Punch

It's like you climb through those ropes, and you transform.

– Jim (Jordan Oosterhof) describes the feeling of stepping into a boxing ring

This whole town reeks of testosterone.

– Whetu (Conan Hayes) on his rural West Auckland town

Win it. Get the f**** out of here.

– Whetu (Conan Hayes) on Jim's boxing ambitions

...Sometimes parents do try to live through their kids and they're trying to restore something that they didn't get, and their child is doing that for them.

– Writer/director Welby Ings on the theme of parents and kids in Punch, in a Radio New Zealand interview, 23 July 2022

For Whetu we auditioned for over three years to find him ... he was really difficult to find because he is not camp, he is not drag ... he's takatāpui which is not being gay itself; it's a deep thing ...I wanted to try and offer something out into the world which walked away from this mistaken idea we have of gay being about drag. When some people's gayness questions the nature of masculinity it doesn't mean they become drag queens...

– Writer/director Welby Ings on the character of Whetu, in an interview with Radio New Zealand's Kim Hill, 23 July 2022