A freelance arts writer since 1998, I fell in love with the theatre as a toddler, proved rubbish as a ballerina: my starring role was as Mrs Pussy in Noddy as a seven-year-old, and earned my stripes as an academic in Fine Arts and Art History, in subsequent years. I write for a range of online and print publications, including the Sunday Times, the Mail & Guardian and artslink.co.za and was formerly the arts editor of the SA Jewish Report, a weekly newspaper with which I was associated for 16 years. This blog promises you new stories every week, be they reviews, profiles, news stories or features.
REVIEW: RADIO DRAMA ‘KRAG’. WHAT ARE THE protocols of an emergency under lockdown? A little old lady, Elsa Venter (Elize Cawood) fiercely alone in her Linden flat encounters a problem big enough for her to call the emergency services, but is it big enough for them to take […]
TRIBUTE TO GIVEN MKHIZE RESEARCHED BY DANIELLE ROODT. “WHAT YOU SEE is what you get,” were the words accomplished South African actor, choreographer and dancer Given Phumlani Mkhize used to describe himself on social media. This skilled and delightful performer literally left his heart and soul onstage, on […]
FILM REVIEW: A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM. CAN YOU HAVE too much midsummer madness at the same time? It’s an odd decision for arguably two of the biggest of London’s theatres to be live streaming the same play at virtually the same time. Truth be told, if you watch […]
DANCE REVIEW: PEST CONTROL. YOU DO NOT need to know the dirty politics of the arts in contemporary South Africa in order to access the angry new dance missile which Mamela Nyamza launches at this year’s National Arts Festival. You do not need to know the specifics of […]
FILM REVIEW: SMALL ISLAND. A TALE OF hate, love and the indignity of war, Small Island is one of those massive narratives that should enjoy the kind of classic currency of Margaret Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind. With the fabulous Leah Harvey as Hortense, the intense eye to […]
FILM REVIEW: A MIDSUMMER NIGHT’S DREAM AT THE GLOBE THEATRE. A miasmic tale of darkness and tomfoolery, which ramps amateurism up to the skies and has a denouement that sees everyone in the arms of their rightful lover, Shakespeare’s Midsummer Night’s Dream is notorious for its complexity, double- […]
TEASER FOR AFRIKAANS RADIO DRAMA: DIE BLIKSLIM. READY FOR A CRUNCHINGLY good bit of Afrikaans-language radio drama this evening? Well, you need to take up the position, next to the wireless. Under the direction of Renske Jacobs and with the penned words of Martyn le Roux, this week’s […]
DANCE REVIEW: CUT. AS THIS ALMOST 17-minute long video begins, you feel torsion in your gut. The layers of the kind of discomfort one experiences in lockdown are articulated in the impossibly, claustrophobic tight frames and how the dancer is from time to time rudely cut from his […]
TRIBUTE TO TONY BIRD RESEARCHED BY CHELSEA BARTON. THE SINGER/SONG-WRITER WITH the courage to apologise to Africa, who knew how to sing the songs of its landscapes, Tony Bird brought wisdom and activism to local youth before it was fashionable to do so. Considered by British music journalist […]
TRIBUTE TO SIBUSISO KHWINANA, RESEARCHED BY INEKE HURTER. A fresh young artist with a promising career ahead of him, Sibusiso Khwinana was the face of the 2019 South African coming-of-age comedy Matwetwe. He was also the face of immense optimism and hope in arguably one of the toughest […]
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