Ph.D. Candidate Joanna Evans
PS Ph.D. candidate, Joanna Ruth, whose research on improvisational performance led them to interview Seth Sibanda and Fana Kekana Seth, two of the creators of Workshop71's Survival. Joanna interviewed Seth and Fana about devising this play in Johannesburg in 1976. Survival draws on their experiences of incarceration in apartheid South Africa, toured the country during the upheaval of the '76 student uprising, and was invited to California in 1977, leading the cast into exile in the US. It was performed in radically different environments, from prisons to off-Broadway theaters, and the play was constantly adapting to duck censorship, incorporate new events in the performers' lives, or respond to changing contexts (including the release of Nelson Mandela in 1990 - which was announced in the middle of a revival run of the show).While there's a surviving script, there's almost no footage, no record of all the changes in the piece, as well as no recordings of the original songs. The other two creators, Salaelo Maredi and Themba Ntinga, are no longer living. This piece was a forerunner in the South African workshop theater tradition, but is sorely under-studied. To address this, Joanna had the idea of re-staging Survival as a public reading, with Seth and Fana playing the roles they had created almost 50 years ago. Amazingly, they agreed, and David Glover and Namisa Mdlalose took up the other two roles, as well as jazz singer Vuyo Sotashe who is bringing the original songs back to life, and Keenan Oliphant who is co-directing alongside Joanna. Joanna says, "It's an amazing opportunity as a scholar to learn about this piece from the inside, and to gather up the contextual details and stories that could only emerge in the rehearsal room. Something about preparing it for performance unlocks Seth and Fana's memories in a different way, and brings the very wacky, experimental form of Survival to life."
