BOESMAN AND LENA

Athol Fugard classic to be staged at Stable Theatre!

Stable Theatre is to present a schools production of “Boesman and Lena”, Athol Fugard’s powerful story set in apartheid South Africa. It deals with a coloured couple who have been uprooted from their shanty town home which has been bulldozed by the white authorities in order to drive them and other blacks and coloureds in the segregated settlement further away from their white neighbours.

Taking place in the course of a single evening, the play follows Boesman and Lena’s story as they traipse across the mudflats of the Swartkops River near Port Elizabeth, carrying all their belongings in bundles. As they find a desolate spot to rig up some shelter, they meet an old black man. Despite Boesman’s scorn, Lena invites him to sit by the fire …. but the man dies unexpectedly.

Dealing with survival against major odds, “Boesman and Lena” premiered in Grahamstown at the Rhodes University Little Theatre in 1969 with Fugard himself in the role of Boesman and Yvonne Bryceland as Lena. Glyn Day, a white actor, played the part of Outa in blackface.

Eager Artists’s production of this classic play is directed by Siza Mthembu and features DUT graduate Jessica Jamisson in the role of Lena with Musa Ntuli as her abusive husband, Boesman.

“As South Africa is preparing for the 2011 elections, it’s time we take a look at what happens when a black man took over the country,” asks Siza Mthembu. “Do we as South Africans scorn him or do we invite democracy in our lives? Or is it democracy?”

There will be performances of “Boesman and Lena” for matric students from April 11 to 21 at 10h00 and 12h00 with performances for the public on April 15 and 21 at 19h00. Tickets R40 (R30 students).

For further details contact Bonang at Stable Theatre on 031 309 2513.