Curtain comes down on the Drama for Life Festival
The Drama for Life Festival program came to an end on September 5 leaving theatre lovers licking their lips and asking for more. The program which started on a high note on August 20 was packed with all sorts of theatrical works ranging from dramas, workshops to dances.
The festival saw beautiful dramas being showcased. These included UBOM’s Swimming Lesson a play that demonstrated the potential to use props to create any set that a theatre maker may dream of. The piece exquisitely creates a beach scene on stage using a big blue sheet and holding pieces of wood. A sad story of a lost chain and a missing child is told in a comic manner making it easy for the audience to follow the events but still empathise with the actors involved.
UBOM’s Risky Business can pass as the most popular play for the festival with standing ovations from the beginning of the festival.
Risky Business artistically dissected the human psyche and how it reacts to issues of HIV testing. The ‘collective psyche’ was analysed and members of the audience were able watch the actors and watch themselves too and see how irresponsible behaviour, fear and lack of knowledge could stop them from going for HIV counselling and testing.
Imbokodo (A Woman’s Strength) makes use of Jersey Grotowski’s concept of poor theatre. This is done by Hupenyu Art Development Project. This type of theatre is called poor theatre because of the simple circumstances in which it takes place. Mbokodo tells the story of the burden that women carry in South Africa and they achieve this with only two actors who use their bodies to create everything that is needed on stage.
The Memory Box is another play that got audiences thinking about the basics again. Dr Fischer and her team of young actors took the audience back to the subject of HIV and AIDS orphans through the story of a family that was killed by HIV and AIDS leaving two young children to fend for themselves.
Ntokozo Madlala had the audiences wiping tears and smiling simultaneous as she and her father turned grief into something that people could talk about. It was a family affair as daughter and father took the audience through their own memories from the time her maternal grandmother passed away.
The story of the grandmother, which takes the better part of the play, is told with such touching nostalgia making memory such a beautiful gift. The sad Zulu song usually sung at funeral wakes known as ‘amagugu alelizwe ayosal’ emathuneni’ (The good things of this world will remain in graves) is changed to read like ‘amagugu alelizwe ayohlal’ enhliziyweni’ (The good memories of this world will be cherished in our hearts). This is a new way of handling grief that allows people to speak joyfully about the departed and look back nostalgically at what they used to do and because the play is performed by father and makes it so much more real.
Drama for Life students also came in with their interactive theatre pieces meant to create dialogue around the subject of HIV and AIDS and its related subjects. The Ahaa! Project is a Drama aide, CCDU and Drama for Life initiative.
Brilliant concepts were also dealt with through workshops conducted by different specialists from all walks of life. Betsi Pendry’s workshop Characters and Conversations; Democracy, Participation & HIV and AIDS explores issues of creating plays collectively and speaking from one perspective.
This is a brilliant concept for those interested in creating living and complex characters that appear as a mirror for communities to see themselves.
Lincoln Theo took participants through exercises that are aimed at healing lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex people living with HIV and AIDS. This is a unique thrust that looks at matters of sexual orientation and HIV and AIDS.
Dr Kennedy Chinyowa and his Acting Against Conflict Team explored conflict from a participatory theatre perspective. The Acting Against Conflict Project being hosted by the Division of Dramatic Arts (WSOA) is one of Wits University’s Carnegie funded institutional culture projects under the auspices of the Transformations Office.
As part of the University’s students-led transformation initiatives, the project aims to develop students’ ability to manage different forms of conflict using the medium of applied drama and theatre. Some of the conflicts being considered include sexual harassment, xenophobia, racial conflict and homophobia.
The drama therapy concept was part of the program with Amanda Gifford taking participants through the elements of drama therapy in a practical environment.
Whenever participants take part in such exercises, one cannot help but wish such spaces were always provided for people to deal with their past experiences as well as their current challenges. In this workshop it was reported that there are currently only are seven drama therapists registered with the department of health.
Playback Theatre became a serious highlight of the festival. The Drama for Life Playback Theatre Company, formed in 2008 applies this innovative form of theatre to address various social issues according to a community’s needs.
Playback Theatre is especially suited to confronting South Africa’s challenging social issues as it has been effectively used in educational, therapeutic and social change settings in order to break down barriers and taboos around topics such as HIV and AIDS, violence and abuse. One of the strongest features of Playback Theatre is that it allows marginalised voices to be heard through storytelling in a space that is modelled on the core values of empathy and community.
Playback Theatre thus becomes a vehicle for reflection of people’s lives as people’s stories are played back to them. In turn people reflect and dialogue with one another and internally with themselves about what they witness during a Playback Theatre performance. Such an experience encourages communities to listen and engage on sensitive issues in a caring non-judgemental environment, modelling essential life values through the magic of Playback Theatre.
The curtain finally came down of the September 5, 2009 and this time events took place in the heat of Soweto, at Ipelegeng Community Centre.
The program began with workshops before the community gathered once again to explore the strengths of playback theatre. The audience was quite excited but when it came to telling their stories.
One got the feeling that more needed to be done in terms of adapting the style to suit this particular community taking their peculiarities into consideration. Issues of language, safe space and culture needed reviewing. It was disappointing that the audience would not speak openly but it must have also come as a source of a desire for further exploration.
The day ended with young boys and girls reciting poems, enacting skits and dancing under the able tutelage of Clinton and Andile from Phakama and two Drama for Life students, Tush and Martha.
This must have made Augusto Boal smile as theatre was given to the Ipelegeng community to use as a weapon against HIV and AIDS. What got exciting as the curtain came down was the excitement that community members showed. The youths could not stop singing and dancing even when a vote of thanks had been said.
Inge James, festival coordinator and her team could only watch and sigh as two long but exciting weeks came to an end.