Kightley is an award-winning playwright, actor, presenter and director from Auckland.
He was the 2006 Arts Foundation Laureate Award winner and was made a member of the New Zealand Order of Merit in 2009 for services to theatre and television.
Kightley was born in Samoa and immigrated to New Zealand with his mother when he was four years old.
In 2007, he spent a week as an artist resident at the University of Hawaii shortly after the hit movie Sione's Wedding, which he co-wrote and acted in, was released.
