Dave Armstrong (playwright)

Dave Armstrong
Born	1961 New Zealand
Occupation	Playwright

Dave Armstrong (1961) is a New Zealand playwright, screenwriter, trumpet player and columnist for The Dominion Post. His work has featured on stage, radio and television. His television writer credits include Spin Doctors, Seven Periods with Mr Gormsby, Great War Stories, and script editor for bro'Town.

Armstrong states:

Just about everything I have learnt about literary and dramatic structure has a parallel in classical music composition. Good dialogue has a rhythm, so if you have a musical ear you can hear it when it works.

In 2004 Dave Armstrong and Oscar Kightley co-wrote the play Niu Sila, about the friendship between a Samoan and a Palagi boy in 1960s New Zealand. It premiered at Downstage Theatre, and went on to win the 2004 Chapman Tripp Theatre Award for Best New New Zealand Play. In 2006 Armstrong and Oscar Kightley received the Arts Foundation of New Zealand Award for Patronage, for Niu Sila which they co-wrote. In her New Zealand Listener review of the Auckland Theatre Company production, Natasha Hay called Niu Sila "a triumph." The original "two-hander" play Niu Sila, which is written for 2 actors to play 24 characters, is published by Playmarket, (The Tutor is published in the same book),. In 2007 Armstrong and Kightley adapted the play for schools, so that it can be performed with a large cast. The schools' version was published in 2007 by the New Zealand branch of Cengage Learning, and features study resources and drama activities. Niu Sila is one of the prescribed plays for NCEA (NZ) Level 3 Assessment.

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