Dealing with race, identity and sexuality Victor Rodger continues to transport Pacific lived experiences to the stage.

Since Victor graduated from Toi Whakaari: New Zealand Drama School in 1997 he has seen much success. The following year Victor won four Chapman Tripp Awards including Most Outstanding New Writer and Most Outstanding New New Zealand Play for his play Sons. In 2001 he won the Sunday Star Times Bruce Mason Playwriting Award. Victor was awarded the Fullbright Creative New Zealand Pacific Writer-in-Residence, University of Hawaii 2006; Ursula Bethell Writer-in-Residence, Canterbury University 2009; and Creative New Zealand Pacific Artist-in-Residence, Macmillan Brown Centre for Pacific

The breadth of Victors’s career has seen him in a wide range of roles. Starting his career as a journalist, Victor went on to write stories for Ears, National Radio’s children’s programme before moving into writing for the theatre. Victor has also written for the soap opera Shortland Street as well as various acting roles. While he has proven himself a versatile writer, it is his plays which have most recently cast Victor in the spotlight. Victor’s theatre challenges stereotypes of Pacific people by unearthing real portrayals of a New Zealand based Pacific Diaspora. Further than that his plays act as a vehicle for Pacific stories and faces on stage.

Sons, Victor’s first play, debuted in 1995. Locating yourself within a Samoan world can be difficult especially for mixed-race Samoans, something Victor highlights. This semi-autobiographical play reflects his experience of cultural dislocation, through the estrangement of his Samoan Father. Being kept a secret from his half siblings, this Samoan/Palagi raised in Christchurch negotiates relationships with both his father and his culture. Sons was accepted into the 1994 Oceania Playwrights’ Workshop and subsequently premiered at Court Two, Christchurch in 1995. In 2014 Sons was revived at The Mangere Arts Centre, Auckland. The writing behind Sons has proven to transcend time, remaining relevant twenty years later.

Victor’s plays have had seasons throughout New Zealand as well as internationally. His plays include Sons, 1995; Cunning Stunts, 1997; Ranterstantrum, 2002; My Name is Gary Cooper, 2007; At the Wake, 2012; and Black Faggot, 2013, Girl on a Corner, 2015 and Puzzy (by Kiki feat Victor Rodger), 2016.