Duncan Armstrong claims major festival award
Duncan Armstrong claims Best Performance Award at Auckland Fringe Festival
Duncan Armstrong is back home after taking Auckland Fringe Festival by storm.
The success was a while in the making but Duncan managed to take his performing arts career to the next level by a collaboration with Nic and Rose from Everybody Cool Lives Here.
Last September, director Isobel MacKinnon and Duncan started devising what became ‘Force Field’.
Using Duncan’s personal experience and ideas borrowed from Shakespeare’s The Tempest, the pair took two weeks to create a story line for a 25 minute show and a character named Chris.
“Chris imagines someone there and then they find romance,” says Duncan. “To Chris, Fiona is a real character…she’s out there somewhere”.
In November the team expanded by recruiting a few designers and by mid-January the team was working full-time on the show.
“It’s fun and a lot of work, sometimes I get tired from it,” tells Duncan.
“Sometimes we have to take a break and then come back to it. Then you are refreshed and recharged.”
Before heading up to Auckland, the team tested the work with a few invited guests, including Duncan’s mum, Max. Character parallels with real life included wanting to move out of home, a story line that may not best delivered to an unexpected mum on the opening night.
The Basement Theatre season ran for five nights and the team managed to stay with friends, giving Duncan a taste of living with flatmates.
After a week of catching up with sleep, the Auckland Fringe Awards were announced and Force Field took home four awards, including Best Director, Best Production Design, and Best Performance (Theatre) for Duncan.
Everybody Cool Lives Here followed the awards up by attending the annual Performing Arts Market where Duncan pitched his solo alongside Jacob Dombroski.
Fingers crossed it means a step forward to touring the works to regional theatres and festivals. A Wellington return season is definitely on the cards for Force Field, and Duncan is currently looking at what it might take to get the work to Edinburgh Fringe.
