No CrossRef data available.
Article contents
Performing Protest and Protesting Performance: The International Circuits of Touring Political Theatre
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 March 2021
Abstract
From 1980 to 1981, the Baxter Theatre of Cape Town, South Africa, produced a multi-racial Waiting for Godot that garnered vastly different reactions in the various cities to which it toured. With a cast led by John Kani and Winston Ntshona, icons of anti-apartheid theatre, it was sometimes hailed as a scathing anti-apartheid polemic, sometimes admired for its ‘universality’, and in one case denounced and shut down by anti-apartheid activists as a piece of pro-apartheid propaganda. Based on both archival research and interviews, this essay investigates the artists’ intentions and the public's reception in order to illuminate how the international theatrical circuits dovetailed with international activist circuits, sometimes supporting one another, and occasionally tripping each other up.
- Type
- Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © International Federation for Theatre Research 2021
Footnotes
I am tremendously grateful to all of the theatre-makers and activists who consented to be interviewed for this research. These include John Kani, Winston Ntshona, Soli Philander, John Slemon, Anthony Robinson and Mankekolo Mahlangu. I also want to thank my two research assistants – Abigail Schrader (who was my student at Reed College, Portland, Oregon, during the first leg of work on this project) and Jhelisa Carroll (who was my student at the University of Toronto) – for their assistance with transcribing these interviews. Finally, I want to acknowledge and thank the Baxter Theatre, who generously opened up their archives to me.
References
NOTES
2 For more on the Belarus Free Theatre, and how well-intentioned progressives and activists have inadvertently narrowed the range of material that the company feels that they are welcome to perform, see Kompelmakher, Margarita, The Human Rights Performative: The Belarus Free Theater on the Global Stage (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Digital Conservancy, 2017)Google Scholar. For more on the ways that the Belarus Free Theatre educates international audiences about political oppression in Belarus, see Snyder-Young, Dani, Theatre of Good Intentions (London: Palgrave, 2013), pp. 81–94CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
3 For more on Exhibit B as an anti-racist and anti-colonialist performance, on the intentions of its creators, and on its impact on audiences, see Lewis, Megan, ‘Until You See the Whites of Their Eyes: Brett Bailey's Exhibit B and the Consequences of Staging the Colonial Gaze’, Theatre History Studies, 37 (2019), pp. 115–43CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For more on the protestors of Exhibit B in London, see McGuinness, Caoimhe Mader, ‘Protesting Exhibit B in London: Reconfiguring Antagonism as the Claiming of Theatrical Space’, Contemporary Theatre Review 26, 2 (2016), pp. 211–26CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
4 For more on the Lincoln Center production of To the End of the Land, and the controversy of accepting Israeli government funding for that production, see Jake Offenhartz, ‘Artists Call on Lincoln Center to Dump Israeli Government-Backed Play’, Gothamist, 6 July 2017, at https://gothamist.com/arts-entertainment/artists-call-on-lincoln-center-to-dump-israeli-government-backed-play, accessed 25 February 2021. For the letter of protest signed by Annie Baker, Caryl Churchill, Lynn Nottage and other prominent theatre-makers, see ‘Letter Calling on Lincoln Center to Cancel Israeli Government's “Brand Israel” Theater Performances’, Adalah, NY: Campaign for the Boycott of Israel, 1 July 2017, at https://adalahny.org/web-action/1473/letter-calling-lincoln-center-cancel-israeli-governments-brand-israel-theater, accessed 25 February 2021. For more on how individual artist-citizens made difficult decisions about their own potential involvement in this boycott, see M. J. Kaufman, ‘Why Boycott a Play’, Howlround, 31 July 2017.
5 David Michael Ettlin, ‘Tactics of Baxter Protestors Assailed’, Baltimore Sun, 19 June, 1981, p. B6.
6 ‘Three Weeks on Stage: Here's the Schedule’, Baltimore Sun, 7 June, 1981, p. N1.
7 Author's interview with Soli Philander, 22 May 2017.
8 Mark Swift, ‘Fine Acting in a Superb “Godot”’, The Argus, 22 February 1980. Jill Fletcher, ‘Remarkable Production of “Godot” at Baxter’, Cape Times, 22 February 1980, p. 6.
9 ‘1980 Theatre Award Nominations’, Cape Times, 3 February 1981, p. 6. Many thanks to the Baxter Theatre for the access they provided to their archival materials, which I have cited both here and throughout this article.
10 Swift, ‘Fine Acting in a Superb “Godot”’. Fletcher, ‘Remarkable Production of “Godot” at Baxter’.
11 Peter Fourie, ‘Howarth's “Godot” Is an Aesthetic Affront’, Cape Times, 8 March 1980, p. 6.
12 Donald Howarth, ‘I Do Not Agree’, Cape Times, 14 March 1980. Stanley Levensteen, ‘“Godot” was great stage experience’, Cape Times, 14 March 1980. John Slemon, ‘Beckett Was Consulted’, Cape Times, 14 March 1980.
13 Levensteen, ‘“Godot” was Great Stage Experience’.
14 Slemon, ‘Beckett Was Consulted’.
15 ‘Live Theatre Entertainment’, Rand Daily Mail, 23 July 1980.
