They’re back!
The Naked Samoans do magic
One of New Zealand’s most beloved comedy troupes reunites to bring a touch of magic — and biting social commentary — to next year’s Auckland Arts Festival.
Performing for the first time in 12 years, The Naked Samoans — Dave Fane, Mario Gaoa, Shimpal Lelisi, Oscar Kightley, Robbie Magasiva and Heto Ah hi — are the headline local comedy- theatre act at the 2018 festival.
Though the AAF doesn’t release its full programme until Tuesday, incoming artistic director Jonathan Bielski shared the news with the Weekend Herald because the reunion show is bound to sell out.
Founder member Dave Fane and Robbie Magasiva, who joined in 2001, say they can’t wait to get back on stage with their best mates, and though The Naked Samoans last performed in 2006, they always knew they’d be back together again one day.
“It’s fun when you’re working with your greatest mates,” says Fane, who takes a break from rehearsals this week to play US civil rights leader Martin Luther King in the play The Mountaintop.
“It’s kind of like being back in third form and coming back after the summer holidays and laughing about what you got up to.”
The Naked Samoans Do Magic will see them play at Auckland’s The Civic, their biggest venue ever, but Magasiva says they’re taking it in their stride.
“It is a lot of seats . . . but I’m sure we can do it,” he says.
Magasiva, recently returned from Australia where he filmed season six of the TV prison drama Wentworth, says it marks a new chapter for The Naked Samoans.
“I don’t like to admit it but maybe we are a bit older and wiser,” he says. “In the past, we spent 80 per cent of our time in rehearsals just laughing at one another and the script wasn’t ready until a couple of weeks before opening night, but this time, we’re actually really organised.”
The Naked Samoans, who started their act in 1998 to keep themselves in work, gained acclaim for a brand of social satire and physical comedy celebrating the members’ Pacific Island culture and identity. Fane, Gaoa, Lelisi and Kightley went on to create the cartoon series
bro’Town, which ran for five seasons, while the “Nakeds” also wrote and starred in the hit films Sione’s Wedding and Sione’s 2: Unfinished Business.
AAF’s artistic director Jonathan Bielski, who was previously in charge of programming at the Sydney Opera House for 13 years, wanted an act that was “quintessentially Auckland” to celebrate the city, the festival becoming an annual event and his return to New Zealand.
With fond memories of The Naked Samoans’ “naughty, clever and subversive comedy”, he says he couldn’t think of a better group to bring to the Auckland stage especially as 2018 marks the comedy troupe’s 20th anniversary.
“They’re sophisticated thinkers and writers who use comedy as a vehicle for smart social commentary,” says Bielski.
“They might present the persona of slightly buffoonish Pacific Island guys, but that’s not what they’re really like at all.”
He also likes the fact that the troupe celebrates male friendship: “You can clearly see that underneath it all, they have a great respect for one another, love and camaraderie.”
Fane says he and Kightley were already kicking around ideas for a reunion show when Bielski approached them.
They’d been talking to internationally acclaimed theatre director Nina Nawalowalo whose The Conch theatre company tells Pacific stories across the globe.
But Nawalowalo also spent years working in London with magicians and illusionists. Now directing the touring show
Magicians, which arrives in Auckland next week, she wanted to add an extra dimension to the Nakeds’ work.
It means they’ll do tricks on stage and star in a story premised on the idea that the group split up, headed in different directions and were reunited after a mysterious old magician’s death. Rather than skit- based sketches where they portray different characters throughout, the Nakeds play distorted versions of themselves.
Fane says in this alternate reality, he’s become a celebrated KFC chef while Magasiva lives in Dunedin and is transitioning to become a palagi. Director Nawalowalo says it’s a story about finding hope in a world where that seems to be diminishing.
“I think we’re creating a very, very rich and beautiful show that will fill The Civic space well.” The Naked Samoans Do Magic, The Civic, March 22- 25