Kiwis take on Summer Bay
A trio of Maori actors is about to turn up the heat on Home and Away, writes Holly Byrnes
IN THE months before New Zealand actor Rob Kipa-Williams won his role on Seven’s Home and
Away, he was resigned to a new career altogether. Struggling with the fickle nature of an actor’s life, the sometime construction worker had spent six months retraining as an accredited insurance salesman, in readiness to quit show business.
A year after finishing up on another Seven drama series, 800 Words, Kipa-Williams says he’d missed out on one audition too many and was ready to throw in the towel.
Grandma Minna is a massive fan and she couldn’t believe I got the job.’’
“I went through this phase in my life where I’d had a few disappointments, where I’d got really close to big roles and a few promised that didn’t come through. I got to the point where I wasn’t sure if (acting) was for me anymore … I just needed to focus on creating a more stable life,” he says.
But just as he finished his sales training, Summer Bay came calling.
“I am actually still qualified,” Kipa-Williams jokes, “so anyone feel free to reach out if you need any advice on your health or life insurance.”
Instead, he inked a three-year deal to play Ari Parata, the fiercely protective head of a Maori family who will make the Seven series home in 2020. The show airs after Neighbours and before local soap Shortland Street.
Ari’s arrival is not exactly low key. He plays the hero when the local hospital is locked down during a violent siege.
But his character’s backstory hints at more drama and tension ahead for the Parata clan – which includes Ethan Browne as his brother Tane and another NZ newcomer, Kawakawa Fox-Reo, as his nephew Nikau.
“My character is working on a nearby construction site in Summer Bay and injures himself at work. That’s how he finds himself at the hospital and sitting next to Marilyn (Emily Symons), who is having a panic attack (during the siege). I comfort her the way that I can, but for Ari, it’s not his first rodeo when it comes to having danger around him.”
The more experienced of the three Maori actors has taken a fatherly role with his younger co-stars, but admits he was still starstruck at meeting the Bay’s patriarch, Alf (Ray Meagher).
“The first scene I did with Ray, I actually met him at the same time in real life. I got one of the make-up team to video the screen so I had it on record … it was a big deal,” he says.
For Browne, scoring his first TV role on Home
and Away is a thrill for his family of fans.
“My grandmother and mum would watch it quite a bit … still do and now even more so. Grandma Minna is a massive fan and she couldn’t believe I got the job,” Browne says.
She may want to brace herself for what’s ahead, as his character’s brief is a saucy one, with notes like “most likely to be drunk and disorderly” and “most likely to bring home a different partner every week”.
Browne laughs: “He certainly is a mischief maker, the cheeky brother and quite free spirited. But deep down he’s family orientated.”
HOME AND AWAY – SEVEN – MONDAY, JANUARY 27, AT 7PM