Pieter-Dirk Uys keeps the ‘mock’ in ‘democracy’ in his one-man show

It was the early 1990s when Evita Bezuidenhout came onto an SABC radio station for an interview in which she said the National Party government was “the best government money can buy”.

That barb, made more gasp-worthy by being directed against a fearsome security establishment on the state broadcaster, has made another appearance. This time it is used to describe the ANC government in Pieter-Dirk Uys’ new one-man show Sell-by Date at Pieter Toerien’s Montecasino Theatre in Johannesburg until September 10.

While that particular barb may have lost some of its sting thanks to our freedom to say far worse things of our leaders, Uys still brings the political heat to this production.

Sell-by Date is up-to-the-minute political satire. The Brics conference had barely closed when Uys, in character as homeless Capetonian Jimmy, gave it a thorough roasting for the bloc opening its arms to countries guilty of human rights abuses such as Iran, Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Even the security guards on the streets of Sandton came in for a ribbing.

“Who are those people in uniform? They’re so thin,” he said. “It’s probably the Wagner people because they have no boss anymore.”

As we have come to expect, Uys roasts our politicians, calling ANC secretary-general Fikile Mbalula the “transport minister who killed all the trains” and Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma the “doek diva”.

But his real target in this show are arguably the politically correct who take issue with him, a 77-year-old white man, playing characters of a coloured man (Jimmy), and women (Evita Bezuidenhout and Nowell Fine). His aim, he tells us from the stage, is to keep the “mock in democracy and highlight the con in reconciliation”. He is an actor playing characters, he says. Nothing more, nothing less.

He relates how he has been asked why he continues to perform as Tannie Evita, who according to the woke he should not impersonate because he is a man. He responds by saying that she wouldn’t exist if he had not created her. Tongue firmly in cheek, he asks the audience to kindly give a 77-year-old white man permission to play a 77-year-old white man.

In Sell-by Date, Uys deliberately provokes with humour that sails close to the edge. Some jokes, like one about BEE, drew horrified gasps from some younger audience members and roars of laughter from others. It is a fine line to tread and much is at stake, not least a legacy as a moral voice and sharp-eyed social commentator forged over decades which he would not want to see lost by being “cancelled”.

Decades after he debuted characters such as Nowell Fine, Uys gives them a new outing and they have new things to say about the times we in which we now live. Tannie Evita, who he refers to as a “trans tannie”, has a new look and a new wig to replace the Boere bouffant of old.

He also trots out real-life characters from past shows — PW Botha, Jacob Zuma and Archbishop Desmond Tutu — and has the audience guffawing at how well he impersonates them.

Sell-by Date has much to recommend it. Just leave your political sensitivities at the door.

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