{"id":815960,"date":"2026-07-21T08:21:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-21T08:21:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/815960\/"},"modified":"2026-07-21T08:21:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T08:21:09","slug":"sam-neill-fans-send-sales-of-his-two-paddocks-wine-soaring-in-tribute-to-late-actor-sam-neill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/815960\/","title":{"rendered":"Sam Neill fans send sales of his Two Paddocks wine soaring in tribute to late actor | Sam Neill"},"content":{"rendered":"

New Zealand stores have been selling out of Sam Neill\u2019s wine label, and the causes he held dear have had an influx of support, as fans find ways to pay tribute to the adored late actor.<\/p>\n

The 78-year-old New Zealander died on 13 July<\/a> of pneumonia<\/a>, just three months after Neill revealed he was finally cancer-free<\/a> since being diagnosed with stage three angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma, a type of blood cancer, in 2022.<\/p>\n

Neill\u2019s representative, Philip Grenz, suggested to fans wanting to honour Neill\u2019s memory they make donations to \u201cone of the causes he cared about most deeply\u201d instead of sending flowers to the family.<\/p>\n

Neill was an avid winemaker, producing pinot noir, riesling and ros\u00e9 under his label Two Paddocks, in Central Otago, New Zealand. He was known to be generous with his wine<\/a>, donating it to charity events and giving it to friends and colleagues. Now, fans are raising a glass of Two Paddocks in his memory.<\/p>\n

Liquorland, a national retailer with 175 stores, said Two Paddocks pinot noir went from being the 423rd bestselling wine the week prior to Neill\u2019s death to number five in the days after news broke \u2013 representing a 1,828% increase in its sales.<\/p>\n

Regional Wines, a boutique store in Wellington, sold out of stock the day he died, while Moore Wilson\u2019s, a boutique supermarket and wholesaler in Wellington, sold five times the usual volume of Two Paddocks.<\/p>\n

\u201cCustomers have shared plans to enjoy Sir Sam Neill\u2019s movies with a glass of his pinot noir,\u201d said Amanda Thompson, Moore Wilson\u2019s general manager. \u201cOthers are stocking up the cellar, and some of the cafes and restaurants were putting up a blackboard special to celebrate his life.\u201d<\/p>\n

Two Paddocks\u2019 general manager Jacqui Murphy told the Guardian Neill would have been touched. To Neill, sitting around a table with friends and family and a glass of great wine was a \u201csign of living well\u201d, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m sure he would regret the reason they needed to do this, but he talked about wine being about conviviality, connecting people,\u201d she said. \u201cSo I think he would think it was very apt, and he\u2019d be even more excited that they were, of course, drinking his Two Paddocks.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dean McHenry, the general manager of Two Paddocks distributor, Negociants New Zealand, said the brand had always been popular but there had been an upswing in demand over the past week. \u201cI just think it shows what he meant to us as a nation at the bottom of the world,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

An anti-mining group called Sustainable Tarras received a sudden bump of more than NZ$20,000 (\u00a310,300) in donations after the news about Neill emerged. Neill joined the group\u2019s fight to stop a controversial open-cast goldmine <\/a>being developed in the Dunstan mountains, a few kilometres from his vineyard in Central Otago, saying the mine would \u201cbe the end\u201d for the region.<\/p>\n

Fans are now vowing to keep up the fight. \u201cIn honour of the great Sam Neill and for everyone against this ugly idea,\u201d wrote one person who donated to the group.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor Sam. We will carry on fighting in your name,\u201d wrote another.<\/p>\n

One fan in Scotland said: \u201cDonating in memory of Sam Neill, a man of integrity and honour who would want you to continue the fight against this appalling assault on such a wonderful landscape.\u201d<\/p>\n

The chair of Sustainable Tarras, Suze Keith, said Neill was a \u201cknight in shining armour\u201d whose championing of the cause allowed the group to better fight the proposal by bringing in experts.<\/p>\n

However, the support Neill\u2019s fans showed after his death had been \u201cbittersweet\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s just so tragic to have lost him \u2026 It\u2019s so encouraging so many people have come out to say: \u2018keep it up, keep up these efforts, let us help you keep up these efforts\u2019. It is really quite a remarkable thing,\u201d Keith said.<\/p>\n

Dunstan Hospital Foundation in Central Otago, where Neill received cancer treatment, also received dozens of individual donations from around the world.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese have included some special, heartfelt messages of how important Sir Sam was to them and how important this hospital is,\u201d said Hayley Anderson, the chief executive.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Zealand stores have been selling out of Sam Neill\u2019s wine label, and the causes he held dear…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":815961,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[49,48,75],"class_list":["post-815960","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/815960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=815960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/815960\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/815961"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=815960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=815960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=815960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}