Ray Waru

Waru spent his childhood in Auckland. He was educated at St Peter's College.

Waru obtained positions in radio and television from the 1970s. In 1980, he headed the original Television New Zealand Māori production unit. Waru directed a broad range of Māori programmes, including the first ever full Māori language drama project, Te Ohaki a Nihe, and items on the Te Māori exhibition.

In the 1980s Waru produced and directed a revolutionary documentary series, The Natural World of the Māori, various film and television productions in New Zealand and in Australia, as well as an IMAX production under the East-West Center in Hawaii. In the 1980s he was appointed as chief executive of the Aotearoa Māori Radio Trust, charged with the development of a national Māori radio system.

In the 1990s Waru was co-producer of the major history series, Our People, Our Century, a winner at the 2000 New Zealand Film and TV Awards, and he produced Toro Mai, a 25-part serial drama in te reo.[1]

In 2005 Waru co-produced the New Zealand historical series, Frontier of Dreams, The Story of New Zealand[2]

In the 2006 Queen's Birthday Honours, Waru was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to radio and television.[3]

In 2012 Waru published "Secrets & Treasures" which consists of "stories told through the objects at Archives New Zealand"[4] and which "delves into the archives to tell a very human story of New Zealand, a story that involves love, death, war, immigration, disaster, protest, defiance, censorship and hokey pokey".[5]