Ian Mune has built a unique international reputation from a lifetime of work, based in his native New Zealand: as writer, actor, director, producer, and mentor. His 2024 knighthood was a fitting recognition.
He has been a constant presence in the New Zealand and Australian performing landscape for more than four decades. The face (“pummelled out of dough”) and the unmistakably growly voice have been put to a wide variety of uses.
Having made an early decision to set aside the opportunity of joining the Royal Shakespeare Company and return from the UK to “talk my own language”, it is not surprising that Ian has long been a passionate promoter of the telling of Antipodean stories, and of an untrammelled creative environment.
He is specially identified with many of the milestones of Kiwi cinema and television as performer, producer, director and writer. His screen debut was in pioneering drama series Pukemanu (1971), an opportunity also to start developing writing skills.
Ian’s longtime collaboration with Roger Donaldson included Sleeping Dogs, regarded as one of the pivotal moments in New Zealand’s cinematic renaissance. Ian co-wrote Goodbye Pork Pie, and his feature film directorial debut was another homegrown classic, 1985‘s Came A Hot Friday. Bringing international award winner The End of the Golden Weather to the big screen in 1991 was a major personal and public highlight.
Having declined Once Were Warriors, Ian stepped in at short notice to direct the sequel, What Becomes of the Broken Hearted? which won nine of its 13 New Zealand Film Awards in 1999 and remains his biggest commercial success.
More recently Ian showed his documentary skills with Billy T - Te Movie, a widely praised and heartfelt tribute to one of his earliest creative partners, and a top grossing New Zealand release in 2011.
Awards are not new, but the 2024 knighthood, added to a raft of awards - including an OBE in 1991 for services to Film and Theatre - underlining the remarkable impact he continues to have in finding our voice and celebrating Australasian culture. In ‘Mune - an Autobiography’, published in 2010, he not only tells the story of a Tauranga farm boy who fell in love with acting, but captures the frustrating, painful, exhilarating and sometimes triumphant business in which he has played such a big part.
When The New Zealand Herald asked how it felt to be made a knight of the realm, Ian Mune ‘burst into a booming laugh’. ‘If it’s used on formal occasions, that’ll be fine - I just don’t want my kids calling me Sir Dad,” he joked. The acting great has countless accolades to his name, including ‘Television Legend’ status, but he doesn’t want to get “too carried away with the formalities”.
To another sir, with love
New Zealand’s other actor Knight, Sir Sam Neill, spoke to The New Zealand Herald about his longtime friend and collaborator:
“I can think of no-one who has contributed more to New Zealand film, television and theatre singlehandedly than Ian Mune. His complete devotion to this country and our culture has to be applauded and now it’s rewarded. As a writer as a director and as an actor his contribution is absolutely immeasurable."
https://www.1news.co.nz/2023/12/31/exclusive-sir-sam-neill-talks-deserving-new-knight-sir-ian-mune/
