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Occupation: Actor
Active: '90s-2000s
Major Genres: Drama, Action
Career Highlights: Once Were Warriors, Vertical Limit, Six Days, Seven Nights, Star Wars: Episode Two Attack of the Clones.
First Major Screen Credit: Never Say Die (1988)Biography
Boasting brooding good looks which have allowed him to play both edgy heroes and fearsome villains, Temuera Morrison is one of New Zealand's best-recognized actors, and perhaps the most visible Maori performer in the world. Morrison was born in the tourist community of Rotorua; his instincts as a performer came naturally, given his father's career as a musician and the fact his uncle, Sir Howard Morrison, was one of the nation's best-loved entertainers. After completing high school, Morrison briefly worked with his uncle, but before long he decided to go into acting, and studied drama through New Zealand's Special Performing Arts Training Scheme.
Morrison's SPATS training led to his first film role, in the drama Other Halves, and in 1988 he got to show some comic flair in the James Bond parody Never Say Die. In 1993, Morrison was hired as the Maori dialogue advisor on the international hit The Piano, but his big break came a year later, when Morrisonwas cast as Jake Heke, an alcoholic and abusive Maori husband and father, in the acclaimed drama Once Were Warriors.
Morrison's vivid performance won him the Best Actor trophy at the 1994 New Zealand Film and TV Awards, and the attention brought Morrison to Hollywood. However, Morrison's initial American roles were in a handful of would-be blockbusters which died on the vine commercially speaking, including Barb Wire, The Island of Dr. Moreau, and Speed 2: Cruise Control. However, Morrison fared better at the box office with 2000's Vertical Limit, and the year before he made a triumphant return to New Zealand to star in the sequel to Once Were Warriors, What Becomes of the Broken Hearted?
The film did not receive the same degree of international attention as the original, but it was popular and well-reviewed in New Zealand, and Morrison's second turn as Jake won him another Best Actor prize from the New Zealand Film and TV Awards.
Morrison landed his biggest hit in 2002, when he was cast as Jango Fett in the eagerly anticipated Star Wars: Episode Two -- Attack of the Clones.
Personal life Morrison was born in the town of Rotorua in the North Island of New Zealand, to Hana Stafford and Laurie Morrison, a musician. He is a Māori and the nephew of Māori entertainer Sir Howard Morrison. His secondary education took place at Wesley College, Auckland where he was Head Prefect in 1977.[citation needed] Morrison lives in New Zealand, and divides his time filming there and in Australia and the United States.Career Trained in drama under the New Zealand Special Performing Arts Training Scheme, one of Morrison's earliest roles was in the 1988 film Never Say Die, opposite Lisa Eilbacher. Before this he had starred as a character called "Ricky" in the original TV1 soap opera called "Close To Home". He played Dr. Hone Ropata on the television soap opera Shortland Street from 1992 – 1995; he was immortalized when another character rebuked him with the line "You're not in Guatemala now, Dr. Ropata!"
In 1994 he received attention as the violent and abusive Māori husband Jake Heke in Once Were Warriors, a film adaptation of Alan Duff's novel of the same name. The role won him international acclaim, and he received the 1994 award for best male performance in a dramatic role from the New Zealand Film and TV Awards. He reprised the role in the sequel, What Becomes of the Broken Hearted?, for which he received the Best Actor award from the New Zealand Film Awards. He has appeared in supporting roles in Speed 2: Cruise Control (1997) and The Beautiful Country (2004). In 2005, Morrison became the host of the talk show The Tem Show on New Zealand television.
In recent years, Morrison has received much popularity from his role as the bounty hunter Jango Fett in Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones (2002). Part of the film's plot involves an army of clones created with Jango's DNA; Morrison also provided acting and voice work for the soldiers. He reappeared as a number of clones in Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, the final film of the series, and rerecorded the lines of the character Boba Fett (Jango's son and another clone) in the 2004 DVD re-releases of the original Star Wars trilogy, replacing the voice of Jason Wingreen.
He has since provided the voices of Jango Fett and his clones in a number of Star Wars video games, all produced by LucasArts. He played the commando "Boss" in Star Wars: Republic Commando and voiced all the troopers in Star Wars: Battlefront and Star Wars: Battlefront II. He played Jango again in Star Wars: Bounty Hunter, which reveals the origins of Jango Fett, and played Boba Fett in the 2006 game Star Wars: Empire at War.