This Bosman’s Just Up My Street

Tara Notcutt is a director who, since her well-deserved Fleur du Cap award in 2009, has really been making a splash on the local theatre scene with her signature style of startlingly detail-oriented and often richly visual interpretations. With Mafeking Road – a piece that started life as her young directors’ bursary work of choice – things are no different.

With the aid of the ever-talented duo of Mathew Lewis  (Lenny and the Wasteland) and Andrew Laubscher (Lovborg’s Women, Is it Because I’m Jack?), Notcutt takes us through the best of Bosman’s short stories from the perspective of that most loved of all South African narrators, Oom Schalk Lourens. Lewis and Laubscher seem to be having as much fun as we do, as they take us on a giddy gallop through the Groot Marico’s biggest social goings on. Whether you’re a longstanding fan of Bosman or a new convert, you’re going to love the ride.

Adapting one short story for the stage is a tough ask. Adapting a series, especially a series as intrinsic to the South African Afrikaaner psyche as Bosman’s, is a near-impossibility. Notcutt has taken some bold stylistic choices here that may have traditionalists somewhat taken aback, but which work a theatrical treat. Lewis and Laubscher work as a narrative team, channelling a music hall style of banter that is all the more humorous for its thick local flavour. Taking turns to play the coveted role of Oom Schalk, they keep up a playful, fast-paced energy that ensures the audience are right there with them in every adventure.

I particularly enjoyed the comic book style of narration where, stripped of any props, the pair play out the action using every ingenious application of physical skill possible: hands become characters, minutely playing out the action on the large-scale ‘set’ of an arm or back and sound effects are gleefully introduced at every turn. If it weren’t for the very adult talent on show, the pair would resemble nothing so much as gleefully overgrown schoolboys having a riotous storybook romp in an idle hour before supper. Mafeking Road is a reminder of how good a cracking tale can be…and why you don’t need big budget sets to win over an audience.

Mafeking Road has already toured to rave reviews at the Voorkamer Festival, the Grahamstown festival and, most recently, to the Groot Marico itself, for the Bosman Literary festival. You don’t have to get on your horse to see it this time around – it’s playing at the Intimate Theatre in town until 5 November.  Go on – Oom Schalk is waiting.

Catch the Dating Dis-ease

‘Catch’ is on at the Kalk Bay Theatre. In it, Shirley Kirchmann plays Talulah, a thirty-two year old singleton, with the angst of a Bridget Jones but the mouth of Vinnie Jones.

I laughed a lot. You will, too. It’s the theatrical equivalent of reading the Cosmo dating columns. Somewhat like these columns, though, it’s not offering anything radically new. Internet dating, extra-marital dating, hilarious dating, awkward dating: you name it, it’s thoroughly (to the point of being somewhat over-) exposed.

‘Catch’ certainly doesn’t lack on energy. But does it deliver on style? For me, Talulah and Shirley seem to overlap and meld into one at times, leaving the piece caught between coming across as either overly-rehearsed stand up or under-prepared theatre. A little more directorial distinction between sections and it could have been framed as a witty, fourth wall breaking piece of theatre, or – with Talulah dispensed with – a slick piece of stand up. As it was, it felt slightly schizophrenic to me, rather like a date who can’t decide who she’s going to be for the evening.

Kirchmann is a very authoritative performer – a bit of a powerhouse. She uses that oomph to storm the gates of the single psyche and doesn’t hold back from controversy in the process. Personally, I didn’t mind her potty mouth, but some of the racial stereotypes made me cringe. I think that’s the nature of riding roughshod over dating terrain in this kind of performance – Kirchmann’s out to confront, she’s looking for a reaction. You’re going to react.

Don’t go to ‘Catch’ for nuance. Go for every excruciating date you’ve ever suffered through alone and miserable, thinking ‘this would make a really good bad joke’. Because it does.

