Former Prime Minister John Key has disputed claims he once banned Hollywood star Anna Faris from New Zealand for bad mouthing the country.
Speaking to Justin Long on his podcast Life is Short, Faris said that her banning happened in 2010, shortly after she finished filming the kids movie Yogi Bear here.
"I got a letter from the Minister of Tourism of New Zealand that I was no longer welcome in their country."
If her claim and timeline was correct it could have been ex-Prime Minister John Key who sent the letter banning Faris. As well as being PM, Key was also Minister of Tourism from 2008 until his resignation in 2016.
But Key told the Herald that was unlikely to be the case, as the Minister of Tourism did not have the authority to ban someone, only the Minister of Immigration.
"I'd love to see the letter, but I'd be surprised if it was from me."
In a statement to the Herald, Immigration New Zealand operations manager Michael Carley said: "There are no records against Anna Faris's file that indicate she was ever banned from New Zealand."
Whoever it was seems to have been wound up by comments Faris' made on a chat show about being vocally abused by two carloads of Kiwis after a rock concert.
"Did I ever tell you about how I got kicked out of New Zealand?" Faris asked Long during their chat. "I didn't get kicked out, that sounds so dramatic."
She then said that she was walking home after a Queens of the Stone Age concert when she was catcalled.
"I was walking back and, this should not be an important detail, but I feel like the societal pressure to make this a detail, I was wearing jeans and a T-shirt and a backpack. And this car drives by and these dudes yell out like, 'Show us your tits!' But in a New Zealand accent."
She said that "felt a little random" until a second car sped past her shouting, "we wanna f*** your p***y."
"Anyway, I recounted this story, because it was the only one I had, on The George Lopez Show," she said. "And then I got a letter from the Minister of Tourism of New Zealand that I was no longer welcome in their country. So then, it became a whole thing."
Rhys Darby and Anna Faris in the Air New Zealand safety video.
"They felt like you had slandered the entire country?" Long asked her, to which she replied, "yeah".
She also said the wrote a letter to the Minister to apologise, concluding it with the fact that "we have a lot of ding dongs here in America as well."
The apology must have satisfied Key because her ban was lifted and she was once again free to visit the country.
"A couple of years ago I did an Air New Zealand safety video," she said. "So we are all good."
