The long game

Women and girls rugby in the Bay of Plenty is growing fast, but behind the progress are real challenges, and a community working hard to bridge the gaps. Karen Clarkson talks with powerhouse referee and women’s rugby advocate Tiana Ngawati-Anderson, uncovering the grassroots movement reigniting the spirit of the women’s game.

words KAREN CLARKSON photos GRAEME MURRAY hair + makeup NATALIE DAWSON

In rugby-mad Aotearoa, the Bay of Plenty is often seen as a quiet achiever. It’s a region steeped in generations of club tradition, burgeoning talent and the unmistakable buzz of communities gathering on the sidelines every weekend. But behind the booming registrations in women and girls’ rugby lies a story of fractured pathways, trailblazer community leaders, and a collective call to return to the grassroots.

At first glance, the numbers are promising. Women and girls rugby participation has grown steadily, with club-level growth for teenage girls at 39 percent and a 13 percent increase among 5-12-year-olds playing tackle. But the surface tells only part of the story. Dig deeper and the challenges quickly emerge: drop-off rates at age 14, disconnection between the secondary school and club rugby systems, and the gap between community and professional rugby widening by the season.

“Some of the most powerful change is happening at the grassroots level,” says Tiana Ngawati-Anderson, former Black Ferns Sevens player and international 22 | unomagazine.co.nz “But when I didn’t make the Auckland under-17 netball team, I thought: right, I’m going to play rugby.” Raised by a touch rugby-loving whānau, Tiana (Ngāti Hine, Ngāti Porou and Ngāti Whakaue) had known the oval ball her whole life, but like many young girls, netball seemed the obvious choice. “The moment I stepped onto the rugby field, it just clicked.”

That instinctive switch lit a fire that’s fuelled more than two decades at the heart of New Zealand women’s rugby. From captaining teams and representing her country, to coaching secondary schools and mentoring young referees, Tiana now has a hand in shaping the future of the game she loves.

And she’s not doing it alone. She points to local female rugby legends like Renee Wickliffe and Portia Woodman-Wickliffe, who started a girls’ team at Arataki Rugby Club when no competition existed for their age group.

“So they played the boys, and won. Now they’ve got two girls’ teams and even fundraised to travel to Christchurch for a national girls' festival. That’s what leadership looks like.”

Another changemaker is Victoria Grant, former Hurricanes Poua head coach. “She found out only two Tauranga teams went to a Waikato tournament, so she created her own under-11s competition at Rotoiti, and nine teams turned up,” says Tiana. “They’re creating opportunities so their daughters can come through with real game experience, not just talent.”

Reconnecting the pathway

Back in 2018, Tiana moved to the Bay of Plenty with her husband, who joined the Black Ferns Sevens as a strength and conditioning coach. She was close to retirement, juggling training and parenting their daughter, when a gym conversation changed her direction. “Someone asked me if I would consider being a referee and I said ‘hell no’. But it planted a seed.”

By 2019, she had made the New Zealand referees squad and officiated her first Sevens nationals in Tauranga. Since then, she’s gone on to referee the Farah Palmer Cup final, be nominated for Referee of the Year, and become the second woman ever to officiate a men’s NPC match. At the same time, she was also stepping into leadership, taking on the role of general manager for high performance at Bay of Plenty Rugby Union. There, she saw firsthand how disconnected the women's pathway had become from the community.

“The academy (Athlete Development Programme), had been established to guide amateur players into a professional environment and we were trying to build depth in the Volcanix team, but we realised we had to go back to where it all starts, which is the clubs.” She leaned on her own experience coming through a strong development system in Auckland. “The truth is, “I remember thinking, we’ve got to go back to boosting and investing in community rugby. We want more girls playing rugby and staying in the game.”

The cup that counts

While teaching at Te Whare Kura o Mauao, she took the reins of the school’s rugby programme and pushed her team to compete in the open grade. “In our first year, we made the final. The girls didn’t realise how good they were. But eligibility rules blocked us from going to Nationals. So I turned to coaching the Western Bay U18 girls. That year, we won the Youth Development Cup.” That cup, she says, is the only talent identification tournament for girls’ rugby in the region. “You see the talent on the fields every weekend, you know, that one, and that one… they’re Black Ferns in the making. But then what? There’s no New Zealand U18 or U20 women’s team. The pathway just stops.” BOPRU’s newly launched U16 and U18 girls’ league, beginning this season, is a direct response to that gap. It offers girls their first true 15s competition, which is crucial for developing real game experience before reaching rep level.

