Alan Cumming was able to joke about his lost luggage. Photo / Nick Reed
Writers Festival speaker gets little relief from airline’s care kit.
He arrived in town on Tuesday for the Auckland Writers Festival - alas, his luggage did not.
Acclaimed Scottish actor, activist, photographer and memoirist Alan Cumming took to social media to make light of his travel predicament, even poking fun at the sartorial emergency kit Air New Zealand provided him as quick recompense.
But after two days of the same clothes, Cumming could be forgiven for feeling irritated.
"Well, yes, I am wearing the same clothes as I was wearing in this newspaper article from yesterday [Wednesday] because my luggage still hasn't arrived," Cumming moaned forlornly in a video diary posted to his Instagram account yesterday.
He held up the article - a New Zealand Herald photo and review of his lauded memoir Not My Father's Son, which he is speaking on tonight as part of the festival programme - to illustrate his green-and-black-striped jersey and Harry Potter specs remain unchanged.
"Shamed in Nee Zee," he said self-effacingly. Air New Zealand tried to accommodate him, sending a care package to tide him over until they could locate his bags.
That prompted more online merriment from the slight actor, who found humour in the over-sized T-shirt the airline provided.
"The lovely Air New Zealand gave me a bag of essentials as my luggage didn't arrive in Auckland.
"A boy could get a complex," Cumming mocked to his 240,000 Twitter followers.
Still, the baggage botch wasn't enough to stop the star enjoying Auckland, and he left his hotel for a wander through Albert Park.
All was well at midday yesterday when the bags were finally delivered.
"Luggage has arrived," Cumming posted, with fluorescent-green plastic Crocs adorning his feet.
He was not wearing them last night, thankfully, at the Auckland Writers Festival gala party.
A sold-out Aotea Centre saw Cumming join seven fellow authors on stage where each delivered a seven-minute true story, without scripts or props.
Cumming was joined by US novelist Amy Bloom, Aussie writers Peter FitzSimons and Helen Garner, Booker Prize winning Nigerian novelist Ben Okri, and New Zealand authors Aroha Harris, Michele A'Court and Nic Low.
1 "Good catch-up with me old mate Harry! Impressive amount of tin being thrown around [read: lot of muscle] by the Prince at Rugby Park."
- Crusaders rugby star Ryan Crotty getting overfamiliar with Prince Harry during a casual after-official-duties workout in the Crusaders' gym.
2 "Where you at John?! Let's set up a lunch with Art Green and I. I'll await your call."
- A very overfamiliar Matilda Rice, winner of The Bachelor, bizarrely tweeting the Prime Minister directly and inviting herself and her beau to lunch with him.
3 "The thing that really annoys me about touring New Zealand is trying to decide where I would live when I eventually move here."
- Irish comedian Ed Byrne delivers the obligatory international visitor line by declaring his love for this country.
4 "If u work for mediaworks and r not on dancing w t stars. U r ifficially nobodi."
- Sour grapes? MediaWorks' Ali Ikram on the number of celebrities announced on Dancing with the Stars who also work for the company. Three, incidentally.
5 #imbackbitches
- Chrystal Chenery (aka "the bitchelorette") on her return to the small screen, this time as a bona fide celebrity on Dancing with the Stars.
6 "It was such an amazing thing to see the Madame Tussauds team measure, match and map Ella for her own waxwork. The eyeball tray alone blew my mind. I so love this waxy Ella! Even I could be tricked into thinking that's my kid."
- Sonja Yelich on fake and real Lorde.
7 "WHAAAAAAAAAT".
- Joel Little on hearing the news his friend and music collaborator has been turned into wax.
He proposed in front of 400 people in a packed Dunedin auditorium during a live comedy show on Tuesday night - thankfully, she said yes.
Irish comedian Ed Byrne let love blossom during the second half of his show, Roaring Forties, which he is touring around the country as part of the New Zealand International Comedy Festival.
Byrne had earlier struck a deal with Dunedin romeo Dan Faulknor, 24, who wanted to pop the question to 21-year-old girlfriend Becky Lieshout - a diehard Byrne fan - during the comedian's show.
Byrne not only agreed, he artfully worked the proposal into his routine.
The comedian, no stranger to interacting with his audience, asked Becky why the seat beside her in the front row was vacant, the Otago Daily Times reported.
It prompted Byrne to invite the audience to yell in unison, "Where are you Dan?" as if in a panto.
Faulknor, stepping out from a side door, walked to the centre of the stage and coaxed the bewildered Becky out of her seat to join him, where he presented a ring on bended knee, much to the crowd's delight. And Byrne's.
The happy couple joked afterwards the Irish funnyman would make a great marriage celebrant.
Meet the Coles. You already know Brendan Cole, the former lover of Nicky Watson and former judge of New Zealand's Dancing with the Stars who went on to minor celebrity as a dancer on Britain's Strictly Come Dancing, and as the star of his own stage show.
Now his siblings are set to take the Kiwi spotlight.
Older brother Scott, who taught dance in Britain, will partner Teuila Blakely on TV3's upcoming Dancing with the Stars, and younger sister Vanessa, who works as a dance teacher here, is partnering Simon Barnett.
She was happy to chat to The Diary about her new television foray until TV3 publicists put a stop to that. Sanitised media only, apparently.
Twenty-one years after first becoming New Zealand amateur champions, Scott and Vanessa are back in the spotlight.
Long retired from competing themselves, the brother and sister are set to cha-cha-cha their way back on the floor.
The Australian site cited a 'heightened threat level' as the issue.