Pete Smith

Pete Smith debuted with a GOFTA-winning role as one of the last people on earth, in classic sci-fi film The Quiet Earth (1985). Smith found acting after being welcomed onto the marae for his father's tangi. Keen to rediscover his ancestry and a "better life", he joined a drama course run by mentor Don Selwyn. He played a detective in Plainclothes, a gang leader in What Becomes of the Broken Hearted? and had an award-winning role on TV series The Market. Later Smith co-created and presented Far North gardening show Maramataka - Once Were Gardeners, and starred in 2010 movie Hugh and Heke. He died on 29 January 2022, at age 63.

The dynamic for me was ‘what can I contribute?’ The whole community was contributing to the upbringing of my kids ... all producing strong upstanding kids. I thought ‘let’s have a film company in Kaitaia. Let’s be the first ones'. Pete Smith, on launching production company Puriri Productions with his partner Mona Papali’i, Te Waha Nui, 6 June 2006