Playing for the mana of the jersey

Tiana credits much of her success to early mentors like Anna Richards and Hannah Porter, who shaped the game with vision and heart. Now, alongside people like Brendon McKeown (community rugby manager), Ryan Setefano (women and girls pathway manager), and Jess Walrond (women and girls participation manager), she’s part of a movement to restore pride and purpose to the club jersey.

“Back in the day,” she reflects, “all you wanted was to wear the Bay of Plenty jersey. That was it. The battles between Eastern, Western and Central Bay – that can be our Super Rugby.”

Brendon and the BOPRU team have continued her work since she stepped back to focus on refereeing and coaching. Together, they’ve launched a five-year strategy, a new province-wide competition, and created dedicated roles to drive participation and retention.

“There’s a vision and commitment at union level to create a sustainable framework to increase participation and keep girls playing through safe, supportive transitions,” says Brendon. “We want girls to thrive through every stage of rugby. Because they need to love the game, to stay in the game. From rippa rugby to secondary schools, into club rugby and beyond. To feel that same pride of pulling on their club jersey, knowing they’re part of something bigger.”

And that honour runs deep. “I referee down in Te Paroa, Whakatāne, and that’s where I enjoy the game most,” says Tiana. “Because of the people. That’s where rugby lives. It’s not about deals or contracts or being one of the few percent that make it to the black jersey. It’s about whakapapa.”

Beyond performance Tiana sees both sides of the game – elite and grassroots – but she’s clear-eyed about where the energy needs to return. “Rugby’s in trouble right now. Too much emphasis is on Super Rugby. The potential is massive in this region – there’s so much raw talent here – but we need to come back to the hāpori (community) because that’s where the passion is.”

Her dream? A purpose-built high-performance centre for women in the Bay of Plenty. “That would be the ultimate. A home for women’s rugby. Somewhere the girls and women can thrive, not just on the field, but as leaders and changemakers, as wāhine.”

She’s also watching the future unfold close to home. “My eldest is nine now and starting to play rugby,” she says, her voice softening. “And I’m hopeful she’ll be part of a generation of women players who are thriving at every stage of their rugby journey.”

What’s emerging in the Bay of Plenty is more than a rugby revival. It’s a movement led by wāhine toa, parents, coaches, and club legends, with the support of a rugby union who now have a clear strategy to shape pathways for the next generation of female rugby players. These people believe that rugby is still, at its heart, a game of belonging. A game that teaches values, builds character and connects generations. And if these community leaders have anything to say about it, the girls coming through today won’t just play rugby, they’ll inherit the full weight and honour of what it means to represent.

New York state of mind

UNO catches up with local film director James Ashcroft in New York to discuss his new thriller, the demons driving his films, working with Robert De Niro and Stephen King, and how he achieved all of this from the shores of Mount Maunganui.

words KARL PUSCHMANN
photos MIKE ROOKE | hair + make-up TALITHA DAENG SITUJU

This sounds made up but it is entirely true. A local film director who lives in Mount Maunganui has just released his second film, The Rule of Jenny Pen. The terrifying psychological thriller stars internationally renowned actors, Geoffrey Rush and John Lithgow.

When UNO calls, the director is in Manhattan, New York, in pre-production for his next movie, The Whisper Man, which he is making for Netflix. The star of this dark thriller? Acting legend Robert De Niro.

Once wrapped on that, he’ll begin work on his next project, Danny Coughlin’s Bad Dream. This is based on a story by famed horror author Stephen King, who kept the fan favourite story aside specifically for him.

As I said, it sounds made up. Rush, Lithgow, De Niro, King... they’re all bonafide legends and the guy linking them all together lives just down the road? Really?

It sounds not just improbable, but impossible, and when I ask director James Ashcroft if he ever has to pinch himself when thinking about all this. He looks a little perturbed and answers, “No. I don't.”

He pauses and looks around the Manhattan apartment he’s calling home for the next little while and then adds, “My wife would be the first one to say I should try just... you know... celebrating a bit and acknowledging who I’m around and everything.”

