FULL INTERVIEW: Portia Woodman-Wickliffe

Portia Woodman-Wickliffe (0:00)

The Flava Podcast Network.

SPEAKER_2 (0:03)

The Flava Breakfast Podcast with K'Lee, Azura and Charlie.

SPEAKER_3 (0:07)

This is very, very exciting. I mean, for once, we're not actually talking about sports with you. We're not talking about rugby, we're talking about Barbie.

Portia Woodman-Wickliffe (0:17)

Yeah, what the heck, guys?

SPEAKER_4 (0:19)

You know what, man? To be honest, growing up, I couldn't afford the Barbie those, but I had the knockoff ones. But to me, this is a massive flex. You've cracked it.

Portia Woodman-Wickliffe (0:30)

That's what I was saying to my friends. I was like, I feel like I've clocked the game. You know, when you clock...

SPEAKER_4 (0:35)

Game over...

Portia Woodman-Wickliffe (0:36)

.get to the end, you're like, game over. You're like, wow.

SPEAKER_3 (0:38)

Tell us a little bit about how this all came about you having your very own Barbie. I mean, you're one of four for this edition of Wahine Playing Rugby. And yeah, how does it make you feel?

Portia Woodman-Wickliffe (0:52)

It started prior to the World Cup. My agent told me that Barbie wanted to do a Barbie of me, and then I kind of was like, what are you talking about? Hey, man. This is a scam. Like, are you sure it's a real Barbie? And then communication continued, and she was like, no, it's legit. Seen through what you want. There's a few communities that I get to represent, and it's like one was I wanted K'Lee here. I wanted my LGBTQ community. I wanted my Masley girl, athletic build community. And then being Māori was the most important part. And so those are the four things that I kind of requested. I put those four things through, and then they sent through some like teasers of what do I think about her face and her hair. And then they sent through the whole picture of her, and she just was perfect. I was like, oh yeah, mean.

SPEAKER_4 (1:38)

One thing that you brought up, like the curly hair, because that's a representation of Pacific Islanders. When you look at the Barbie dolls, they had perfect hair. You know what I'm saying? But if you were to see your Barbie with curly hair, like can you imagine all the Māori Pacific Islanders like, yep, that's our girl. That's our girl with the tamoko on there as well. That's a representation of all of us, man. So this is what I mean by you clocking it.

Portia Woodman-Wickliffe (2:00)

Yeah, that's exactly how I thought of it. And for me, I've never been quite spoken about it, but whenever I play, I always have my curly hair because I don't want girls to think that they have to straighten their hair to look presentable. Curly hair girls are always told, you've got to flick it down and make it tamed. And I'm like, no, be big, be loud, be as big as you want it to be. And she's got some guns on her too.

SPEAKER_4 (2:22)

That's all you right there, right?

Portia Woodman-Wickliffe (2:23)

She's got bulging and she's got calves. So again, that's another community of, you know, our Māori and Pacifica whānau, we're all quite muscly and strong women. And Barbie, again, just didn't quite represent that for us. And so that was a big one for me.

SPEAKER_3 (2:37)

And, you know, getting to work with the other athletes, with their Barbies, how cool was it when you guys all came together for that shoot and were able to show your dolls to each other? You must have just felt like a little girl all over again.

Portia Woodman-Wickliffe (2:50)

It was, it was really cute. Like, you know, even our French girl, her hair is beautiful. The cool thing was is we had three out of the four Barbies had textured hair. And I thought that was really cool. Like we said, you don't often see Barbie with any curly hair. So it was just really cool. You know, Ali Kildan, her Barbie had her nose piercing. Alona Marshy, you know, she's big on body confidence and being proud of your body. And her body's as muscular and broad shoulders like mine. So it was really, really cool. I wanted to sit down and play Barbie that whole week.

SPEAKER_3 (3:26)

Oh, I love it. And you know, Portia, after the Rugby World Cup, I mean, record-breaking crowd and numbers watching yet again as the game gets bigger and bigger. And then this Barbie, like you said, you're like, well, I mean, that's me done. Like I've clocked it. What is next for you? Are you just chilling? Are you just chilling now?

Portia Woodman-Wickliffe (3:45)

Until the end of the year, I'm chilling. I'm housewife. I'm dropping my wife and daughter off to school and work, cooking, cleaning. I can only probably do that until the end of the year. And then I'm like, okay, what's next? How do I get out of the job?