Below is a compiled list of the most interesting facts about Taika Waititi. Check it out!
Taika Waititi, also known as Taika Cohen, hails from the Raukokore region of the East Coast of New Zealand, and is the son of Robin (Cohen), a teacher, and Taika Waiti, an artist and farmer. His father is Maori (Te-Whanau-a-Apanui), and his mother is of Ashkenazi Jewish, Irish, Scottish, and English descent. Taika has been involved in the film industry for several years, initially as an actor, and now focusing on writing and directing.
Interesting Facts about Taika Waititi
- Taika spent two years in Berlin working and exhibiting in the Schliemann 40 House.
- Taika means magic in Finnish.
- ‘What We Do in the Shadows’ actors hadn’t seen the script before and during the making of the film; they had only some directions from Jemaine and Taika and the script was largely improvised.
- His father is of Maori descent, with a distant French-Canadian line. Taika’s mother is of one quarter Ashkenazi Jewish ancestry, from her own paternal grandfather, along with Irish, Scottish, and English.
- First Indigenous filmmaker to win an Oscar. He follows Buffy Sainte-Marie as the second Indigenous person to win a competitive Oscar.
- Cohen is his mother’s surname, Waititi is his fathers family name.
- Taika uses false teeth quite often in his comedy performances: ‘The Ordinary Alien’ in Radiradirah, Gunter the German “joke” teller in his stand up, vampires in the original ‘What We Do in the Shadows’ short film, his many characters in ‘Falling Leaves’, a short film.
- Taika in Maori means ‘Tiger’.
- His Dad was a painter and his Mum is a teacher.
- The music video for The Phoenix Foundation’s ’40 years’ was shot in Lyall Bay on Wellington’s South Coast in one single shot using the BAXI bike to carry the camera.
- In ‘Eagle vs Shark’, Taika plays Jarrod’s dead brother Gordon.
- When it comes to the original music for his films, he always collaborates with the Wellington band The Phoenix Foundation who have made the film scores for his three films: ‘Eagle vs Shark’, ‘BOY’ and ‘Hunt for the Wilderpeople’ and Samuel Scott of The Phoenix Foundation was the music editor for ‘What We Do in the Shadows’.
Personal Quotes by Taika Waititi
I come from a country whose idea of masculinity is quite extreme, and I’ve grown up around a lot of that energy. I’ve been part of that a lot. And it’s very draining; it’s quite tiring trying to be macho.
Taika Waititi
Visually, I’m always considering shots and composition quite a lot, and I love putting art into films, and I do a lot of the art.
Taika Waititi
In my films, a lot of the situations come from real life.
Taika Waititi
My style of working is I’ll often be behind the camera, or right next to the camera yelling words at people, like, ‘Say this, say this! Say it this way!’ I’ll straight-up give Anthony Hopkins a line reading. I don’t care.
Taika Waititi
I’ve loved vampires since I was a kid, or loved a lot of the vampire movies that I saw. Anything with sharp teeth, really. I remember you could get those fake vampire teeth, and I remember just keeping them in all the time.
Taika Waititi
