In the small theatre venues around town –
in studio theatres, in converted church halls, in old warehouse buildings –
some really interesting theatre is happening night after night, written by new
and emerging playwrights. These are theatre events that crucially examine
issues of importance to contemporary South Africa. Published by Junkets
Publisher, the New Voices Series brings together five of the New Voices to have
emerged between 2011 and 2014.
Sinethemba Twani: The Beneficiary. This play raises a number of South African
inter-generational issues: How does Lifa, bent on a career in professional
soccer administration, react when his grandfather makes him the beneficiary of
the clan’s family homestead and farm in the Eastern Cape? How does Lifa’s
mother react to the Rastafarianism of Lifa’s girlfriend? The dialogue is in
English and isiXhosa (with English translations).
Christo Davids and Jody J Abrahams: Bullets over Bishop Lavis. The unexpected
consequences of the Struggle emerge when two men, brothers in those desperate
times, re-connect years later, after their separate lives have taken very
different directions. For one of them: a professional law practice, a home in
an affluent suburb, and a white wife; for the other: release from seven years
in prison, locked into the no-hope poverty of the townships. The dialogue is in English and Afrikaans, with translations.
Anele Rusi: iSystem. This play asks some pertinent questions about the South
African Police Service. Can we rely on our police system to serve us well? How
does a police officer allow or not allow his personal life and his survival
dilemmas to influence his work? Are those appointed to investigate the
misdemeanours of members of the Service themselves above suspicion? The
dialogue is in English and isiXhosa (with English translations).
Philip Rademeyer: The View. Set in some post-apocalyptic future, all homosexual
people have been shipped out into space. The Boy finds himself in a
hermetically-sealed pod, looking down at a ruined and devastated Earth. He is
granted his last request: a cassette tape of messages from the people and
figures he knew in his life on Earth. The play has achieved a swathe of awards
and nominations: at the Fleur du Cap Awards, the Aardklop Festival, and the
Dublin International Gay Theatre Festival (winning both the Doric Wilson Award
for Intercultural Dialogue, and the Oscar Wilde Award for New Writing).
Khayelihle Dom Gumede: Crepuscule. This is a stage adaptation of a Can Themba short story
of the same name. It is set in the swirling, living excitement that was
Sophiatown in the 1950s. Can and his fellow Drum writers meet in Can’s ‘House
of Truth’ or move about the place from shebeen to shebeen. He meets a young
white woman, and they fall in love. Suddenly there is someone new – and
unexpected – in the Kofifi haunts where Can is known by everyone. Including the
apartheid police. Add to the mix the fact that Janet is married, and drama has
to result.
All five playwrights are young, in their 20’s
or early-30’s, and come from very diverse backgrounds. Twani studied Retail
Business Management for a while, and also worked as a petrol attendant; Rusi
has a diploma in Electrical Engineering; Davids and Abrahams have both been
actors since their boyhood; Rademeyer has a Master’s in Theatre and Performance
(Directing), a degree in Psychology and Theatre from a US university, and
teaches in the drama department at the University of Cape Town; while Gumede
has come through the in-theatre training of the Market Theatre Laboratory.
“We will hear more from these New Voices,
there’s no doubt about that!” says Robin Malan of Junkets Publishers.
Each of the New Voices playscripts sells at R80 and are available by emailing info.junkets@iafrica.com
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