Well Played, Well Worn

Planet B is set in a post-apocalyptic South Africa, where Mama Africa, clearly disinterested in playing the hostess with the mostest, makes certain her presence is felt. Water is desperately scarce, weather conditions are extreme, life is every (wo)man for themselves.  In the midst of this, two people find a connection with each other and, in the process, themselves again.

It’s no secret that I’m often sceptical of message theatre. I often find, whilst the heart is there, the art can often be lost in an earnest desire to make ‘meaning’.

There’s no messagey preaching in Planet B, though. In fact, eco issues provide the backdrop, but hardly the heart, of this play. Slowly, though, through careful interactions and cunning narrative, we see how human selfishness begets more suffering. How living eco-consciously can be done on the tightest means. How generosity of spirit can impact a world greater than just one’s own.

Now that’s clever consciousness.

Planet B provides carefully crafted theatre with some beautiful visual elements. The set, for instance, is a magical assemblage of salvaged canvas structures and spare parts. It somehow manages to be both crazy futuristic contraption and cosy homestead, with inventive ‘green’ solutions to all life’s necessities (not sparing the proverbial kitchen sink). Infinitely adaptable, it becomes by turn a life pod, a cave, a makeshift stage and a sailboat, proving that the extraordinary always lies behind the everyday, if we only have the creativity to unlock it.

This Well Worn Theatre production is well worth a look, whether you’re a greenie theatre buff or a regular Joe(anne).

Sirkelpad Stirs the Schools

It’s easy to forget just how magical puppetry can be. As world-weary adults, we know ‘how it’s done’, even as we appreciate the effects produced. So, despite an ingrained mistrust of smaller humans, it actually was a real treat to sit amongst an audience of appreciative schoolchildren during Isangqa / Sirkelpad – a bilingual Afrikaans / isiXhosa tale of small children and big situations.

Sirkelpad follows the tale of two children who are struggling with the concept of death, something that has touched their lives at a very young age. Through dream, memory, imagination and spirit guidance, both come to discover a knowledge and understanding of the world that can heal their lives.

The children loved it. Despite the tale being poetic and possibly slightly complex for a very young audience, it was rewarding to relive the magic of puppet animation by hearing collective gasps when wooden puppets came to life, delighted squeals when they moved mischievously about the stage, even a few sniffles as they were hurt or distressed.

My Afrikaans proficiency is something of a joke amongst friends, but I was perfectly comfortable with this simple yet moving tale. I am, in fact, so glad that Out the Boxfest-ers have the opportunity of seeing a play that is not only in Afrikaans but is also performed with touches of isiXhosa – there are too few productions that allow these languages their stage-space and keeping them in the public performance space allows the possibilities they afford to be reimagined, re-experienced in ways that everyday dialogue cannot hold.

With a beautiful set by Ilka Louw and an interesting text by Amy Jeptha, we’re invited into a world of children’s fears, of absence and dreamscape, of loss and lack of understanding. While not everything about the text worked for me (and I’m very aware this could well be a language barrier issue), the children were captivated by the puppet world and intrigued by the tale that was so proficiently told, particularly by Cindy Mkaza and Sharon Martin.

Take a trip down this path, then. It’s a pretty interesting journey.

The Madam Would Like Your Company

This was my second time around watching Beren Belknap’s Madame Touxflouwe but for Herbert and company that’s nothing. After all, they have to live the same day for all eternity. Fortunately, they make sure the time you’ll spend with them doesn’t feel anywhere near that. In actual fact, despite taking into consideration their undead demeanour and tortured souls, you might find yourself having rather a grand old time.

Johann Vermaak and Brendan Murray are particularly delightful as head butler Henry and the Russian chef Vlad, respectively.  Vermaak is fabulously austere with just a hint of hysteria and Murray’s superb comic timing and accent work make him a chef not to be messed with.

