My Kitchen Rules NZ Changes Behind-the-Scenes Chefs

Australia’s Seven Productions will make the next season of My Kitchen Rules NZ for TVNZ 2 in a bid to boost its popularity.

Kiwi production house Imagination TV (MasterChef NZ, Karena & Kasey’s Kitchen Diplomacy) produced the first two series.

But TVNZ has farmed out the 2017 season to the production arm of the Australian network that airs MKR.

Seven Productions was licensed to make the EndemolShine format in Australia and has an eighth in production; it will make MKR NZ III as Seven Productions NZ.

“We are teaming up with format-owners and producers Seven Productions to turn up the heat on MKR NZ and serve to 2 viewers in 2017,” TVNZ’s General Manager of Commissioning, Production and Acquisitions, Andrew Shaw, said in a statement.

The new version also will import MKR celebrity chefs Pete Evans and Manu Fetildel as the judges.

“We could not be happier to have legends Pete Evans and Manu Feildel joining the series to travel our country and dish up the drama to a bunch of new Kiwi home cooks,” Shaw said.

Although MRK Australia remains a big hit on TV2, MRK NZ has never been as popular. It flopped on TV One in 2014 and was revamped for TV2 in 2015 but still under-performed.

? Wannabe contestants can apply at this link for mkrnz.co.nz.