George Henare

George Winiata Henare CNZM OBE (born 11 September 1945) is a New Zealand actor with a career spanning over 50 years.

George Henare

CNZM OBE
Henare in 2010
Born
George Winiata Henare

(1945-09-11) 11 September 1945
Gisborne, New Zealand
OccupationActor
Years active1965 – present

Early life

Born in Gisborne on 11 September 1945, the third youngest in a family of ten children,[1] Henare affiliates to the Māori tribes of Ngati Porou and Ngati Hine. He lived on a farm until the age of 12 on the East Coast of New Zealand's North Island.

Career

Henare has a distinguished career as an actor in New Zealand with 50 years on stage and screen. Henare began his acting career after a stint as a postman and a trainee teacher.[2] He has played lead roles in film, television, opera and theatre as well as radio and voice work. An early success was landing a role in a New Zealand Opera production of Porgy and Bess in 1965. He later toured Australia in Jesus Christ Superstar and Phantom of the Opera.

Film

Henare played the role of social worker Bennett in the classic New Zealand movie Once Were Warriors. Other films include Crooked Earth, Rapa Nui produced by Kevin Costner, The Silent One, The Legend of Johnny Lingo and Kawa (aka Nights in the Gardens of Spain). Henare also played a lead role in the NZ short film Mananui (1995) alongside actor Cliff Curtis.[3]

Television

Henare has performed in numerous television dramas in New Zealand including The Park Terrace Murder (1976), the historical series Greenstone and Mercy Peak. He also acted in the award-winning docu-drama Nga Tohu: Signatures which explored political and social issues around the Treaty of Waitangi. Other television roles included appearances in Xena: Warrior Princess, Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and Street Legal.[4]

Starting in March 2011, Henare began in a recurring guest role as Henare Ngatai, father of Roimata in the long-running soap opera Shortland Street.

Stage

On stage, Henare has played a variety of roles from classical Shakespeare, musicals, operas to contemporary New Zealand theatre. In 2006, he won the actor of the year awardat the Chapman Tripp Theatre Awards for his performance in the role of Willy Loman in Death of a Salesman at Circa Theatre, Wellington.[5]

In 2014 Henare became patron of the Newmarket Stage Company, a professional company based in Newmarket, Auckland. To help launch the company Henare played the lead in their first two productions of Educating Rita by Willy Russell and the New Zealand premiere of Tuesdays With Morrie by Mitch Albom and Jeffrey Hatcher.

Honours and awards

In the 1988 New Year Honours, Henare was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire, for services to the performing arts.[6] In 2008, he received a Laureate Award from the Arts Foundation of New Zealand and was also honoured with the Te Waka Toi Award, Creative New Zealand for outstanding contribution to Māori theatre.[7] He became a Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to the theatre in the 2010 New Year Honours.[8]

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References
  1. http://www.artsfoundation.org.nz/george-henare.html
  2. http://www.nzonscreen.com/person/george-henare/biography
  3. http://www.nzonscreen.com/title/mananui-1995
  4. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2014-04-07. Retrieved 2014-04-02.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  5. http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/CU0703/S00223.htm
  6. "No. 51173". The London Gazette (3rd supplement). 31 December 1987. p. 34.
  7. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2009-10-04. Retrieved 2009-09-15.CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  8. "New Year Honours: Restlessness in opera led to busy life as actor". The New Zealand Herald. 31 December 2009.
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