In the spotlight: Celebrity chat with Laura Daniel.

Actress and comedian Laura Daniel, 29, is a Seven Sharp reporter who used to impersonate Jacinda Ardern on the now defunct comedy show Jono And Ben. She has appeared on Funny Girls, Dancing With The Stars and the film Kiwi Christmas. Laura is currently starring in the TVNZ OnDemand comedy show Snort Live with her partner Joseph Moore, a Seven Sharp producer. The pair have been together for three years and perform as the musical comedy duo Two Hearts.

Before joining Seven Sharp this year, you had already done quite a bit of TV. But was it daunting joining the show?

Yes. I was a bit nervous when I started because obviously I had come in to do a bit of a comedy style. It was a bit daunting working on a news level and being around journalists and things like that. It took a little while to understand how it works but it has been really cool and exciting.

On Seven Sharp during lockdown you dyed your partner Joseph’s hair blond.

It was difficult to come up with (story) ideas. You couldn’t go see anyone. You couldn’t really go anywhere. That was where my background in making sketches and all the other comedy shows I’ve worked on came in handy. We thought, ‘OK, we’ve got to come up with a creative way to put something on the show’. We also engaged with viewers on the show with ‘Show us your haircut’. It was crazy. His hair is still blond right now.

He’s a brave man.

He is. He gets put through quite a bit.

For a Seven Sharp bake-off against Hilary Barry, you famously made a cake that was supposed to resemble Jacinda Ardern. You said, ‘Never bake your heroes’. What was the hardest part about making the cake?

I think the hardest part was the disappointment I felt in myself because I had the picture in my head and I was like, ‘This is going to look awesome’. Joseph directed that bit and I had to warn him and my

camerawoman, ‘Guys I’m actually quite good at baking so I could actually win this’. But when we got to the end they were just laughing so much at me to think I had the confidence to win the bake-off. I had an idea that I was going to use a different type of icing then I didn’t have the ingredients. I just was kind of working with what I had. It ended up looking like her face had melted.

What did you want to be when you grew up?

I definitely wanted to become an actor. I was kind of always into drama at school and stuff like that. So I definitely had the ambition to act and entertain. Over the years I’ve discovered that I like making people laugh. That’s what I enjoy doing the most. Before that, my original thought was I wanted to be a hairdresser. And you know, I did actually get to fulfil that this year on Seven Sharp. But I’m pretty glad I didn’t choose that (career).

If a movie was made of your life, who should play you?

Jacinda Ardern. I’ve spent enough time playing her.

Who’s the one person who makes you laugh every day?

You’re going to groan at this. Joseph. I’d say also now in addition to that, my cat Martin. I’ve just got a cat and he is the funniest, cutest thing in the world. I highly recommend getting a cat. It’s definitely changed my outlook.

What has been your favourite assignment so far on Seven Sharp?

Lockdown was quite tough because it was quite hard working from home but I felt really lucky to have a job. I was given a set of constraints and you have to be creative around it. So as a creator of content it was a really good challenge. My favourite stuff came out of lockdown because you had the most people watching TV. People just wanted something nice to uplift their spirits because it was a really scary time. My favourite thing we did was a dad dancing competition. Then we did ‘mum moves’ and ‘lockdown lipsync’. The number of New Zealanders that got on board ... we just got thousands of entries ... That’s one of my favourite things I’ve done.