At the moment he doesn’t have time to stop and smell the roses. Given the level of achievement we’re talking about here, it should come as no surprise that James funnels extraordinary amounts of his time, energy and focus into his work. But, as I’ll discover through our chat, this is by design. Keeping busy keeps his own demons at bay. We’ll get to them in a minute. But for now, I only want to know one thing.

How did all of this happen? The Rule of Jenny Pen is based on a short story by Aotearoa author Owen Marshall. It’s set in a retirement village that outwardly seems lovely but hides a dark and disturbing secret after dark. Its premise is frightening and its realisation by leads Rush and Lithgow is both believable and brilliantly horrifying.

The movie is James’ follow-up to 2021’s Coming Home in the Dark, the acclaimed thriller that caught Hollywood’s attention after gaining buzz at Sundance, the prestigious tastemaker film festival.

When success came knocking, James was prepared to answer. The script for Jenny Pen had been sitting in his desk drawer for 11 years. He seized the moment and approached his dream leads for the movie. He knew he had a great story and a great script. He knew they’d both be amazing in the roles. He knew he was asking them to temporarily relocate to New Zealand for filming and to take a substantial pay cut.

He asked them anyway.

“My father was somebody who was very much about, ‘You can't know, unless you find out,” he says. “It was really important for me to have them [in the film]. I grew up watching them. I had to disguise my fanboy-ness for a long time. I‘m not sure if I‘ve even revealed it to them.”

To his delight — and surprise — the pair were quick to sign on. Rush agreed in four days. Lithgow made James sweat by taking seven.

“The material really frightened him,” James admits. “It‘s quite confronting. John is one of the nicest human beings on the planet and the part required him to do a number of things that are less than savoury.”

But once Lithgow was in, he was all in. His performance in the film is menacingly unsettling. Made even more so by his delivery of one of the finest, mostly accurate, Kiwi accents ever captured on film.

“I‘m seeing John next week so I‘ll pass that on to him. He’ll be very gratified to hear that,” James grins. “It’s very hard to get right and we were all aware of its difficulty.

Many fine actors have stood at the base of the Everest-type challenge of that accent... But John was very committed. I would notice him talking to different people, like an extra or a caterer, and if he liked their accent or their range and tone, he’d ask them to say certain words that he would listen to and practice and try and master it that way.”

That James was so interested in the process isn’t surprising when you learn he began his career as an actor, appearing in TV shows and films. His acting love, however, was the theater. But, as he tells me, “It‘s incredibly hard to sustain a viable living as an actor in New Zealand. It's near impossible”.

It was at cast drinks after performing in a middling play to a disinterested audience that he had a revelation.

“We’d gone down to the bar to bitch and moan about how the director doesn‘t know what they‘re doing, and how the theatre should do this and that. And I thought, ‘If I don't change something I‘m going to be leaning on this bar with a bunch of moaning actors in 20 years singing the same old song’. It was a case of going, ‘You need to do something about that, James’.”

It was then he decided to move behind the scenes. Directing, he realised, would use all his talents. It’s a job that requires concentration, collaboration, managing relationships and steering a ship towards a singular vision.

“I would find it very frustrating that all those decisions were made by somebody else,” he says. “Part of me was unfulfilled. I wanted to be the boss. I‘m interested in the big picture.

I love working with people who are great at what they do and leading them together in a cohesive way that brings about the whole.”

“I thought I was going to find stepping away from acting very, very hard,” he says. “But since getting behind the camera, I‘ve been more curious and more passionate about the craft of acting. And I enjoy actors a lot more.”

He sheepishly admits to being a “very competitive actor,” back in the day. Someone once likened him to the “John McEnroe of actors,” telling him, “You can give a really good game, but it‘s not always pleasant to be around.”

“I think they meant it as a compliment,” he chuckles. “I‘m not sure...”

James and Geoffrey Rush on the set of The Rule of Jenny Penn.

When UNO Zooms in for our interview James had only been in New York for a few days.

“I‘m missing my family terribly,” he says. “I burst into tears when I arrived in Manhattan last Saturday, because it really hit me; ‘Oh my God, I'm going to be gone for nine months’.”

The plus side that he’s identified is that he’ll be “cocooned in the work,” his removal from his normal everyday life forcing him, “to live it and breathe it in another way.”

The New York air is very different to the sea-salted breeze of the Mount. He and his family moved here from Wellington 10 years ago and have now “put down very deep roots,” in the area.

