(Pieter Scholtz)
Fellow actor and drama lecturer Jane Ross will present St Clements’ Monday at Six programme on August 4 as a tribute evening for the late Emeritus Professor Pieter Scholtz.
A celebrated actor, playwright and novelist, Pieter Scholtz headed the Department of Speech and Drama at the University of Natal in Durban (now UKZN), for 22 years. He died on the afternoon of July 5 at Durban’s St Augustine’s Hospital after a period of declining health. He was 88.
Pieter Scholtz, the inspiration behind Mondays at Six: friend, mentor to many, emeritus UKZN Drama professor, author of innumerable books and plays (a number of which, long-time Monday night fans will remember, were launched by Pieter at St Clements), adventurer, visionary, dreamer, legend and forever-adoring husband of the late Jilian Hurst (Jilly), who died in 1997 (dancer, choreographer, director with Margie Larlham of the Barefoot Dance Company, precursor of the Flatfoot Dance Company).
Jilian Hurst wrote the book Dancing into Being, one of the books Pieter published and launched at St Clements, written and illustrated by Jilian before she died.
Pieter was a man who cared about others and whose fervour for acting, theatre, the stage, the written word, seemed to come not from ego or pretension but from a deep passion for the art, the craft, the desire to share, to interpret, to nurture, to create.
Planned for the August “Monday at Six” is a lively and celebratory tribute evening for Pieter. Jane Ross, a lecturer in drama at Stadio college, an actress and a friend, is putting together the evening. Look forward to meeting some of Pieter’s former students, hearing interpretations of some of his favourite readings and poems and lots more.
Also on the programme will be Caroline Smart, artSMart owner and editor as well as an experienced actress, who will present a couple of items in honour of Pieter, who was a good friend. She will also read a tribute by Mervyn McMurtry who took over the Department of Speech and Drama when Pieter Scholtz retired.
Rick (a St Clem stalwart now in Joburg) and Jill Andrew have recorded Pieter’s St Clements anthem, Forever Young, for the occasion. Expect, also, to hear from Pieter’s St Clements "Friday breakfast group" friends including Chris Nicholson, Val Coppin-Shaw and Paul Mikula. Hopefully Graham Linscott, too, who Pieter would coerce when he was still “running the show” to judge the many short story contests he ran, won sometimes by the late great Andrew Verster, who was a Mondays at Six stalwart and great Pieter friend.
Jane promises an open mic. Expect to enjoy a four-minute video from James Parker in the UK, telling an anecdotal tale about Pieter. James, who wrote the book Drama Queen on Prof Elizabeth Sneddon and who was a close friend and collaborator (of both former UKZN drama professors), has also sent a segment of an interview where Pieter eloquently defines art. James is among Pieter’s St Clem friends who has moved far away but opts to stay on the special Mondays at Six email invitation list and when in Durbs, comes and joins the little Pieter “friends” group that meets weekly at St Clements.
Pieter had been living at Garden Grove, his well-being overseen by his loving niece, Heidi van Rooyan, with a full-time carer and with regular visits from former drama students and other friends. He celebrated his 88th birthday with a brekkie at St Clements, his home from home, and where, until the last six or seven weeks, he was still a regular, if frail, visitor.
The great staff at St Clements took good care of him. Steve Clements was there for Pieter, helped him find and buy his last car (which Pieter gave to a former student when he had to stop driving), gave Pieter a refuge that kept him sane during Covid, took him to Eshowe when Pieter had to finally pack up his dream “tree house” there. (Which came, in retirement, after the house boat in the UK, which was followed by the water tower in France.)
Hopefully, a public memorial for Pieter Scholtz will be arranged at some point at UKZN — ideally at the Sneddon Theatre. James Parker reminds us, “Elizabeth (Sneddon) told me Pieter “designed” the Sneddon Theatre (as in having been consulted on every aspect.) For instance, “his insistence that the area above the stage be of equal size as the stage to accommodate the ‘flies’ and that the wings be roomy enough to allow actors to stand there… the rake of the auditorium” and more.
Keep Ithaka always in your mind.
Arriving there is what
you’re destined for.
But don’t hurry the
journey at all.
Better if it lasts for
years,
so you’re old by the
time you reach the island,
wealthy with all
you’ve gained on the way,
not expecting Ithaka
to make you rich. — from Ithaka by C.P. Cavafy.
Pieter had Ingrid Lotter Smith, artist, teacher,
calligrapher and owner (till some commercial people turned it into an office)
of what was the fabulous Artisan Gallery at the top of Florida Road,
“calligraphy” this poem for him. He had her transpose the poem in English over
the words printed in pale green in Greek. Pieter had this framed in his Eshowe
“dacha” and moved it with him to Garden Grove, where it hung on the wall in his
bedroom. It is a poem that seems to powerfully express Pieter’s life and how he
lived it.
(Ingrid was scheduled to present, on calligraphy, at the August St. Clements Monday. Instead, she will be with us in September.)
When the donation box is passed around, a minimum of R50 per person is suggested.
Weather permitting, the production will be outdoors. Indoors if it rains.
Bookings limited to diners in support of St Clements
restaurant and staff.
Be there in time to order — evening scheduled to start at 18h00
Please cancel if you book then can’t make it.
Table bookings essential: RSVP ST Clements +27 62 582 0980* (aka 062 582 0980)
St Clements is situated at 191 Musgrave Road in Durban. Mondays @ Six run between 18h00 and 19h00. Table bookings are essential on 031 202 2511.
If you wish to dine after the presentation, place your order before 18h00.
Posts
