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Photo: Supplied/Three
Photo: Supplied/Three

Pop CultureJuly 25, 2022

Welcome back, Masked Singer NZ, you glorious fever dream

Photo: Supplied/Three
Photo: Supplied/Three

Who is it, who is it, who is it underneath the mask? Tara Ward has a lovely time watching the return of The Masked Singer NZ. 

You don’t have to be a celebrity wearing a giant ice cream cone to know that embracing The Masked Singer NZ is the best – nay, the only – way to get through this shitstorm of a winter. Wild costumes! Silly song choices! A gyrating alligator! Who says TV is dead? Certainly not me and certainly not Sharyn Casey, and we’ll tell you this for free: whoever the celebrity hiding inside that giant steak and cheese pie costume is, they are living their very best life and I will hear no further arguments about it.

The Masked Singer NZ returned to Three last night with 12 glorious costumes and two new judges. Sharyn “Aunty Shaz Dog” Casey and James “Detective Daddy” Roque returned to the judging panel for a second season and were joined by Anika Moa, while Jono Pryor was the first of a series of special-guest guessers. The mood was set, the game was on. All we needed was a sparkly unicorn to come on stage and rap the shit out of Scribe.

(Screengrab: Three)

How many unicorns you know roll like this? Not many, if any. Bedazzled Unicorn was a sparkly vision, her hooves made for dancing and her culottes born to be wild. None of the guessing panel knew who Unicorn was, mostly because that’s the point of the show, but also because unicorns are also tricky little fuckers. One clue mentioned breadcrumbs, which made Sharyn wonder if it was Nadia Lim. “I’ve seen Nadia Lim breadcrumb some stuff,” Aunty Shaz Dog said, and she wasn’t wrong. In this wicked game, Nadia Lim covered in breadcrumbs is as valid a guess as any other.

Nobody puts breadcrumbs in the corner, apart from The Masked NZ audience. They vote which singers go through to the next round, and they sent the one horned wonder straight into the bottom three. Unicorn’s rival, Retro Robot – could be Simon Bridges, could be the Waipū Terror Doll – sang ‘Cry Me a River’ and earned a standing ovation from three of the four judges. That’s like a Dancing With the Stars perfect score in week one. Where does Retro Robot go from here, other than the scrap metal yard? God speed, Retro Robot.

Retro Robot, Clint Randall and Bedazzled Unicorn walk into a bar (Screengrab: Three)

It may have been chaos on stage, but the judges were having the time of their lives. The banter flowed and the guesses spewed forth like a volcano spurting out New Zealand celebrities. Anika Moa wondered if Retro Robot was Brian Tamaki, but Jono Pryor pointed out Tamaki was anti-mandate and unlikely to go on a show about masks. Jono reckoned Robot was Rhys Darby, while in the next round, James Roque thought Gladiator Alligator might be Ben Lummis. The jewelled reptile had sauntered onto the stage to sing ‘Moondance’, swivelling his hips like no alligator should. Were we not entertained? The audience certainly were, sending Alligator’s leafy rival Pōhutukawa Tree straight to the bottom three.

The final round in this cheese dream talent show saw a giant ice cream cone duke it out with a baby bird, because that is the reality TV circle of life. Ruru Chick sang Robyn’s ‘Dancing on My Own’, her golden shell shimmering in time with the beat. James thought Ruru was Karen O’Leary, while Jono reckoned Rose Matafeo. Two Scoop Ice Cream sang ‘Cold Cold Heart’, maybe because it lives in the freezer, maybe because it knew the audience was going to send it to the bottom three. We’ll never know the truth.

Two Scoop Ice Cream was now up for elimination, and 90 minutes of spangly creatures singing cover songs was over too soon. The judges had to decide which of Bedazzled Unicorn, Pōhutukawa Tree and Two Scoop Ice Cream would be eliminated, and they struggled to choose. Forget Sophie’s Choice, this was Sharyn’s Choice. It was horn over heart and tongue over trees as the judges threw Pōhutukawa Tree into the Masked Singer mulcher of hopes and dreams.

