A week before the start of the National Arts Festival, an Anglo-Zulu skirmish unfolds on a hill made of pencil cedar. There is bloodshed and death, which appears to ooze down the richly textured slopes, and there the violence recedes — replaced by maids on all fours, their fastidious scrubbing somehow unable to erase the past’s stains from lingering in the air.

The rehearsal space of the Playhouse complex in Durban’s Mayville suburb is a flurry of activity as the rest of the 12-member cast rush through costume changes on the sidelines or scramble to their next mark in writer-director Neil Coppen’s Abnormal Loads.

At the back of the room, his chair leaning against a wall lined with story­boards, Coppen, the 2011 Standard Bank Young Artist for Drama, is still. At times he mouths the actors’ lines — wincing when they stray from the script.

Occasionally, he scribbles notes on to a piece of paper. The young dramatist, who recently turned 30, is meticulous about detail — whether in research or in rehearsals. Read the rest of this entry »

Mary Corrigall chats to Neil Coppen about his new play, a black comedy that deals with history

IF ANY set of events best encapsulates the manner in which South African history is contested, it would have to be the debacle around Andries Botha’s notorious R3 million sculpture of Shaka. Not long after Botha’s likeness of the Zulu warrior king took its position outside Durban’s new airport, it was removed. It was said that King Goodwill Zwelithini and his royal household felt the statue was a poor representation of Shaka. They believed it cast the celebrated Zulu figure as a herd-boy rather than a powerful warrior. In a seemingly absurd gesture, a task team of historians and researchers were formed to investigate its appropriateness, as if it was something that could be quantified and verified.

Playwright Neil Coppen observed the shenanigans with amusement and interest. For almost six years he had been working on a novel centred on the politics and impact of history on the present. The narrative was still fragmented, its essence still embedded within numerous newspaper clippings he had been collecting. The stories were as absurd as they were revelatory of the status quo, such as one where a statue celebrating Read the rest of this entry »

(Pics by Sean Laurenz)

1.) Where did your love for theatre originate, and when did you know that this was what you wanted to do professionally?

It’s a little bit of a cliché, but I really can’t remember wanting to do anything else with my life. I suppose the earliest memory I have is when my mother took me to see Singing in the Rain at the Natal Playhouse when I was six years old. The opera theatre with the stars in its ceiling, the hum of the orchestra tuning up before whole worlds appeared and evolved before my eyes.Particularly memorable for me was the scene where it poured with rain on the stage. I roped several relatives into taking me to see it again and again. I couldn’t understand how they timed the show with this deluge each performance. It was as if they had a hotline to some celestial being who made it rain on cue. I had seen magic before but this took things to a whole new level.So you could say this was the beginning of a very long and involved love affair, with my mother taking me to the theatre regularly. From an early age I was exposed to a wide range of styles including children’s theatre, opera, pantomime, contemporary and classical dance, Shakespeare, Fugard, Slabolesky Ngema musicals etc.At the time we were also family friends with the Ellenbogen Family (when they were living in KZN) and Nick and Liz invited me to sell programs at one of their Theatre for Africa seasons at the Grahamstown festival when I was around nine years old. This was another turning point for me in that I witnessed some of South Africa’s finest theatre makers at work.Out of watching theatre came the need to create and tell my own stories. I would sit for hours writing plays and then building miniature sets using my father’s Jenga blocks and brothers screen printing screens as gauzes.At the same time my passion for literature and cinema was growing and all these mediums began to fuel my future aspirations.

During my schooling career I was fortunate to have teachers who recognized my love for creating new work and who allowed me to stage my own material. By the time I matriculated there was no question of which direction I wanted my life to take.I worked as an actor (even dabbling in a spot of contemporary dance) for several years after leaving school, and decided to hone my interest in story-telling by obtaining a Degree in creative writing through UNISA. I threw myself into many strange and varied experiences during this time: teaching at a theatre summer camp in New York, as a dialect coach and stand- in on film sets, a producer of a large scale musical project, a researcher on a documentary film, a free -lance journalist and travel writer. All these experiences have, in rather unconventional ways, shaped and inspired the work I do as a playwright and theatre-maker.

