WITH his former job at the NZ Film Commission having sucked up much of his energy, it had been seven years since Wellington-based playwright Hone Kouka had launched a new work.It was not surprising, then, that presentations in both the Capital and in Auckland of his one-man play I, George Nepia, triggered a few nerves.
Add to that the presence of large num-bers of Nepia whanau members in last month’s opening night audience and Kouka was, he says, “terrified”.
He needn’t have worried.
According to one reviewer, at one point in the play one of those whanau members cried out “That’s it! That’s exactly it!” — indicating that Kouka’s interpretation of rugby great Nepia’s character was spot on.
The work went on to play to packed houses in both main centres. Perhaps most telling, though, was another critic’s comment that as well as being beautifully written, I, George Nepia was “a beautifully realised play”.
It is that commitment to ensuring a show is audience-ready that brings Kouka to Gisborne this week.
In town with his company Tawata Productions’ co-founder Miria George, a cast of eight and crew, Kouka is staging a “development” presentation of his newest work, Tu, based on Patricia Grace’s 2004 novel of the same name.
It is the second stage of development, writer/director Kouka having worked with high-profile dramaturge Murray Lynch after the first small season in Wellington last year.
“There are big plans in place for Tu for 2012 so it is important to ensure it is fully realised by then, says George, herself a writer and director of some note and producer for the play.
“It has helped that, since Hone started working on it in 2008, we have pretty much the same team of actors which assists in ensuring the story is told with clarity, that the historical details are correct and that the characters are properly drawn,” she said.
“Too often we see New Zealand plays launched brand new at major festivals where they are programmed against international shows that have been touring for years. We don’t want to fall into that trap. Our focus is on creating highly developed, high quality art.”
George and Kouka founded Tawata in 2001 to provide an outlet for diverse voices but, though the company has pro-duced prize-winning works by both, Kouka’s work with the Film Commission had until recently kept him out of the writing loop.
He says that both I, George Nepia and Tu have given him an inspiring re-entry.
With the former, the multiple award winner — who has also been named a member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for his services to contemporary Maori theatre — was able to connect to his ancestry, Nepia having been related to him through marriage.
And for the latter, he again mined his whanau history to tell the story of the title character who, after fighting with the Maori Battalion, etches the scars of World War 2 on the hearts of his own family.
Much of the action is set in 1940s Wellington, to where Tu’s East Coast family migrated as part of the great urban drift of that period.
So Kouka (Ngati Porou, Ngati Raukawa, Ngati Kahu-ngunu) has drawn on his own family’s experience of migra-tion to the South Island. And he adds a few other whanau-related twists, such as changing Tu’s brother’s names to those of his own, Philomel and Boydie: “I guess I got to thinking about how far would my brothers go for me?” And he plays up the role of Tu’s mother, his strong sense of family making him wonder how a woman would respond to losing each and every one of her sons.
Describing the play as being inspired by rather than being an adaption of Grace’s novel, Kouka says he has been lucky enough to have been given free rein by the writer, who says she will stay away until the development process is finished.
In the meantime, he gets to work with what he describes as a writer’s gift . . . a cast of characters who, due to their time and place, are extraordinarily well spoken and “a joy to write dialogue for”.
“Many of our koro of that time they spoke beautifully, they often dressed beautifully, there was an eloquence and an elegance to them,” he said. “But there was still this sense of discomfort in their new homes, a sense of being immigrants in their own land.”
Meanwhile, with Tawata Productions having secured a two-year funding contract from Creative New Zealand, George and Kouka are committed to producing more new works. They’ll also continue to stage existing pieces, including I, George Nepia, which Kouka hopes to bring to the Gisborne region next year.
“We’ve pretty much been told that we have to at least take it to Rangitukia, Gisborne and Nuhaka, so that’s the plan,” Kouka says. “We’re up for that — we always have a great time in Gisborne. And it’s just wonderful to be directing and writing again . . . to be just doing it.”
■ Tawata Productions’ presentation of Tu will be on at Lawson Field Theatre tonight, tomorrow and Saturday (8pm). Tickets at Stephen’s PhotoPlus or at the door.
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