List of Famous people born in Rotorua, New Zealand
Steven Adams
Steven Funaki Adams is a New Zealand professional basketball player for the New Orleans Pelicans of the National Basketball Association (NBA). After playing one season with his hometown team Wellington Saints in 2011, Adams moved to the United States in 2012 to play college basketball for Pittsburgh. In June 2013, he was selected by the Thunder with the 12th overall pick in the 2013 NBA draft.
Jean Batten
Jean Gardner Batten was a New Zealand aviator. Born in Rotorua, she became the best-known New Zealander of the 1930s, internationally, by making a number of record-breaking solo flights across the world. She made the first-ever solo flight from England to New Zealand in 1936.
Cliff Curtis
Clifford Vivian Devon Curtis is a New Zealand actor. His film credits include Once Were Warriors (1994), Three Kings (1999), Blow (2001), Training Day (2001), Whale Rider (2002), Sunshine (2007), Live Free or Die Hard (2007) and The Dark Horse (2014), for which he won the Best Performance by an Actor award at the 2014 Asia Pacific Screen Awards. Curtis had television series roles on NBC's Trauma and ABC's Body of Proof and Missing. From 2015 to 2017, Curtis portrayed Travis Manawa on the AMC horror drama series Fear the Walking Dead.
Dylan Hartley
Dylan Hartley is a New Zealand-born English former rugby union player who played as hooker for Northampton Saints. Hartley was the captain of England from January 2016 until the end of his international career in 2018. He is England's most capped hooker of all time, earning his first cap in 2008. Hartley captained England to the Grand Slam in 2016, the first time that England had done this since 2003, and to a 3–0 series win in the 2016 Cook Cup against Australia. He announced his retirement on 7 November 2019.
Valerie Adams
Dame Valerie Kasanita Adams is a New Zealand shot putter. She is a four-time World champion, four-time World Indoor champion, two-time Olympic, three-time Commonwealth Games champion and twice IAAF Continental Cup winner. She has a personal best throw of 21.24 metres outdoors and 20.54 m indoors. These marks are Oceanian, Commonwealth and New Zealand national records. She also holds the Oceanian junior record (18.93 m) and the Oceanian youth record (17.54 m), as well as the World Championships record, World Indoor Championships record and Commonwealth Games record.
Joe Warbrick
Joseph Astbury Warbrick was a Māori rugby union player who represented New Zealand on their 1884 tour to Australia and later captained the 1888–89 New Zealand Native football team that embarked on a 107-match tour of New Zealand, Australia, and the British Isles.
Temuera Morrison
Temuera Derek Morrison is a New Zealand actor who first gained recognition for his role as Dr. Hone Ropata on the New Zealand soap opera Shortland Street. He gained critical acclaim after starring as Jake "The Muss" Heke in the 1994 film Once Were Warriors and its 1999 sequel What Becomes of the Broken Hearted?
Trent Boult
Trent Alexander Boult is a New Zealand international cricketer who plays as a bowler for Northern Districts in New Zealand's domestic cricket, and New Zealand internationally.
Logan Dennis Hutchings
Logan Dennis Hutchings is a New Zealand former professional cyclist. He notably won the New Zealand National Time Trial Championships in 2008 and finished second overall in the 2005–06 UCI Oceania Tour.
Clinton Avery
Clinton Robert Avery is a New Zealand racing cyclist, who last rode for the Champion System team.