2.)What does the Standard Bank Young Artist Award mean to you at this stage of your career?

I suppose for me this award offers a significant moment to stop and take a deep breath. It’s a very welcome point for reflection, to look back over my body of work while at the same time preparing myself for a future of new challenges and directions. I’m so grateful that I get to continue doing what I love, crafting stories, worlds and characters while working with inspiring people who care deeply about the same things that I do.On saying this, there are so many of my fellow artists that I feel are deserving of this award and it certainly cranks up the pressure in the sense one doesn’t want to disappoint.

I was glancing over the list of previous winners the other day and my elation suddenly turned to terror. These are all hugely influential people in my life and I keep waiting for someone to phone me up and tell me there has been a terrible mistake.

3.) What inspires you as a person and as an artist?

I am inspired by people, strange pockets of history and places. I draw much inspiration from fellow artists and friends who continually strive for excellence and innovation in their chosen fields. I am inspired by this country and others. I love to travel, to witness how stories are communicated and told from different perspectives and cultures.Most of all I am inspired by visionaries who throughout their careers have forged legacies that never lose immediacy or relevance. Read the rest of this entry »

On a visit to Bronwen Vaughan-Evans studio earlier this year I found her paused in the post-coital catharsis of her last exhibition home is where the heart is. She was sitting alone, in a now desolate studio, free of the imposing portraits and figures that had crowded the studio walls for the past eighteen-months. After so much time spent in their company, the sight of her, abandoned in that that Spartan white space, reminded me of a mother having just sent her grown kids off into the big wide world. Yet I recall how excited I felt at that moment, to catch the artist in that rare moment of solace, poised, catching breathe before commencing with her next journey/body of work which was to become Memento Mori (now on at Bank Gallery).

A handful of Vaughan-Evans’ portraits in home is where the heart is re-emerge in Memento Mori and wandering between the two, both their synergy and difference is striking. The portraits from the former exhibition–contained in separate room within the gallery– are far warmer in tone and temperament, at times intimidating in their scale and presence. Here we find each subject’s essence exquisitely distilled, lovingly etched out: eyes alive with strength, weakness, curiosity, fear, insecurity and fragility.

home is where the heart is (Michael)
2008
Gesso and Oil on Board

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What do a philosophising frog farmer, a ropey plastic surgeon, a fat-cat politician and a professional kidnapper all have in common? You might be forgiven for thinking they are the odd ball line up of characters constituting the cast- list for the next Coen brothers film. These are however all too real people–each of whom plays a crucial role in the sprawling cycle of violence and corruption currently plaguing modern Brazil.

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To the unseasoned classical concert attendee—such as myself—spectating a Symphony concert for the first time can be a pretty intimidating experience. At a Thursday evening concert’ held at the Durban City Hall in February (part of the Kwa-Zulu Natal Philharmonic Orchestra’s (KZNPO) World Symphony Summer Series) I was to learn the hard way—arriving in the somewhat inappropriate attire of slops, jeans and a t-shirt and then proceeding to burst into applause during the performance at the most inopportune moments (after and never between the movements-a disapproving audience member is quick to inform me.) Read the rest of this entry »

On my drive along the N2 up the North Coast to meet acoustic maestro Guy Buttery, I pop his album ‘Songs from the Cane Fields’ into my CD player. It’s a sound that instantly connects me to the unraveling KZN landscapes. Compositions that reflect none of the clamor evident in the long line of property development that ruins the Indian Ocean side view of my widow, but rather let rip when soaring through those wide open Kwa- Zulu Natal expanses. Spaces where Buttery’s finely plucked strings may conspire with the valley’s that roll across my review mirror while transforming lowly crows into inspired notes along fleeting telephone lines.  Read the rest of this entry »