Cliff Curtis on Matariki Awards, zombies and his best role yet

  • 27/06/2016
Cliff Curtis at the Fear The Walking Dead Season 2 premiere (AAP)
Cliff Curtis at the Fear The Walking Dead Season 2 premiere (AAP)

Cliff Curtis, one of New Zealand's most successful acting exports, was honoured last night at the inaugural Matariki Awards, which honour Maori achievement in a range of different areas.

After his breakout role in 1994 hit Once Were Warriors, Curtis went on to star in Hollywood hits like Three Kings, Blow, Training Day, Sunshine, The Last Airbender, Collateral Damage alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger and Die Hard 4.0 alongside Bruce Willis.

He has become much more recognisable than ever in recent years thanks to his lead role in cult zombie series Fear the Walking Dead.

But the best performance he's ever given, according to the man himself?

"The Dark Horse, probably," Curtis tells Paul Henry, citing the contemporary New Zealand classic over any international productions.

Curtis won a Matariki Award for his contribution to the arts, as well as taking home the event's supreme award.

"It's a huge privilege to be considered worthy of that level of recognition," says Curtis.

"I come from pretty humble circumstances, so I never really thought of myself that way. So it's still a big challenge for me to accept that level of honour."

Clearly, Curtis remains humble, which surely must be difficult given his level of success -- but not according to him.

"Not where I come from, it's easy," he laughs.

"Our community keeps it very easy for us to stay humble. Also, the general business of working in Hollywood keeps you pretty humble. It's pretty rough, there's a lot of rejection to deal with. The ego doesn't get too much of a chance to take flight."

Curtis acknowledges that he knew his Fear the Walking Dead role would be a career-changer, saying it was a strategy to hook himself to the well-established franchise. He's very happy with the result.

"It has been an amazing success," says Curtis.

"People seem to really like the genre. Apparently they love the whole idea of survivalism, thinking about what they'd do in that situation, how would I save my kids and my marriage, that kind of thing."

Curtis has played a number of different nationalities in foreign films, from Latinos to Middle Easterns to what he calls 'mulatos'. But in Fear the Walking Dead, Curtis plays a Maori, despite it being a US production.

"That was a bit of a coup for me," says Curtis.

"They offered to make the character Maori, they changed his name to Travis Manawa. That's a meaningful thing for me. The only compromise is that he's an American Maori, but oh well, we'll start with that."

As for what's next for him, Curtis says he can't take on another lead role in a TV series, but is eager to work with Taika Waititi -- although he has trepidations about delivering on the Boy filmmaker's sense of humour.

"I think he knows exactly what he's doing by not casting me in his movies," grins Curtis.

Fear the Walking Dead screens on Sky's SoHo channel in New Zealand.

Newshub.