Talia Pua’s Pork & Poll Taxes Brings Chinese New Zealand History to the Stage

Five years after its sold-out premiere, Talia Pua's Pork & Poll Taxes has returned to Auckland in September 2026 with something more ambitious than a simple revival. Talia Pua’s debut play returned to the Herald Theatre redeveloped under the direction of Chye-Ling Huang, with Talia herself stepping onto the stage as Yuk Chun in a story that asks who gets remembered in New Zealand history – and what migration can cost the families living through it.

Written by Talia, Pork & Poll Taxes 人頭猪税 is set against the Chinese poll tax era of the late 19th century. The story follows Jiu Choy, who leaves China for Aotearoa in search of a better life, and the family whose future is reshaped by that decision. What begins with hope becomes a story of separation, financial pressure, racism, obligation and competing ideas of where “home” really is.

The history underneath the drama is very real. As The Spinoff explored in its feature on Pork & Poll Taxes, Talia first encountered the Chinese poll tax while researching a high-school drama project. The subject stayed with her and, years later, she began developing those ideas into the play that would become Pork & Poll Taxes.

Importantly, Talia wanted the story to look beyond the men who travelled to New Zealand and consider the wives, mothers and daughters whose lives continued on the other side of the journey. It gives the play a family perspective that makes its history immediate. Government policy is not left sitting on a page: we see how it reaches into relationships, separates people and changes the choices available to generations of a family.

That idea sits at the heart of Pork & Poll Taxes. The Chinese poll tax introduced in 1881 began at £10 before increasing to £100 a decade later. Around that history, Talia has built fictional characters facing questions of sacrifice, responsibility, assimilation and belonging. The result is a story grounded in a very specific part of Chinese New Zealand history, but one that also speaks more broadly to the experience of leaving one home in the hope of creating another.

The play originally had its sold-out premiere at Auckland’s Herald Theatre in 2021 and was subsequently recognised as an Adam NZ Play Award finalist and winner of Playmarket’s b4 25 Play Award. You can explore the development and original season of Pork & Poll Taxes on Talia’s website.

For the 2026 redevelopment, Talia moved from her original position as writer-director into the cast, playing Yuk Chun, while Chye-Ling Huang took the director’s chair. The season was presented by Proudly Asian Theatre, Hand Pulled Collective and Auckland Live, with Darren Young, Nikita 雅涵 Tu-Bryant, Dennis Zhang 张全, Talia Pua and Xiao Hu forming the cast.

The response to the new production highlighted both the strength of Talia’s writing and the impact of seeing this history played out through a family rather than explained as a history lesson. Reviewer Andrew Whiteside described the production as “well-written and superbly acted”, noting the universality of its family dynamics alongside its examination of New Zealand’s immigration history.

Dramatic Pause’s review was similarly enthusiastic about the writing, describing Pork & Poll Taxes as a “family drama of the highest echelon”. Talia’s own performance was also singled out, with the review recognising the particular connection that comes from a playwright performing within the rhythms and language of her own work.

That critical response points to something Pork & Poll Taxes does especially well. It does not ask audiences to approach history as something distant or safely completed. It gives that history parents and children, arguments and compromises, humour and fear. The political becomes personal because audiences see what discriminatory policy can actually mean around a family table.

The play also challenges the idea that early New Zealand migration stories can be neatly separated into those who left and those who stayed. The decisions made in Aotearoa reverberate back into China, just as family expectations and obligations travel in the opposite direction. Ideas of putting down new roots compete with the enduring pull of where those roots began.

For Talia, the 2026 season adds another chapter to a creative practice that crosses acting, writing, theatre-making, design and puppetry. Her wider work can be explored at taliapua.com, and audiences can also watch more from Pork & Poll Taxes on YouTube.

Collaborate Management are incredibly proud to represent Talia Pua. Pork & Poll Taxes demonstrates what makes her creative voice so interesting: thoughtful research, strong visual storytelling and a willingness to take a part of New Zealand history that has too often sat at the margins and put it firmly at the centre of the stage.

Want to find out more about Talia’s acting, theatre, screen and creative work? Get in touch with Collaborate Management.