Written by Simon Cooper:
And so it begins again. I can’t help wondering if, truly, for me the last day of the Grahamstown Festival is not actually New Year’s Eve, a night to celebrate the good that has punctuated the year before and to gird up one’s loins for the year ahead. But before we get there, there are 11 days of cold mornings and evenings, of amazingly good performance and some rank bad hours spent sat on an uncomfortable seat, of meeting and talking with a lot of talented and inspired people, simply of being part of Grahamstown.
And before we get to this year’s shows, here’s a look at what has been here and is here again and if you haven’t seen it yet, GO SEE IT this year in case it doesn’t come back again next year - there’s James Cairns & Taryn Bennett in “Sie Weiss Alles” at the Drill Hall; and Tara Louise Notcutt’s “Mafeking Road” with Andrew Laubscher & Matt Lewis; and the frenetic Gaetan Schmid in “Body Language”; and the intriguing “……Miskien” with Albert Pretorius & Gideon Lombard; and the “sleeper” of the 2010 Festival, “Hats” with Richard Antrobus & Tristan Jacobs; and [I declare an interest] “London Road” with Robyn Scott & Ntombi Makhutshi.
Seriously people if you haven’t seen any of these, go book a ticket now : come to think of it, even if you have seen them, go again!
The beauty of the whole thing is that there are more out there like those and next year, some performances that we haven’t seen yet will be the MUST SEE shows of 2013. This country has truly amazing theatrical talent and it doesn’t get enough support and recognition, the so-called popular press gives theatre less and less space and the word does not spread.
The Festival information somewhere calls Grahamstown the word-of-mouth capital – it is. So go out, see shows and talk about them wherever you are, in queues, in coffee shops, in restaurants, anywhere, everywhere, tell the people what is good and what is bad, be opinionated – it’s your right. Go forth and be heard.