“It was a very big change of scenery and took a long time to get used to,” he says. “I moved from running the National Theatre Company to wanting to pursue that goal of film. My wife and I, we had two kids at the time, we've got three now, we were going, ‘What else are we wanting from life?’.”

Along with giving film his best shot, James realised he also wanted to be a stay-at-home parent.

“I didn’t want to miss out on that time with my girls,” he smiles, thinking of his three daughters, who are aged seven, 11 and 13. “It’s a great place to raise a family.”

Then, he laughs and says, “But I’m still the most uptight person on the beach.”

James sees the world in grey. It’s where his fascination as a filmmaker lies. In his view, the world isn’t black or white. The material he’s drawn to reflects this.

“I don’t believe in good and bad people. I believe in good and bad actions or intentions. As human beings, we all have those within ourselves. It’s something that we grapple with throughout our lives,” he says.

Working in the creative industries, first an actor, now as a director, that darkness is never far away. Whether auditioning for a part or pitching a film project, James says the industry has a “99 percent rejection” rate.

While things are going swimmingly now, he’s definitely not relaxing or coasting, saying “you’re only as good as your last job. And the next job won’t necessarily come”.

He tries not to dwell on these things. Instead, choosing to pour his energy into making things happen for himself.

“I don’t want to wait. It’s important to me to develop and create things in the way in which myself and my peers want to. How do you get Geoffrey Rush and John Lithgow in your movie? You give them a script you think they will respond to. You go, ‘I think you might be interested in this strange little story I want to tell that I want to tell in this way’.”

He pauses a beat, then says, “They’re definitely not going to be in it, if you don't ask them.”

The work keeps him too busy for his hang-ups. The failed pitches. The rejections. The worry. The anxiety. These haven’t been conquered. But they have been successfully minimised. He refers to them as “distractions,” attempting to thwart his goals.

“I don’t think I’ve overcome them at all. They’re always there. I’m not worried about Robert De Niro being the lead in the new film that I’m directing. I don’t have time to worry or be anxious about working with Bob. What I have to be clear about is; What are the objectives and actions that I’m going to give to him? What are the questions he might have? That makes it all about the work. It’s when I'm not working that those doubts start to creep in and become distractions.”

“Late in life I found weightlifting. It helps keep it steady and keep that boiling of anxiety that can come up at times under control. Having that level of fitness and health in my daily routine helps and has really been good at keeping that volume down and manageable. Because it’s always going to be there. Everyone has it. It’s not something to fix or dispel. You've got this much space inside. If I’m going to fill it up with work, then there’s very little space for all that unhealthy noise to exist. That’s why I have seven or eight projects on the boil at different stages at the moment. I find that incredibly energising to move around and helpful to quell those professional anxieties and things like that.”

James’ love of genre was instilled at an early age. His dad would occasionally let him stay up late to watch the Sunday Night Horrors on TV. But he became truly fascinated with the possibilities of darker storytelling at age 10 when his cousin, who was babysitting, put on David Lynch’s surreally unsettling masterpiece Blue Velvet.

“Blue Velvet is not a film that a 10 year old should watch,” James admits. “But it definitely made a very big impact on me. I wouldn’t say it was traumatising or anything like that. A lot of it went over my head. But the images and the feeling of it was something that I hadn’t been exposed to. It had a huge impact on me.”

From there he began reading horror literature, like Dracula, before finding, and devouring, the work of horror maestro Stephen King. His journey to the dark side was complete. After the success of Coming Home in the Dark, James wasn’t going to sit around and wait for people to come to him. He’d been picked up at a big Hollywood agency and so he decided to work his contacts. “Whatʼs the worst thing that Stephen King can do if you send him a letter? Not reply.”

The next day he went book shopping. Naturally, he had made his way to the horror section when his phone buzzed with a notification. He looked at the screen and saw it was from ‘S. King’. “I didn't connect the dots. I thought it must be, you know, Samuel King or Sarah King,” he says, thinking back. He opened the message and started reading.

“I was like, ‘Holy shit! This is from Stephen King!” he laughs. “He’d written this incredibly wonderful, complimentary email. It was like, ‘Wow’. It was a surreal moment. I was literally standing right in front of his books.”

Then, with a mixture somewhere between joy and astonishment, James Ashcroft says, “I was slightly floaty for the whole night after that,” and then we say our goodbyes and he resumes working on his Robert De Niro film in his apartment in Manhattan.