16 Author's interview with Soli Philander, 22 May 2017.
17 Oswald Mtshali, ‘“Godot” Tragicomedy Is Relevant to Our Times’, The Star, 4 August 1980.
18 Barrie Hough, ‘An Excellent Godot’, Beeld, 24 July 1980.
19 John Michell, ‘A Play of Hope Amid the Gloom’, Rand Daily Mail, 24 July 1980.
20 Author's interview with John Kani, 25 May 2017.
21 Ibid.
22 Author's interview with Winston Ntshona, 26 May 2017.
23 Mel Gussow, ‘Theater: South Africans in “Godot” at Long Wharf’, New York Times, 5 December, 1980.
24 Jack Kroll, ‘“Godot” in the Veldt’, Newsweek, 15 December 1980.
25 Review of Waiting for Godot, The Stage, 12 February 1981.
26 Milton Shulman, ‘Taking a Coloured View’, New Standard, 19 February 1981.
27 Author's interview with John Kani, 25 May 2017.
28 Ida Peters, ‘Showtime: Baxter Theatre Cancelled – Alternative Fest Successful Continues This Weekend’, Baltimore Afro-American, 20 June 1981.
29 This list of coalition partners is drawn from an article in the Baltimore Sun. David Michael Ettlin, ‘Tactics of Baxter Protestors Assailed’, Baltimore Sun, 19 June 1981. However, the coalition leaders explained to me in an interview that the main organizing entity was the Bethel AME (African Methodist Episcopal) Church, which they described as a five-thousand-member church in Baltimore that was heavily involved with social-justice activism. Anthony Robinson, the coalition leader, was asked by the pastor to found and lead a branch of the Henry McNeil Turner Society, a pan-African activist organization, within the church. Robinson led this protest in his capacity as the leader of the Turner Society, with the broader support of the church. He and Mankekolo Mahlangu, who led the protest with him, established coalitional relationships with the other organizations on this list, including Morgan State University (especially theatre professor Samuel Hay), the NAACP and several labour unions. Author's interview with Anthony Robinson and Mankekolo Mahlangu, 13 March 2019.
30 Ettlin, ‘Tactics of Baxter Protestors Assailed’.
31 Ibid. ‘Baxter Cancelled as Actors Stay Out’, Baltimore Sun, 18 June 1981.
32 Loren Kruger, ‘Apartheid on Display: South Africa Performs for New York’, Diaspora, 1, 2 (1991), pp. 191–208, here p. 201.
33 Frantz Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth (New York: Grove, 1968), p. 239; Kruger, ‘Apartheid on Display’, p. 193.
34 Kruger, ‘Apartheid on Display’, p. 191.
35 Jack Tinker, ‘Seeing This Classic Play in a New Light’, Daily Mail, 19 February 1981.
36 Michael Billington, ‘Waiting for Godot’, The Guardian, 19 February 1981; Swift, ‘Fine Acting in a Superb “Godot”’.
37 Author's interview with John Slemon, 23 May 2017.
38 John Engstrom, ‘These Cries for Help’, The Observer, 15 February 1981.
39 Christopher Balme, The Theatrical Public Sphere (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014), p. 46.
40 Ibid., pp. 188, 200.
41 Ibid., p. 202.
42 Engstrom, ‘These Cries for Help’.
43 Irving Wardle, ‘Waiting for Godot’, The Times, 19 February 1981, p. 8.
44 Balme, The Theatrical Public Sphere, p. 201.
45 Culverson, Donald, Contesting Apartheid (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1999), p. 100Google Scholar.
46 Ibid, pp. 112–13.
47 Irving Wardle, ‘Waiting for Godot’, The Times, 19 February 1981, p. 8.
48 Author's interview with John Kani, 25 May 2017.
49 Ibid.
50 Ettlin, ‘Tactics of Baxter Protestors Assailed’.
51 Culverson, Contesting Apartheid, p. 101.
52 Chong, Dennis, Collective Action and the Civil Rights Movement (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1991), p. 74CrossRefGoogle Scholar, as quoted in Culverson, Contesting Apartheid, p. 100.
53 Megan Rosenfeld, ‘Baltimore Festival Flap’, Washington Post, 17 June 1981.
54 ‘South African Troupe Cancels Its Performance’, The Telegraph and Associated Press, 19 June 1981. ‘Baltimore Protest Halts Drama by South Africans’, New York Times, 18 June 1981, p. C14. ‘South African Troupe Cancels Baltimore Performance’, Washington Post, 18 June 1981.
55 ‘The Killing of “Godot”’, Baltimore Sun, 18 June 1981.
56 James M. Abraham, ‘Boycott Victory: Black Actors Bow Out of Festival’, Baltimore Afro-American, 20 June 1981, p. 1, p. 29.
57 ‘Black Troupe Cancels Drama’, Star News and Associated Press, 18 June 1981.
58 Author's interview with Anthony Robinson and Mankekolo Mahlangu, 13 March 2019.
59 Culverson, Contesting Apartheid, p. 108.
60 ‘Boycott Victory’, Baltimore Afro-American, 20 June 1981, p. 4.
61 Author's interview with Anthony Robinson and Mankekolo Mahlangu, 13 March 2019.
62 ‘Stars of “Godot” to Boycott Baltimore’, Baltimore Sun, 16 June 1981, pp. C1, C5.
63 Author's interview with John Kani, 25 May 2017.
64 Ibid.
65 Author's interview with Anthony Robinson and Mankekolo Mahlangu, 13 March 2019.
66 ‘Stars of “Godot” to Boycott Baltimore’.
67 Author's interview with Anthony Robinson and Mankekolo Mahlangu, 13 March 2019.
68 Ibid.