Whetū Fala

Whetū Fala has built a career championing Māori and Pasifika storytelling across theatre, film, television and radio. Born Māori with Samoan heritage, she was raised in Aramoho near Whanganui. Fala discovered her love for the performing arts early; she recalls being "utterly entranced and amazed" watching theatre (including Red Mole) in her hometown. Her passion was "taken to a new level" when she began singing and dancing in her school’s annual operettas.

As a teenager Fala moved to Auckland to pursue theatre, at a time when "there were very few Māori or Pasifika parts". She performed in a range of productions, from Greek comedies to Shakespearian tragedies. In 1983 she landed a role in Death of the Land, Rowley Habib’s landmark Māori courtroom drama.

After moving to Wellington to join the Town & Country Players, Fala was shocked to find casting directors would only audition her for Māori or Samoan parts. "I was also told many times 'you don't look Māori' by white casting people. The lack of performing arts roles and opportunities politicised me". Joining the Depot Theatre collective, she co-founded their Māori caucus with Nan Wehipeihana. The result was “the first Māori theatre shows run, written, acted, and produced by Māori". The collective evolved into Taki Rua Theatre.

After moving to Wellington to join the Town & Country Players, Fala found that casting directors would only audition her for Māori or Samoan parts. "I was also told many times 'you don't look Māori' by white casting people. The lack of performing arts roles and opportunities politicised me". Joining the Depot Collective Theatre, she co-founded their Māori caucus with Nan Wehipeihana. The result was “the first Māori theatre shows run, written, acted, and produced by Māori". The collective evolved into Taki Rua Theatre.

In Wellington, she quickly got "swept up by the kaumātua who were involved in the performing arts". Fala became a founding member of Te Manu Aute, the Māori filmmakers' collective led by Barry Barclay. Fala also began learning te reo Māori "in earnest", and volunteered with te reo radio station Te Upoko o te Ika.

Fala made her first on-screen appearance in 1986, when Te Ohu Whakaari theatre troupe appeared on children’s magazine show Spot On. The following year she acted in an episode of drama series Open House. In 1991 she joined Barry Barclay's feature Te Rua (see photos), about the repatriation of stolen Māori carvings.

In the late 1980s, she began training as an editor at TVNZ, where she worked for a decade. As the only Māori working in her department, she remembers thinking "surely there's gonna be more to join me? But there never was, so in the end I left."

She made her directorial debut in 1990 with an episode of indigenous documentary series From Spirt to Sprit, presented by renowned Māori filmmaker Merata Mita. Fala's episode, Te Upoko o te Ika, captured a day in the life of the pioneering Māori radio station, the first to broadcast fully in te reo. "It was an exciting time for Māori", Fala recalls. "We finally had Māori radio, and television was the last frontier."

In 1993, Fala directed short film Mokopuna. It followed a Māori woman haunted by visions of the past as she journeys to Parliament. Three years later, she directed The Hibiscus for Pasifika drama series Tala Pasifika, in which a grandfather tries to connect his grandson with his Samoan culture via a hibiscus plant.

Continuing to work on both sides of the camera, she appeared in Cliff Curtis movie Jubilee (2000) and American drama The Other Side of Heaven (2001), about a Mormon missionary in 1950s Tonga. She reprised her role in a 2019 sequel. Fala also worked on a number of short dramas — writing Haka & Siva for Aroha (2004), an anthology series of te reo love stories, and directing and producing Ruki’s Voice for another anthology, The Table Plays (2007), about a grieving opera singer who finds solace in an unexpected friendship.

Fala's kaupapa "has always been to create content about Aotearoa". In 2008 she founded her own production company, Fala Media, which specialises in indigenous storytelling. 

As a producer, she worked on three seasons of Waka Reo, in which contestants compete to learn te reo while living in a traditional Māori ways. Fala wrote and produced election comedy series Mana Mana Wahine Party, and directed episodes of marae renovation series Marae DIY. She has worked on several documentaries for iwi initiatives, including Kōtahi Mano Kaika, Kōtahi Mano Wawatā, which followed a long-term Kai Tahu iwi project to promote te reo Māori, and accompanying video resource Raising Bilingual Tamariki. The latter was nominated for a Te Reo Maori Innovation Award.

In 2013, she became the Short Film Manager at the NZ Film Commission, shepherding numerous films under Fresh Shorts and other short film initiatives. In 2016 she was appointed to the board of TV channel Whakaata Māori, serving three consecutive terms. She has also served on the boards of Māori screen advocacy group, Ngā Aho Whakaari; audiovisual archive Ngā Tāonga Sound & Vision; and the New Zealand Film Heritage Trust, Te Puna Ataata. In 2019 she returned to iwi radio as station manager for Whanganui’s Awa FM. 

A passionate advocate for te reo and tikanga Māori in media, in 2019 Fala was recognised for her work championing Māori stories with a Mana Wāhine Award from Women in Film and Television NZ. Fala was commended for having done it all "with a joy for life, a sharp intellect, an acerbic sense of humour, and a great love for people . . . She encapsulates everything that is Mana Wāhine."

Fala returned to her roots in theatre when she directed feature-length documentary Taki Rua Theatre: Breaking Barriers (2024). The film looks back on the development of the pioneering Māori theatre, from its beginnings as the Depot Collective Theatre into a hub for Māori storytelling. Fala celebrates trailblazers like Tūngia Baker, Keri Kaa, and Rona Bailey. Filmed partly in her hometown of Whanganui, the project fulfilled a lifelong ambition. As Fala says, "my childhood dream of making movies in Whanganui came true".

Profile written by Alexandra Paterson; published on 28 November 2024

Sources include
Whetū Fala
Fala Media website. Accessed 28 November 2024
Ella Henry, 'Wairua Auaha' (Interview in PhD Thesis documentary film)
Emile Donovan, 'Whakataukī of the Week with Whetū Fala' (Radio interview) - Radio New Zealand website. Loaded 19 August 2024. Accessed 28 November 2024
Dale Husband, 'Whetū Fala | Fala Media Owner' (Radio interview) - Waatea News. Loaded 31 January 2024. Accessed 28 November 2024
Susana Lei'ataua, ‘How Taki Rua became our unofficial national Māori theatre company’ (Radio interview) Radio New Zealand website. Loaded 28 October 2024. Accessed 28 November 2024
Laurel Stowell, 'Whetu Fala returns to Whanganui to manage Awa FM' - The Whanganui Chronicle, 6 March 2019. Accessed 28 November 2024
Unknown writer, 'Whetū Fala wins 2019 WIFT NZ Mana Wahine award' - WIFT NZ website. Loaded 14 May 2019. Accessed 28 November 2024
Unknown writer, 'Whetu Fala appointed to Māori Television Board' - Te Ao Māori News website. Loaded 29 June 2016. Accessed 28 November 2024