Stephen Sinclair

{{short description|New Zealand playwright, screenwriter and novelist}}

{{Use dmy dates|date=July 2019}}

Stephen Sinclair is a New Zealand playwright, screenwriter and novelist. He is the co-author of stage comedy Ladies Night. In 2001, the French version won the Molière Award for stage comedy of the year. Other plays include The Bellbird and The Bach, both of which are prescribed texts for Drama Studies in New Zealand secondary schools.{{citation needed|date=August 2021}}

He has co-written several films with Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh, notably Meet The Feebles, Braindead, and The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers. He also wrote and directed the feature film Russian Snark, which premiered at the 2010 New Zealand Film Festival in Auckland, and won numerous international awards.

Sinclair has written the novels Thief of Colours (Penguin Books, 1995), and Dread (Spineless Press, 2000), and a book of poetry, The Dwarf and the Stripper (2003).{{Cite web|title=Stephen Sinclair|url=https://www.playmarket.org.nz/playwrights/stephen-sinclair/|access-date=2021-08-02|website=Playmarket|language=en-US|archive-date=23 July 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210723170517/https://www.playmarket.org.nz/playwrights/stephen-sinclair/|url-status=live}}

Plays

  • Le Matau (The Fish Hook) (1984), co-written with journalist Samson Samasoni. Premiered at New Depot Theatre, Wellington, in February 1984,{{Cite book|author1=Lisa Warrington|title=Floating Islanders: Pacifika Theatre in Aotearoa|author2=O'Donnell|first2=David|date=2017|publisher=Otago University Press|isbn=978-1-98-853107-6|location=Dunedin|language=en|author-link1=Lisa Warrington|author-link2=David O'Donnell (actor-director)}} directed by Stephen Sinclair and Helen Jarroe The play tells the story of Ioane, who leaves Samoa to work in New Zealand to support his family, but faces pressures to conform to {{lang|mi|Pākehā}} ways of doing things.{{Cite book |editor1=Marc Maufort |editor2=David O'Donnell |isbn=978-90-5201-359-6 |issn=1376-3199 |language=en |ol=23674269M |pages=466 |date=2007 |location=Brussels |publisher=Peter Lang |title=Performing Aotearoa: New Zealand Theatre and Drama in an Age of Transition}} Also one of the earliest bi-lingual New Zealand plays.
  • Ladies Night, co-authored with Anthony McCarten, 1987.{{Cite web|title=PRODUCTION INFORMATION: LADIES NIGHT - Theatreview|url=https://www.theatreview.org.nz/reviews/production.php?id=7468|url-status=live|access-date=2021-08-03|website=www.theatreview.org.nz|archive-date=3 August 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210803000936/https://www.theatreview.org.nz/reviews/production.php?id=7468}}
  • Big Bickies (1990), a musical satire about an ordinary family winning the Lotto.
  • Caramel Cream (1991) depicting a relationship between a Māori teenager and his {{lang|mi|Pākehā}} social worker.
  • Drawer of Knives
  • Success (2015){{Cite web|title=SUCCESS - Study in failure proves success|url=https://www.theatreview.org.nz/reviews/review.php?id=8348|access-date=2021-08-03|website=www.theatreview.org.nz|archive-date=3 August 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210803001552/https://www.theatreview.org.nz/reviews/review.php?id=8348|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|title=PRODUCTION INFORMATION: SUCCESS - Theatreview|url=https://www.theatreview.org.nz/reviews/production.php?id=5917|url-status=live|access-date=2021-08-03|website=www.theatreview.org.nz|archive-date=3 August 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210803001321/https://www.theatreview.org.nz/reviews/production.php?id=5917}}
  • Remain in Light, (2017){{Cite web|title=PRODUCTION INFORMATION: REMAIN IN LIGHT - Theatreview|url=https://www.theatreview.org.nz/reviews/production.php?id=5606|url-status=live|access-date=2021-08-03|website=www.theatreview.org.nz|archive-date=3 August 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210803001317/https://www.theatreview.org.nz/reviews/production.php?id=5606}}
  • Intimacies
  • The Bach, set in the Coromandel, shows family disintegration as two brothers and their wives spend time at the beach, while two of them are trying to write a script about iwi history.
  • The Bellbird (2002), in which a 19th-century {{lang|mi|Pākehā}} woman marries a Māori man; set in Marlborough.

Awards and festivals

=Short films=

  • Ride: Selected for the Montreal Film Festival in 2004.

=Feature films=

References

{{Reflist}}