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.
Writing vigorous material is not easy. And documenting a life from within a first person perspective can be a pit of snakes: what you might consider utterly fascinating about your own life might not be enough to get your reader to turn one page before soporific murkiness pulls […]
With direct points of homage to the likes of Samuel Beckett, Athol Fugard and Ariel Dorfman, Boykie and Girlie is a fresh new piece of theatre which sparkles with its own beauty, but lacks punch in its denouement. Meet the eponymous characters: he’s a writer waiting for work, […]
Bouncing and bounding onto stage in choreographic sequences — designed by Shelley Adriaanzen — which are satisfying to behold, is a fabulous young cast, telling a tale as old as time itself: The inestimable sadness of being different in a world where your greatest desire is to fit […]
Occasionally, you come across a curated exhibition so attuned to delivering on its promises, your heart sings. Fiona Rankin-Smith with years of curatorial expertise yields an impeccable reflection on migrancy which informs without being didactic, moves without being maudlin and will touch you very deeply. The magic starts […]
Actress Lara Lipschitz (26) has enjoyed stints in local soapie, Isidingo and top musical Jersey Boys, but she’s hungry for more: “I’ve always wanted to make my own show,” she told the SA Jewish Report recently, in speaking of her series of YouTube films, Chin Up. <<A version […]
It’s not everyday that you get the chance to see veteran actor John Kani performing on stage, and the experience of watching this ostensibly vulnerable old man with rapier-like wit and electric timing is precious. The man has a magnetic stage presence; his performance in Missing is simply […]
An ambitious work, which fills the auditorium with a messy residue of many stories that are either unresolved or resolved so without narrative challenge that they fall flat, Hungry is a play lent life support by its design, but it doesn’t hold its own in the storytelling, performative […]
When it comes to shock and horror, religion is a magnificently fruitful reservoir for metaphors ad images, which lend themselves to being fabulously twisted to digress toward sexual and political overtures. Karen von Veh, Professor of Visual Art at the University of Johannesburg clearly had a lot of […]
Think of a solid mix of the myriad hairpin bends in Roald Dahl’s famous unexpected tales, mixed with a touch of Beckettian bizarreness and a perfect sense of surrealism, performed by veteran performers with an empathetic and generous understanding of the universe and many of its quirks and […]
Dudu Yende (pictured) larger than life actress, performer and contemporary dancer, was known and loved for her irreverent manipulation of the English language. A passionate outreach collaborator, a loving mother and a generous friend, recognised as an icon, a diva and a sister to so many, passed away […]
Geoff Sifrin
Robyn Sassen
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