Riwia Brown
New Zealand writer
Riwia Brown (née Taylor; born 1957) is a New Zealand playwright. She is the screenwriter of the popular and award-winning New Zealand movie Once Were Warriors (1994). The Once Were Warriors screenplay, adapted from the book of the same name by Alan Duff, gained Brown the Best Screenplay award at the 1994 New Zealand Film and TV Awards. Brown has written for theatre, television and films.
Early life and family
Brown is the daughter of Mel Taylor, a diplomat, and his wife, Reremoana Taylor and was born in 1957. She is of Māori descent and affiliates to the Ngāti Porou, Te Whānau-ā-Apanui and Taranaki iwi. Brown is from a creative family: her brother Apirana Taylor is a poet, story-teller and musician; her other siblings, Rangimoana Taylor and Haina Stewart, are also theatre practitioners.
Brown was educated at St Joseph's Māori Girls' College in Taradale.
Career
Brown has written a number of plays since she began working in theatre during the 1980s. She was part of the Māori Theatre group Te Ohu Whakaari in Wellington at Taki Rua / The Depot Theatre alongside other writers including Rore Hapipi, Hone Tuwhare and her brother Apirana Taylor.
“Riwia Brown” enters the record as new Zealand writer. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Riwia, Brown and Zealand can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 13, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7339002. VIAF identifies the subject as 76521050. The Library of Congress control number is nb99108699. 2 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1957 and 1994.
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This entry incorporates text from “Riwia Brown” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.