TV’S HOT NEW COP!
Jarod Rawiri reports for duty
It’s been one of those weeks for actor Jarod Rawiri and his wife, choreographer Dolina Wehipeihana. The last 24 hours alone have seen a burst water pipe under their Auckland bungalow (“We wondered what the strange hissing sound was!”) on Dolina’s 45th birthday.
Now with the water turned off until the plumber arrives, there’s a backlog of dishes to wash and poor Dolina – who’s hobbling around in a moon boot after rupturing her Achilles tendon during a run – is hanging out for a bath.
“Welcome to the madhouse,”
she laughs, where, truth be told, it’s a picture of serenity when the Weekly arrives to chat to the down-to-earth couple, before three of their four children arrive home from school.
It’s a rare day off for Jarod, who plays newcomer Detective Constable Daniel Chalmers on TV series The Brokenwood Mysteries, which is New Zealand’s most successful show internationally.
Watched in 18 territories worldwide by audiences in the millions, the show is now in its seventh season and has just launched in the US and Canada.
“I’ve got fan mail already from people in Canada,” says Jarod, 42. “They seem to have accepted DC Chalmers, so that’s nice. At first, I felt a bit like the new kid at school because it’s such an established show. But because [lead actors] Neill Rea and Fern Sutherland have been on the show for so long, they’re a great source of what to do and how to do it.
“I came in with my own ideas and they were like, ‘Wow, look who’s trying to be the star pupil’ – all tongue in cheek, of course. It’s a really fun environment.”
But what Jarod’s really looking forward to is hearing himself in French. He says,
“I can’t wait to hear who’s going to do my voice when the show is dubbed for the audience in France and Canada. Neill was saying his voiceover sounds like a guy who’s been smoking for 50 years, so my one could be really high-pitched… I hope it is – that’d be so funny!”
Well-known for his role as dad Mo Hannah on Kiwi hospital drama Shortland Street, Jarod portrayed Mo for nearly four years before the Ferndale family man was killed in a plane crash.
Since then, he hasn’t been short of work, both devising and acting in a variety of theatre shows and directing Ahika¯ roa, a Ma¯ori bilingual TV series which follows the trials of a group of city-based rangatahi/youth. He also has a guest role in the local sitcom Mean Mums, playing the partner of school fundraiser mother Hine (Aroha Rawson).
“After my character on Shortland Street died, I was feeling excited,” admits Jarod. “I appreciated my time there, but was looking forward to seeing what else I could get my paws into, in what’s an exciting time for our industry in terms of different stories being told and voices being heard.
“And I don’t have teachers from my kids’ school coming up to me any more asking,
‘Can you just tell me what happens with such and such a character?’” he laughs.
His two sons Iarere, 11, and Te Marino, nine, have both been extras on the popular soap, playing children on a school bus which crashed.
“They got to have fake blood put on them, so I asked if they wanted to wipe it off before going to school afterwards. But of course they wanted to keep it on. A teacher saw them and asked, ‘Are you okay?’, while kids in the playground
‘My voiceover could be really high-pitched ... I hope it is – that’d be so funny!’
kept going ‘Wow, what happened to you?’ They played it cool though, and were like, “It’s just make-up.”
As a little girl, daughter Huia, now 14, was also cast in Gaylene Preston’s mini-series Hope and Wire, about the Christchurch earthquakes.
“Gaylene told me, “Your daughter’s got it. She’s really comfortable being still and being herself in front of a camera, which often you have to teach someone.’”
While acting is obviously a wha¯ nau affair, he says it’s only his stepdaughter Tyla, 23, who has avoided “being roped in” to appear on-screen and she works in the office at an organics wholefood company.
“I’ve even pulled in my mum, Awhina, to play a teacher on Ahika¯ roa! We needed someone for a teacher role. So I said, “Mum, you’re a teacher, you do it!” recalls Jarod, who is of Nga¯ ti Whanaunga, Nga¯ ti Tu¯ wharetoa, Te Uri o Hau and Nga¯ ti Hine descent.
He tells of a special relationship with his “superdevoted” mother, who raised him on her own while studying at the University of Auckland and working part-time at a cinema.
“She’s amazing,” he enthuses. “My mum’s my hero. I remember being about five years old, sitting in the candy bar while she was working, and watching Gremlins through the doors. It was scary that movie!”
“Maybe that’s where your love of acting started for you, Jarod?” muses Dolina (Nga¯ ti Raukawa and Nga¯ ti Tu¯ korehe).
“Yeah, probably!” he agrees, mentioning that a high school teacher also gave him the push he needed as a shy teen, recruiting him for a school show when she needed someone with taiaha (Ma¯ ori weaponry) skills.
“I’ve always loved different forms of art – it was a big thing for me growing up,” he adds.
Now the fun-loving dad is in his element helping
“little man” Te Marino make costumes for book day at school or a cardboard Star Wars star destroyer, or even a Fortnite video game-inspired birthday cake.
Says doting mum Dolina,
“Te Marino has big creative ideas and because Jarod so believes in his vision, he tries to make his wishes come true.
“He doesn’t discuss it with me – it’s just their thing. He will even go out late at night to Kmart to buy the right coloured accessories for whatever they’re working on.”
It’s also no surprise the couple first bonded over their shared love of the arts – and Dolina is just as creatively talented in her own right.
With a background that includes performing with Atamira, Black Grace and Touch Compass dance companies, Dolina also choreographed the Thriller haka to Poi E dance in Taika Waititi’s movie Boy, and now works for the Performing Arts Network of New Zealand (PANNZ) and Kia Mau Festival held in Wellington this month.
“I definitely was attracted to her when I saw her dance,” confesses Jarod, turning to smile at his wife of five years. “Straight up, it was beautiful.”
“Look, going to a kids’ disco or dancing at a wedding will do it for me now,” she grins. “Any kind of movement is fundamental to being human, I think, as it brings joy.”
The pair met in 2003, through a match-making mutual friend, who was flatting with Jarod, while he was studying at drama school in Wellington.
“She engineered it so we went to a restaurant that had booths and everyone else sat
‘My dancing is a hidden talent. But the shorts splitting did throw me a little bit!’
in one booth, so there was no room for us,” Dolina remembers. “So then Jarod and I had to sit in a booth by ourselves.
“Everyone was in on it.
I was a bit nervous and told a joke about a millipede. A really bad, long joke… But he laughed at it. We got on really well and it was super-easy to talk to each other.”
However, Jarod adds that he’s going to leave any dance performances up to his wife after he got the biggest laughs on their wedding day for ripping his shorts while doing the splits, competing in a dance battle.
“My dancing is a hidden talent that I only pull out on special occasions,” he laughs. “The shorts splitting did throw me a little bit – I forgot a few moves after that. Luckily, I had a back-up outfit!”
Which begs the question, would he ever consider being a contestant on Dancing With the Stars (with a wife at home willing to practice with him?
“No!” he asserts. “Oh, maybe, we’ll see. My name was bandied about when there was a list of Shortland Street actors who potentially could be on DWTS. Ben Barrington (who plays Dr Drew McCaskill) ended up doing it and yet his name definitely wasn’t on that list!”#