Guy McPherson received undergraduate and graduate degrees focused on extraction of natural resources. Shortly after earning a Ph.D., he was hired into a tenure-track position at a major research university. During his initial decade at the university, Guy was a successful professor by every measure: well-published in all the right places, he taught and mentored students who acquired the best jobs in the field, and he performed abundant, exemplary professional service.
About ten years into a career in the academic ivory tower, Guy began focusing his efforts on social criticism, with topics ranging from education and evolution to the twin sides of the fossil-fuel coin: (1) global climate change and (2) energy decline and the attendant economic consequences. His public appearances stress these two predicaments because each of them informs and impacts every aspect of life on Earth.
With a sharp improvisational mind and well honed original material, Ben Hurley is a versatile act with audiences and critics alike.
After winning the Billy T Award in 2004, Ben moved to the UK where he learned his craft on the notoriously difficult UK pro circuit, including a 3 month UK tour opening for superstar Irish comedian Ed Byrne. Ben was one of the few Kiwi acts to be invited to perform on the prestigious Comedy Store TV show shown on the Paramount Comedy channel. He was also one of the stars of the UK Festival Circuit.
Ben has now established himself as part of the upper echelon of New Zealand comedy, winning the prestigious Fred Award for comedic excellence and becoming a regular fixture on TV3’s ‘7Days’ as both panellist and head writer. Audiences will also recognise him from his many appearances on Comedy Galas and the AotearoHA series.
Ben has performed worldwide from Singapore to Bahrain and Ireland to Switzerland and still regularly tours New Zealand playing both theatres and local pubs. Ben has featured at the World Buskers Festival in Christchurch, the Queenstown Winter Festival, the Dunedin and Wellington Fringes and at five NZ International Comedy Festivals.
Lisa Tamati, Businesswoman and extreme Ultra-runner.
Lisa Tamati is a businesswoman and an extreme Ultra-runner. She has been running internationally for over 13 years, clocking up the equivalent kilometres of over two and a half times around the equator, while training and in some of the most extreme endurance races in the world.
She has three companies and a fourth one in the process of being established. She has a jewellery business and studied goldsmithing in Vienna Austria. She also has a company dealing with her PR.
In 2008, she became the first New Zealand woman to complete the legendary Badwater Ultramarathon, widely regarded as one of the most demanding and extreme running race on earth.
In 2009, she competed in the Gobi March in North Western China and in 2010 she took part in the unforgiving Sahara Race in Egypt.
In 2011, Lisa challenged herself in a completely new environment. Warming up with the 4th edition of The North Face 100 in the Blue Mountains early in the year, she headed to the Himalayas where she was one of only 25 extreme runners in the world to be invited. She completed an incredible 222km non-stop race over the two highest passes in the world!
Te Radar (Andrew J Lumsden) - MC
Te Radar is an award winning satirist, documentary maker, writer, stage and screen director, failed gardener, and amateur historian. He was also the star of four top rating TVNZ programmes, Global Radar, Radar’s Patch, Off the Radar, and Homegrown. A new TVNZ series, Radar’s Pacific, is currently in production. Radar’s Patch won the 2010 Qantas Film and Television Award for Best Information/Lifestyle Programme.
He has recently toured his acclaimed New Zealand history show Eating the Dog following its award-winning season at the New Zealand International Comedy Festival at Sky City Theatre, and at the Downstage Theatre, Wellington.
Over the past decade he has traveled extensively throughout New Zealand, Russia, Scandinavia, UK, and Canada, and he has filmed documentaries locally and in Australia, East Timor, Israel, Africa and The United States.
As well as performing comedy both locally and internationally he has worked for Radio New Zealand, The New Zealand Herald, Metro, TVNZ, Maori TV, TV3, Alt TV, Kiwi FM, and various other publications.
