Northern Irish actor James Nesbitt is in Wanaka today to film a Perfect Woman Competition heat for his New Zealand travel show.
Nesbitt is presenting a documentary on some of New Zealand’s attractions, while he is in the country filming The Hobbit trilogy, in which he plays Bofur.
Among these is the Perfect Woman Competition, which is held at Wanaka’s Bullock Bar each Labour Weekend.
The competition has been running for a decade and involves female competitors skinning animals, shearing sheep and driving jet boats, among other challenges, as they battle it out for the title of the perfect woman.
The bar’s co-owner Brendan Quirke said he usually held about half a dozen heats throughout the lower South Island in the lead-up to the final competition and tonight’s event would double as one of those.
There was space for 10 competitors and, at the time of going to print, there were still two places available.
The women, who are from Wanaka, England, Wales and Australia and aged 20 to 30, will be expected to give a 30-second “how to score McCaw” speech, take a rugby quiz, hammer nails (straight), do a beer-tasting and play pool and darts.
There would also be a “chainsaw event” but those details were being kept under wraps.
“They’d probably pull out if they read what they’re going to have to do.
“We just want to have fun – we never ever want to embarrass the girls.” Nesbitt would also be expected to take part in some of the challenges “to make sure he knows his place,” Quirke joked.
The travel show, which would go to air in Britain in December, would also feature whale-watching at Kaikoura, the Christchurch rebuild and a Queenstown winery.
The Perfect Woman competition raises money for the Canlive Charitable Trust.
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