Image: Three

The journey was over, the mighty had fallen. The judges had a final chance to guess Pōhutukawa Tree’s identity, and everyone but Detective Daddy chose Georgina Beyer, the world’s first openly transgender mayor and member of parliament. The crowd chanted “take it off!” at a dancing tree until the mask was lifted and Georgina Beyer’s face appeared. The clues were good, the judges were correct, and never before has a fabric tree trunk had such a nice time. Beyer sang ‘Fever’ again as the credits rolled, and her words echoed through my heart. Never knew how much I loved you, Masked Singer.


Follow our reality TV recap podcast The Real Pod on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or your favourite podcast provider.


The Masked Singer NZ is on Sundays at 7pm and on ThreeNow. 

 

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Diggy
On Thursday night, Diggy Dupé gets to perform songs from The Panthers live for the first time. Photos: Supplied / Treatment: Tina Tiller

Pop CultureJuly 25, 2022

‘You’re going to move’: Diggy Dupé is bringing The Panthers soundtrack to life

Diggy
On Thursday night, Diggy Dupé gets to perform songs from The Panthers live for the first time. Photos: Supplied / Treatment: Tina Tiller

Hit TVNZ series The Panthers came out when Aotearoa was in a level four lockdown. Now, rapper Diggy Dupé is finally getting a chance to celebrate by bringing his powerful soundtrack to the stage.

When The Panthers debuted to rapturous reviews and large viewing numbers last year, Tāmaki Makaurau rapper Diggy Dupé was, like everyone, stuck at home on his couch. He had a crucial dual role in the production, playing the show’s tough narrator while also helping curate a fitting soundtrack full of local hip-hop figures and R&B singers.

But, because of Covid, production was a stop-start affair, sometimes done in isolation. When the show landed in full on TVNZ+, the country was stuck in a full level four lockdown. “It was kind of a good time and a bad time,” says Dupé. “Everyone was home on their couches so they could watch it [but] we couldn’t go out and celebrate it.”

Now, the 30-year-old is doing his best to fix that. On Thursday night, Dupé is helming the first and, possibly, only live performance of The Panthers soundtrack in the Auckland Town Hall’s Concert Chamber. It’s a one-off for the Elemental Nights music festival happening this month that includes a series of mid-winter shows from the likes of Dope Lemon, Mura Masa and Jungle.

Dupé admits it’s challenging to present a set full of songs that he’s never performed live. He sees it as an opportunity to “do something with the show that I don’t really do with my other ones”. That means it’s the rapper’s first time on stage with a full live band, including a drummer, keyboardist, bassist and DJ.

So far, rehearsals have sounded “mean”, and Dupé is determined to do the songs justice. The TV show, which follows the rise of the Polynesian Panther Party in the 1970s at a time of increasing government and police attention, means too much for him to him to screw it up. He grew up in Grey Lynn, where many of the show’s key events take place.

“It’s so personal to me,” he says. “Getting to tell the stories of where I come from and now getting to perform it, and continue it … is an honour.”

The Panthers was described as “essential viewing” by Spinoff reviewer Dan Taipua, and the soundtrack is a lively, sometimes confronting companion piece that includes appearances by local performers Melodownz, SWIDT, Che Fu, Bella Kalola, King Kapisi and Summer Vaha’akolo.

Dupé’s staying quiet on exactly who will appear on stage alongside him on Thursday. “Obviously, we couldn’t get everybody,” he says. He felt awkward asking those who played smaller parts on the soundtrack to show up for the live show. “I don’t want to be that guy, like, ‘Bro, can you come all the way here, try and find parking in the city, and jump on stage for the chorus?’ I wouldn’t do that. That’s tough.”

Instead, he’s mixing it up. It won’t just be the soundtrack, song-for-song. Dupé says that wouldn’t work “sonically” in a live setting. Instead, there’ll be peaks and troughs that make the most of the artists who do come through. “It’s almost story-lining, like a movie,” he says. “You can’t have the climax halfway through and the end is chill. We had to structure it.”

For those who enjoyed the TV series, Dupé is confident they’ll also enjoy the show he’s put together. Hip-hop heads who dig his solo work, including last year’s debut album That’s Me, That’s Team, will also be into it. For everyone else, he promises: “It’s a real mixed bag. It’s good for all ages … you’re going to move, regardless.”

Diggy Dupé and friends present The Panthers at Concert Chambers on July 28.

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