Penalty Shootout is the third and latest edition of Mike van Graan’s popular, award-winning Bafana Republic one-person, political, comedy revue brand. This time it is young Lungi Pinda who performs under the direction of Mandla Mbothwe.
Projections of Zapiro’s cartoons set the scene for each skit, opening with an estate agent kugel trying to sell Greenpoint stadium after the FIFA World Cup. Others include Madonna hosting celebrity adoptions; a man faking disability giving his take on the political situation; an evangelical preacher soliciting funds from us in order to pay for the soccer event which will bring the new dawn; an over-long spy scandal skit that (somewhat tediously) strings together James Bond film titles; a song “blame apartheid”; a rich, racist white woman with a racist dog struggling to come to grips with transformation at her children’s school; and the top 10 hits as reflecting various public figures. The most satirical sketch targets the African renaissance with a lecture in Dictator 101, and the cleverest is a spoof on South African politics by parodying the most famous lines penned by Shakespeare.
As a performer Pinda is limited to variations on two voices, and his female characters come across more as television stereotypes of over the top gay queens than women. The first Bafana Republic with Lindiwe Matshikiza remains the best performed. The current show is less reactionary and shrill and therefore somewhat funnier than the second instalment.
The problem I have with the Bafana series is that the structure of each skit has become lax. The satirical voice is too muted, because what we get is not quite satire, but almost a string of political jokes imposed on several fuzzily defined South African voices. A better performance would help somewhat.
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Photo: Charley Pollard
As part of his writing residency at the University of Cape Town drama department, Mike van Graan gave a public lecture in which he wondered why we have moved from protest theatre to the theatre of conformity. Are we too confused by our past loyalties and the complexity of our current problems to feel justifiably outraged? In the same lecture, Van Graan singled out Pieter-Dirk Uys as one of the few who had remained true activists, who “aimed his barbs at the current wielders of power as much as he did to the previous government”.
What a welcome boon it is then to have Van Graan following suit and entering the satirical scene. Always the activist, Van Graan finds much to be dissatisfied with and therefore to satirise in the new South Africa. His latest production, Bafana Republic, is inspired by the impending 2010 FIFA World Cup, and its subtext is the question: are we in danger of becoming a banana republic?
Van Graan has composed a dozen sketches. Director Lara Bye has drawn impressive versatility from actress Lindiwe Matshikiza, whose delivery is closer in style to that of John Leguizamo (Mambo Mouth) than Uys. There are fewer visual jokes, but each character has a distinctive and recognisable voice – the coach Raymond Hack, Chardonnay the footballer’s abused wife, and Jorge, Carlos Perreira’s BEE (Brazilian Economic Empowerment) partner who collects the coach’s salary in two large suitcases. The text is dense with puns and the sprightly word play we expect from Van Graan, which makes it worth seeing a second time.
It opens with a proudly South African welcome for the fans arriving in 2010 when Zuma is President and nothing works. Soon we meet Martine van Schalkwyk conducting township tours and the Bhamjee entrepreneurs selling 2010 magic wands that eliminate poverty and crime (no refund). Some portraits are more biting, Pahad (read Essop) suppressing dissent and Kabouter who has a remarkable resemblance to Wouter Basson.
Van Graan, as a columnist, knows how to produce pithy vignettes, the most successful are those that have a dramatic vehicle to deliver them – a roller coaster, Bafana idols, match commentary and a climactic farewell song, a re-lyricised version of De La Rey that goes:
Van der Spuy, Van der Spuy
Sal jy ons hoere kom vry want ons lei Van der Spuy
Ons is kaal kom betaal
Dan mag ons eet nog een maal
Asseblief Van der Spuy
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The innovative Nicholas Ellenbogen returns for the second time to his new pet project – the extraordinary space that used to be the lions’ den at the Old Zoo. Seated on platforms, the audience is separated from the mountain slope enclosure by a deep chasm. Ellenbogen makes good use of this gigantic canvas, hoisting actors up with ropes, dressing them in oversized costumes, and choreographing a great underwater sequence – part of the theatre magic created by design supremo Saul Radomsky.
Set on the Cape’s west coast, a feud between the families of the Grootbooms and the Thembus is healed through a parody on the story of The Little Mermaid. It is a lively combination of pantomime, physical theatre, Disney send-up, and burlesque humour with slapstick moments, in a sort of vaudeville format. The whimsical Godfrey Johnson, proficiently utilising a wide range of recognisable styles – smatterings of Broadway, local folk, pop and cabaret – has composed the musical numbers to lyrics from Ellenbogen.
With Nhlanhla Mavundla in the lead role, Ellenbogen has assembled a cast of respectable talents including Lindiwe Matshikiza, opera singer Bongani Bubu, and musician Roger Lucey. Ivan Abrahams gives one of his best career performances as Methusala.
A past master in the alphabet of theatre craft, Ellenbogen pulls his entertainment off as usual, though the story is not always clear and some of the antics off target. His success is his lack of pretension about his eclectic style, his spirit for fun and critically, the honesty with which he presents his stories.
Dinner is served nightly before the show in the unusual setting of the old lion cages.
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