NZ On Air and Te Māngai Pāho have announced funding for a new six-episode anthology series set to explore supernatural stories of Māori, Pasifika, and Filipino cultures, explains the project’s press release.
“The new scripted series will screen during prime-time on TVNZ 2, and support six storytelling teams in amplifying their voices and cultures to a variety of audiences across the motu.”
The projects selected for the series include:
“Albularyo: The Witch Doctor: When a Kiwi-Filipino doctor discovers that her deceased grandmother has become a manananggal, a corrupted witch, she must face up to her troubled youth and make peace with her estranged brother before they both suffer the bloody consequences.
26:29: A group of millennial vloggers enter an abandoned church in Auckland and uncover the truth of its mysterious past in this found footage horror.
Tappy: A displaced young man and his reluctant ghostly companion confront love, loss, and abuse on an unlikely road trip together when he is sent to steal a dead body.
From The Mist / Te Pao o te Patupaiarehe: Two soon-to-be lovers are drawn together by song but divided by the friction between the human world and the world of the Patupaiarehe.
Taumanu: In 1929, a toi moko is delivered to a colonial manor house and when mysterious Māori twins arrive to reclaim it, the head butler, Tīpene, finds himself drawn into the bloody climax of a century of utu.
Te Āo Mārama: Te Āo Mārama shares the story of a glamourous, ball-breaking, recently deceased wahine, who threatens to haunt her neighbour if he doesn’t help her pass over to the afterlife.”
Watch for more on this series as it heads into production.