Nikki Si'ulepa

Nikki Si’ulepa won acclaim after starring in 1996 movie The Whole of the Moon, as a Samoan street kid in love. There have been further screen roles, but Si'ulepa is more active behind the scenes. Alongside reporting, filming and directing for Pacific show Tagata Pasifika, she wrote Pacific fallout tale Snow in Paradise, co-directing it with Justine Simei-Barton. The short film was invited to 11 festivals, including Tribeca and Berlin. She also helmed shorts Ma and Aroha, and hosted a 2017 episode of Neighbourhood. In 2016 she co-starred in the first of two seasons of Pot Luck, which was promoted as Aotearoa's first lesbian webseries.

[Director Ian Mune’s] discovery of Nikki Si’ulepa, in Mune’s words a ‘very rare talent’, must have been very good for morale. She dominates the camera and the action with a natural authority. Rick Bryant in Metro magazine, reviewing 1996 movie The Whole of the Moon