'I am' becomes 'I do' for actors

Gregor McLennan says it was love at first sight with May-Ana Tirikatene-Sullivan. Picture / Otago Daily Times

Two actors in the "I am Dunedin" television campaign are now a real life ad for the city - they are to marry after falling in love during filming.

It was love at first sight, groom and Auckland-based actor Gregor McLennan says, when he met lawyer May-Ana Tirikatene-Sullivan, of Wellington, in June.

Tirikatene-Sullivan, 35, and McLennan, 36, were both actors in the television campaigns. He was the man trying desperately to get home and she was the air hostess.

A whirlwind romance followed and nine weeks after meeting, during which time they spent an estimated 15 days together - McLennan proposed.

"I thought that was beating around the bush," he quipped. "But, each of us know deep in our spirit that our romance will last forever."

The couple chose Dunedin to marry not only because of how they met, but also because of their ties there.

"I regard this city as home. My family lives here and Otago University is where my father, two brothers, Rob and Jamie and sister Jeannie and I gained our degrees," McLennan said.

Tirikatene-Sullivan descends from the earliest landowners of Otakou. Her mother is former long-serving Southern Maori MP Whetu Tirikatene-Sullivan, while her grandfather was the late Sir Eruera Tirikatene, an MP from 1932 to 1967 and prominent Maori leader.

One of Sir Eruera's prized kakahu kiwi cloaks will be placed on McLennan's shoulders by Tirikatene-Sullivan during their wedding at St Paul's Cathedral on January 5, to signify the beginning of the couple's life together.

They plan to live in Wellington.

- OTAGO DAILY TIMES