Belknap has really gone to town to present a visual extravaganza in this piece and the care and attention to detail really pay off. Shadow puppetry, animation, inventive prop manipulation, and the small matter of your title character lying in two pieces in a trunk…this piece presents many challenges for the creative cast to face. They’re up to the challenge and give spirited performaces in a work that is a glorious celebration of every gleeful horror spoof you can imagine.

This one’s a dead cert for a great night out. Just make sure the Madame lets you leave in one piece.

Anubis Astounds

If you didn’t see Anubis, you missed out on one of the most breathtaking pieces of visual theatre I’ve seen. Sorry about that.

Berlin-based Uta Gerbert is a one-woman manipulation machine. I could hardly believe my eyes as she floated, almost imperceptible in a black outfit, behind one of the most visually arresting, evocative and complex puppets I’ve seen. I simply couldn’t believe that one person was able to expressively operate a puppet’s head (with moveable jaw constructed from jackal skull), two arm rods and cloak (that, at times, detatched from the puppet and needed animating of its own accord), and do so with a nuance and delicacy unsurpassed in anything I have previously seen at the festival.

And that’s just the technical side of things.

Anubis’ thematic content proved just as rewarding as its visual pull. A reflection on mortality through the movements of a skeletal figure of Anubis, an Egyptian god and judge of the dead, the piece works at you slowly, pulling threads and themes with care until a final, exquisite moment of self-revelation and realisation between the manipulator and puppet brings us full circle between life and death, knowledge and naivety, being and been.

Anubis was astounding. I feel privileged to have experienced it.

Coppen Creates the Perfect Mix

I can’t say enough good things about Marvellous Mixtures.

From the set, which was full farmyard chic, to the quirky and clever script, from the outstanding performances by Brian Hiles and Daisy Spencer to the cunning visual techniques to handle otherwise tricky narrative moments, everything was spot-on.

Although not an absolute copy of George’s Marvellous Medicine, Standard Bank Young Artist Award-winner Neil Coppen’s Marvellous Mixtures captures the spirit of Dahl’s story while still transferring it to a sleepy Karoo setting, providing great potential for some lekker local laughs that weren’t in the original. Crucially, it maintains Dahl’s uncanny ability to be bang on the mark with riotous and intelligent jokes, regardless of age or intellectual capacity. Dahl never condescends and neither does Coppin, with even the most physical of giggle-moments being exquisitely set up and perfectly executed through the infectious enthusiasm of Hiles and Spencer.

This is children’s theatre at its best: effusive, intelligent, participatory fun that kept the gleeful not-so-inner child in me right with them at every turn.  I couldn’t wipe the smile off my face.

Perhaps the best indication of its success, though, was that the kids seemed to love it, too. Quick to participate when asked, eager to offer advice, there was rapt attention for all 55 minutes. Not one child looked bored or distracted.

I caught up with Alice, 11 and Zoey, 6 after they show and they shared their views with me. “I thought it was wonderful,” said Alice with a big grin. “I especially liked how they used everyday things to make the props, like bicycle wheels for the windmill,” she added, perceptively.

And Zoey? “I liked being a part of it,” said Zoey, who, together with her sister, made their stage debut with some important police detecting during a bit of a kerfuffle involving an ouma who was too big for her boots. “It was lots of fun.”

Their mum tells me on the stairs that this is one of the best children’s shows she’s been to, a “cut above the rest.”

Frankly, I agree. In spades.

 

Not Blown Away

So, one man and a bag full of blow up dolls go to dinner. Intrigued? I certainly was.

…which is how I found myself in the audience for Blow, a one man, all-rubber extravaganza starring Renos Spanoudes and a heck of a lot of plastic breasts.

Spanoudes goes out on the proverbial limb with this one, playing various characters, all of them seeking to assuage their loneliness by forging relationships (of various kinds) with plastic sex aids.

A play this risqué could only have gone one of two ways. For me, it went south. And pretty quickly.

