EMBRACING THE ART OF ACTING

TAKING A BREAK: Roimata Fox still lives in Gisborne and travels for work. She has had a lot of free time with the film and television industry grinding to a standstill with regional Covid-19 lockdowns. Picture by Rebecca Grunwell

What do space travel, bounty hunters, jazz, a chess-playing corgi and a terrorist who uses exploding teddy bears have in common?

They’re all part of Netflix’s new live-action remake of a 1998 Japanese animated TV show Cowboy Bebop, starring Gisborne’s Roimata Fox.

After applying for a role on a whim, Fox said it had been an extraordinary series of events to be on the cusp of the show’s release, which was announced over four years ago.

Her son, 12-year-old Te Mahia, is a massive fan of anime and begged her to apply for a role when she saw the casting call go out.

Previously, her roles had largely fallen under the Maori production umbrella, so taking this role was a big step into the unknown.

“It’s Maori TV and production companies that gave me this chance. I take a lot of those people with me.”

Fox’s character is a ‘silent assassin’ from the Red Dragon Crime Syndicate, an organised crime gang based on Mars.

While she was coy about not giving away too many spoilers, she did share that her character speaks with an American accent, something she’d never done before.