Theatre not 'just a white thing'

Has the face of the South African theatregoer changed since the days when acclaimed writers and directors, including Athol Fugard, John Kani and Winston Ntshona, took on apartheid?

Or are black people just not interested in plays?

Theatre veteran Dawn Lindberg believes a lot has changed and says revered UK actress Janet Suzman should take off her blinkers.

Suzman controversially said last week that theatre was "a white invention, a European invention and white people go to it. It's in their DNA. It starts with Skakespeare."

Suzman was quoted as saying: "I've just done a South African play. My co-star is a young black man from the slums of Cape Town. Totally brilliant actor. I saw one black face in the room, at the Print Room. I rail against that and say, 'Why don't black people come to see a play about one of the most powerful African states?

"And they don't bloody come. They're not interested. It's not in their culture, that's why. Just as their stuff is not in white culture," she said.

But Lindberg, who runs the annual Naledi Theatre Awards and is a former chairman of Theatre Management of SA, said at the weekend: "I see more than 50 productions a year, and I see the changes. I know what's happening. I think things are becoming very exciting in our industry because people are starting to tell our stories - not only of the past but new stories, which is what I'm interested in."

Lindberg said she had been to many theatres at which the audience had been "80% black".

"I think Janet has lost touch completely with what's going on in her country of birth. She has no idea what's going on in our theatre world."

The Times failed to get hold of Suzman's Solomon and Marion co-star, Khayalethu Anthony.

But John Kani said "hundreds of black people" were "pouring out" of Johannesburg's Market Theatre after watching the final staging of Sizwe Banzi is Dead, which he directs and in which his son, Atandwa, acts.

Lindberg called on the Department of Arts and Culture to increase funding for the performing arts.