The comedy, as befits an Out the Box submission, was very physical. Unfortunately, the timing wasn’t quite there. Gestures that might perhaps, in the hands of a Rob van Vuuren or Mark Sampson, have had great comedic potential came across as awkward or overly-choreographed. Staging techniques like flashes of action stills that should have been effective somehow failed to hit their mark, leaving awkward transitions between set pieces.

To be fair, it is hard to create stage chemistry when your other half’s mouth is stretched into a permanent obscene leer and, to a certain extent, that’s the point. I am quite sure there is meant to be layering and textures to this piece beyond the immediate comic effect – the characters tend to live deeply isolated and lonely lives, highlighting the pathos of their fetish all the more starkly. For me, though, this just wasn’t communicated. The piece was too awkward to be funny and too hysterical to be moving.

Spanoudes was at his best playing a widowed woman uncovering her late husband’s obsession – it was here that I caught glimpses of what the piece could have been. For the most part, though, I felt this one was a little too much hot air.

Tiny Tales of Glittering Things

Bye, Moon is an offering from the Belgian-based Pantalone Theatre Company, presented at this year’s festival through the support of the Flemish Government.  Running at a tiny ten minutes, it’s the perfect length for the attention span of the 3+ age group it’s hoping to attract. When I went this morning, though, there was only one child in the cluster of people attending: a little girl called, appropriately enough, Aluna. Clearly, the work has appeal outside of the children’s demographic.

As we were led up the staircase to the darkened Hiddingh Movement Room, I wondered what Aluna must have made of going to a show with all these intimidatingly large adults. Would the piece work for all of us?

The space was set up beautifully, with cushions and chairs clustered around two projection panels. A violinist, softly lit in the corner, began to play. The work was an animation, both rough and, somehow, beautifully subtle, telling the simple story of a child and his perception of nature, the moon illuminating the world around him wherever he goes.

The images, however, seemed to be a vehicle for the most expressive part of the performance: the sound. The music, composed by Pantalone’s artistic director Philip Bral, was exquisite and the care taken with sound effects – particularly a very realistic croaking frog – was superb. Achieving full surround sound in a bare rehearsal room is no small achievement and the effect was magical.

Personally, I found the animation, however beautiful the individual images often were, did not evoke as rich a scene scape as the soundscape. The story progressed very slowly and I often felt the scenes needed more of narrative interest to keep the experience going and get me to relate to Anton.

But what did Aluna think? Did she like the story of Anton and the moon?

“I didn’t like the little person, but I did like the sparkly things. And the frog,” she told me

Reading between her lines, I reckon we agreed, then.

Bravo, Cardino

After Cardino is Jane Taylor’s literary response to Shakespeare’s famous supposedly lost play, Cardino. It’s also the love story, mystery tale, horror story and comedic tragedy of a seventeenth century woman who was hanged, but comes back to life in spectacular fashion on the autopsy gurney.

It’s also, as you will have gathered, rather complex. But, then, seeing as you’re so quick on the uptake like that, you should go and see it. That’s because all you need to know is that it’s beautiful. Not just because the puppet, Dorotea, is magnificently handled, the mood in UCTs anatomy theatre is historically rich and Themba Stewart’s lighting is wonderfully evocative (which, of course, is all true).  No, it’s also deeply intellectually satisfying, visually intriguing and, at many points, a riotous good time.

There are probably a shade too many layers to this piece. Some dialogue doesn’t always work for me in its translation to from page to stage. But it’s damn clever and a refreshing change to see a very cerebral new work on local stages. Highlights include:

• Marty Kintu’s sensitive manipulation (it’s not easy to have a woman stepping on your toes all the time and still look graceful).
• Jemma Kahn’s acting. I was a fan. Go and see why.
• Jeroen Kranenburg’s marvellous Don Quixote battle with shadow windmills.

But don’t just take my opinion for it. In what will become a regular feature of my reviews, I’d like to turn to my date for their rating of the performance. Today’s date is Marjorie. She’s also happens to be my mother.  Let’s not get into that.