Joanna Wane

1 week ago | nzherald.co.nz | Joanna Wane

Dad jokes: Heta Dawson with daughters Courtney (left) and Irā at his underground comedy club Poppys in Manurewa. Photo / Michael CraigFamily meals around the dinner table were an audition ground for the Dawson whānau, producing two stand-up comedians and a playwright. Now, Irā, the youngest of five siblings, is about to make her debut as a dancer with Black Grace.

3 weeks ago | nzherald.co.nz | Joanna Wane

Hugely successful playwright Sir Roger Hall at his home in Takapuna. Photo / Dean PurcellIt’s almost 50 years since Sir Roger Hall’s first play, Glide Time, burst onto the stage. With his latest show about to open in Auckland, can the man with the Midas touch still spin box-office gold? “The hardest question to answer of all time is, ‘What do you want for lunch?’” If you think that sounds like a Roger Hall line, you’re probably right. The playwright himself isn’t sure.

4 weeks ago | nzherald.co.nz | Joanna Wane

The Surprise, by Auckland photographer Deborah Kelland, whose images documenting the migration of monarch butterflies features in the Auckland Festival of Photography this month. High up on a mountain in Mexico, Auckland photographer Deborah Kelland experienced one of nature’s miracles. The symbolic release of Deborah Kelland’s monarch butterflies will mark an emotional milestone for the former boutique real estate high-flyer, whose exhibition The Sacred Journey: A Flight for Life opens on May 15.

4 weeks ago | nzherald.co.nz | Joanna Wane

British novelist David Nicholls, whose latest book, 'You Are Here', is a midlife romance set on the Coast to Coast walking trail across northern England. One Day’s David Nicholls doesn’t believe in happy endings. For his latest book, he walked 300km across England to try to find one. Sixteen years after David Nicholls published his stratospheric bestseller One Day, the world is still reeling from its devastating ending.

1 month ago | nzherald.co.nz | Joanna Wane

Life in Las Vegas is “utterly insane”, says Kiwi comic Sam Wills, who has become a hit on the Strip with the alter ego he created from black sticky tape and eyeliner two decades ago. It’s late afternoon when the man America knows only as Tape Face leaves his home in suburban Las Vegas and heads to work on the Strip. Some 45 hotel-casinos line the notorious 6.8km stretch of neon heading north from the “Welcome to Las Vegas” sign.