Upfront
Oscar Kightley
by Philip Matthews
Philip Matthews talks to Oscar Kightley, playwright and sports presenter.
As well as writing Niu Sila, you have been involved in transforming your Naked Samoans comedy group into cartoon characters for a show called bro’Town. Let’s talk about both. bro’Town is a primetime animated sitcom that’s going to hit New Zealand in a few months on TV3. It’s going to be awesome. We grew up watching Fat Albert – it was a cartoon and they were dark as well.
Niu Sila is the story of a friendship. We start in New Zealand in the 70s, when this five-year-old Palagi kid meets the Island family that moves next door and forms this strong friendship with an Island kid the same age. They grow up together, but their lives take different paths; it’s a two-hander starring Dave Fane, from Naked Samoans, and Damon Andrews. Dave Armstrong created the Semisi family in Skitz – this is based on a mate that he had.
I remember hearing Scribe interviewed last year, talking about writing plays with Pacific Underground in Christchurch. Not many people know about your part in his success story. Part of our work with Pacific Underground was working with young people and exposing them to the arts, allowing them to see that the arts were a really cool way of expressing themselves that can even transfer into money-making careers. Scribble, as I call him, was one of the sharpest ones that I was privileged to be able to hang out with, plus he’s my cousin. He used to turn up at my house, uninvited, and just stay. That’s all right, he’s family. Me and him, we wrote some plays. That was great. I never taught him how.
How old was he? Fifteen. He’s just sharp, that kid. He’s a good kid. I’m so proud of his success. I know where he comes from and I know that it’s what he’s always wanted to do. A lot of rappers talk about how they used to carry around a pad and a pen, but he really did.
Hence, the “Scribe” moniker, then. That’s why. He is a scribe. He observes life and writes about it. I’m proud as. The world’s his oyster.
Let’s talk politics. This is a fraught time for race relations in New Zealand. National MP Katherine Rich recently generated some news over the allocation of $26,000 in Community Employment Group (CEG) money to Fuarosa Tamati of Christchurch for a hip-hop research tour. She’s a relative of Scribe’s – so, she’s a relative of yours? Yeah, yeah, she’s my cousin.
So, what do you make of the “controversy”? I think it’s really unfortunate. Katherine Rich is from Dunedin. In terms of her putting the spotlight on Fuarosa Tamati and Vic, her husband – you could not find a pair of people who have worked more tirelessly for the community, especially young people, than them. For the past 20 years. Living in Dunedin, how could Katherine Rich know? She should have found out a bit more. The thing about CEG and the people who got grants is that due process is followed. You have to have audited accounts and a trust with a constitution. You have to have goals and a background that shows that you aren’t the sort of person who would waste an opportunity like that.
I think it stinks. If she was studying classical music in Austria or visiting the houses of dead poets in Ireland, would there have been the same fervour? Hell, no. Because it’s hip-hop, which some people don’t see as a valid form of music, and because it’s brown people …
This is a country where me and Nathan Rarere get to host a primetime sports show – things like that make me think that New Zealand’s a cool place, we don’t see colour. But every now and then, you get a little reminder. The fact that Don Brash’s Orewa speech struck such a nerve took me back a bit. And that Labour freaked out. But a lot of the mistrust is based on disinformation and ignorance. Fuarosa is a prime case. If Katherine Rich ever sat down and talked to her, and asked, “What have you been doing for the past 20 years?”, and actually listened, she wouldn’t make such vociferous and smarmy attacks.
The fact that Vic Tamati is an Internal Affairs funding adviser caused some in the media to get suspicious, though. The Pacific population in Christchurch is small. In the 1991 Census, there were only 5000 people. The section of the population that works in the community is even smaller, so that’s why there are a lot of the same people, because these are the people doing stuff. Community work is largely voluntary. It’s a thankless task and no one wants to know. People who do it should be treasured. Fuarosa has worked with alcohol problems, with youth – one of the main reasons that Scribe is out there, that New Zealanders of all ages and colours can enjoy Scribe, is because Fuarosa and Pacific Underground and everyone else who worked down there did these things.
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