Weaving cultural ties

Tanemahuta Gray travelled far to bring his skills back to a New Zealand stage. Carly Thomas talked to him about his epic journey.

Tanemahuta Gray’s house is full of life. In and out of the conversation are kids, sun streaming through the dining room window and a dog offering up it’s favourite toy. It’s wonderfully normal and it’s something that Gray flows into at the end of the week, the first part of which he spends in Wellington as the chief executive of Taki Rua Productions.

The company just wrapped up its nationwide tour of Tikki Taane Mahuta, an epic production combining live music, theatre, aerial performance, contemporary dance, kapa haka, mau rakau and hip hop, and, among all of that, Gray’s family are settling into a new town.

It’s a juggle and Gray and his wife Yumiko Olliver-gray threw the balls up in the air this year when they moved to Feilding. Yumiko home schools their three children and with her mum and dad living just up the road, the family are enjoying the relaxed atmosphere of their new community.

The pair’s littlest son plonks on to his dad’s lap as he begins to talk about his creative journey from then to now and, in between playing with Lego, a thread of a story is woven.

Dance began early on for Gray. When he was 4 years old, he went with his mum and four siblings to the Ngati Poneke Young Maori Club, where he learnt kapa haka, action songs and waiata. Ballet was next. He watched his sister in a performance of Beatrix Potter at the Lower Hutt Little Theatre and it left him sure that he wanted to be on stage.

‘‘I think it was being up there that captured me – not necessarily the ballet at that stage, I was only six – but the performing part.’’

Ballet kept him in its hold for 11 years and once his initial training was complete, Gray went on to the New Zealand School of Dance .

‘‘I was aiming towards becoming a classical ballet dancer and I got my first real experiences of contemporary dance. It just opened me up a bit more as a dancer.’’

Injuries hampered him though, which made it a ‘‘bit of a hard run’’, but as with many threads of Gray’s life, when he ran into a knot, a new way around was sought. It’s how he found mau rakau and taiaha, a skill he diverged into to strengthen his knee. He learnt under the late Mita Mohi, a man Gray says was ‘‘the most amazing, most humble man’’.

‘‘He just wanted to give this art form that was dying to the next generation and now it’s so strong. It was just amazing working with him, what he achieved is epic for this country, an absolutely phenomenal man.’’

Gray went on to graduate, but his knee still wasn’t quite right, which meant his dreams of getting into the Royal New Zealand Ballet were dashed. It left him on the dole, wondering what was next.

‘‘I decided to find out about the other side of me – the taha Maori side.’’

He began volunteering at a Kohanga Reo in Ngaio, Wellington, deciding to do something positive while unemployed. He volunteered there for a year and was employed for another three. Gray says his time on the benefit helped make him ‘‘strong as a person’’. ‘‘And it also got me a set of skills that I brought back into the arts later on.’’

A connection to who he was as a Maori was tied firm and he decided that it was time to widen his net of skills and go overseas. ‘‘I knew then that I wanted to be able to tell the stories of Aotearoa in a bigger way, but I needed more tools to do that.’’

He landed in London and he gave himself six months, picking up an ushering job at the Aldwych Theatre and auditioning for as much as he could. Five months in, he started to worry

he was wasting his time and total physicality.’’

He got it, turned down the role in Phantom and literally hung upside down with the company for the next five years – travelling all over the place and doing what he set out to do, gaining knowledge to bring home.

Maui – One Man Against The Gods was that offering, a neverseen-before show staged in 2005 combining aerial theatre, kapa haka and contemporary dance that told the story of the misfit Maui capturing the sun and fishing up the North Island. Gray’s kete was full, the bridge between contemporary and traditional Maori art was being crossed and

‘‘I decided to find out about the other side of me – the taha Maori side.’’ Tanemahuta Gray