Paul Maunder has had a lengthy career in film and theatre. After university he studied at the National Institute of Dramatic Art in Sydney and then at the London Film School. Both writer and director of his films, his work has won many awards: Best short film at Berlin, Best Actor at Karlovy Vary, Golden Prize at the Asian and Pacific Young Filmmakers Festival, as well as local awards.
In theatre he has worked in mainstream professional theatre as well as group theatre and community theatre, devising and scripting many plays, both historical and bicultural.
He has published articles in cultural magazines and short stories in a variety of collections. His work has been recorded for radio.
Prophets from the Margins was selected for workshopping at Playmarket’s annual gathering in 2003, and Death (and Love) in Gaza played at BATS and Free Theatre in 2005. A recent work in development, Big End, workshopped at The Court in 2007, is a coming of age play set in Palmerston North during the Cuban Missile Crisis. A radio play based on Unite Union’s fast food workers campaign is due for RNZ production this year.
Paul Maunder
The wharf lockout of 1951 became a major industrial dispute in NZ working class history and the chief manifestation of McCarthyism in NZ. This documentary uses rapid scene changes, caricature and agit prop to evoke the period. Script prepared in collaboration with workers who lived through the dispute.
Cast: 6
Paul Maunder
The trials and tribulations of being young in Wellington in the 1960s at the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis and Kennedy's assassination. Coming of Age in the early 1960s.
Cast: 7
Paul Maunder
1967. A hippy (Jo) and his pregnant girlfriend (Kate) want to buy George and Joan's house in Blackball. She is almost due and needs somewhere to have the baby.
Cast: 4
Paul Maunder
Based on the Rachel Corrie story.
Cast: 3
Paul Maunder
Inspired by Freud. As people become increasingly controlled by the consumerism of the new right, characters seek the impulse for liberation in the anarchic river of subjectivity. Sc. 1 has a middle age counter culturalist confronted by a computer whiz kid. In Sc 2 an experimental theatre director auditions for the role of Dora; & Sc 3 a pakeha activist is confronted by a Maori welfare dependent in a police cell.
Cast: 3
Paul Maunder
What is the nature of meaningful political action? A demonstration followed by the ancient Greek story of Electra, on this occasion set in Africa, and her protest against injustice.
An illustration of today's situation in Africa and the nature of protest.
Cast: 9
Paul Maunder
Loosley based on the morality play of the same title, a group of actors embark on a theatrical search for a political ontology in a world of increasing social absurdity.
Cast: 6
Paul Maunder
A poetic evocation of the Gallipoli campaign in which the myth of settler nationhood is confronted. The text is designed as the springboard for a 'poor theatre' performance, with some reference to the 'theatre of cruelty' model.
Cast: 12
Paul Maunder
Inspired by the life and times of James K Baxter - poet turned prophet. In acting out the contradictions of the artist in the face of liberal capitalism, Hemi begins to unweave the settler culture and rebuild one that is more sympathetic with the tangata whenua.
Cast: 12
Paul Maunder
Based on events in Taranaki in the 19th century. The narrative follows the seizure of power by the settler government, the taking of the land and the imposition of the political system. A story of colonial rape - political, cultural and personal.
Cast: 18
Paul Maunder
A selection of scripts evolved from formal working partnerships with community groups. Includes Ko Te Kimihamga - based on the life of Waikato leader Te Puea and evolved with Ki Roto O Poneke. A Level Playing Field evolved with the Service Workers Union and The Market, evolved with the Wellington Prostitutes Collective.
Cast:
Paul Maunder
Harry, an old communist, is dying in a failing health system. He and his comrades stage one last protest to show how the 'right' is wrong
Cast: 7
Paul Maunder
A group of artists search for an agenda for action in a liberal democracy. Their research leads to a cul de sac where the only way out is for the writer to reflect on his own determinations, to tell his own family's story of oppression - both internal & external. In the epilogue the actors also reflect on their determinations, thus offering the same possibilities to the audience, 'the personal becomes the political.'
Cast: 7
Paul Maunder
Combining the oral traditions of the tangata whenua and Brechtian epic forms, this script narrates the events surrounding the arrival of missionary Thomas Kendall, the debate between Christian and Maori spiritual systems and the burgeoning material and political ambitions of Nga Puhi rangitira, Hongi Hika.
Cast: 13
Paul Maunder
The play is set in Guantanamo Bay. The authorities have allowed a prisoner, Yassif, to tell his story to delegates from a human rights type organisation. He sits in his cage with the audience sitting around the outside and begins to tell his story.
Cast: 3
Paul Maunder
“Jodie’s done herself in and we have to mourn her properly by telling the truth.”
Written for performing arts students.
Cast: 16