The Jaquie Brown Diaries, competing on Dancing with the Stars, and hosting a cooking segment on Asia Down Under.
Julia Parnell
Producer Julia Parnell’s CV boasts a diverse range of credits — from comedy (Wayne Anderson: Singer of Songs) to sport (Wilbur: The King in the Ring), music (The Chills - The Triumph & Tragedy of Martin Phillipps) and te ao Māori (Restoring Hope). Parnell’s production company Notable Pictures is behind a run of award-winning short films (Dive, Friday Tigers), plus long-running mini-documentary series Loading Docs.