Love And Redemption in New Taki Rua Play

Love And Redemption in New Taki Rua Play to Premiere in July

FAIRIES, prophetic visions and miracle healings feature in Taki Rua Productions’ new play Putorino Hill.

Written by long-term Taki Rua collaborator Chris Molloy with well-known actor Te Kohe Tuhaka in the director’s chair, Putorino Hill will take audiences on a unique theatrical experience into a magical and sometimes nightmare world.

Putorino Hill has its New Zealand premiere season at BATS Theatre in Wellington from 1-5 July, followed by a season at Q Theatre in Auckland from15-19 July.

Commissioned by Taki Rua, Putorino Hill is the result of the 2013 Taki Rua and Court Theatre Māori Writer’s Residency. Writer Chris Molloy has previously written for Taki Rua’s Te Reo Māori season.

“Essentially Putorino Hill is about healing and what one person needs to do to achieve healing. I was inspired by philosophies from my Christian upbringing and Māori spirituality, but at the heart of it is an old man finally being able to to tell his story.”

Part fairy-tale and part rural legend, Putorino Hill follows one man’s journey into the complexities of manhood, love and his battle to hold onto the ones he’s lost.

First meeting Whiti as an old man, audiences are taken on a journey into his past and the everyday and supernatural events that have marked Whiti’s path through life.

Set against a backdrop of the rural and almost deserted Reinga township, audiences will enter Whiti’s magical and sometimes nightmarish world – a world of taonga pūoro, ancient battles, of patupaiarehe (fairies), prophetic visions and miracle healings.

Sometimes dreamlike and sometimes painfully real, this is the story of a man on a quest for redemption – for himself, his koro and his sleepy hometown, Reinga.

The cast for Putorino Hill will be confirmed in April. Putorino Hill is the first play in Taki Rua’s 2014 season of theatre which will include two more new works; the Te Reo Māori season work Ngunguru I te Ao I te Po will be performed in marae and schools throughout the country, while Vanilla Miraka, written and performed by Hayley Sproull, will have its first season in Wellington in October.

Putorino Hill is at BATS Theatre in Wellington from 1-5 July and at Q Theatre in Auckland from 15-19 July. For more information visit www.takirua.co.nz
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Interviews with Chris Molloy and Te Kohe Tuhaka are available now. Cast will be confirmed by mid-April. Production images will be available in June. For more information and to arrange high resolution images and interviews, please contact:
Sally Woodfield | SWPR | 021 868 020 | sally@swpr.co.nz

PUTORINO HILL
A place to stand, to love and to redeem

Writer: Chris Molloy
Director: Te Kohe Tuhaka
Set & Costume: Brian King
Sound Designer: Matthew Eller
Lighting Designer: Nick Zwart

WELLINGTON: BATS Theatre | 1-5 July | Book at www.bats.co.nz (04) 802 4175
AUCKLAND: Q Theatre | 15-19 July | Book at Q Theatre www.qtheatre.co.nz (09) 309 9771

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