HOSS
UBOM! Eastern Cape Drama Company in collaboration with Andrew Buckland presents a wild Eastern Cape adventure story, set to electrify the National Arts Festival.
A rural Eastern Cape village. A derelict trading store. A pit stop for truck drivers, locals, and lost tourists. Meet an eccentric mother, her son with unbridled dreams, and a weathered farmhand who’s seen it all. Family matters bring home the estranged, urbanised brother with his own share of secrets to add to the family stock. Sins, scandal, and untold violent histories threaten to destroy the family from within. With the arrival of the Pale Rider, an avenging angel who roams the Eastern Cape plains, intriguing and unexpected twists set this wild, wild East tale on its tail.
Lead: Mbulelo
Cast: Andrew Buckland, Sparky Xulu, Elisha Mudley, Seneliso Dladla, Luvuyo Yanta, Thami Baba
Betti and the Yeti
Deep in the valleys of far-far away, nestled between snow capped mountains, lies the quiet town of Hills View. Known for their beautiful silver trees, the town’s happy spirit turns nasty when their beautiful birches begin to die. Having no one to blame, the townsfolk decide that the culprit responsible for their fading foliage is non other than the quiet Yeti living in the mountains. Only Betti believes otherwise and together her and her nervous friend Peter set off to save the day.
Betti & the Yeti” is filled with non-stop action, music to make feet tap and sheer rollicking fun. But above all there is at the heart of the play a poignant message.
Lead: Bhubhuza
Cast: Sparky Xulu, Elisha Mudley, Megan Van Wyk, Thami Baba, Seneliso Dladla, Luvuyo Yanta
STDiesel
Rhodes University Dean of Students office and UBOM! Eastern Cape Drama Company proudly present, STDiesel- a raunchy and an exciting production that explores the many facets of the sexual experience, from vulnerability, virginity, promiscuity, love, sexuality, sexual preference and sexual discovery.
Directed by Rhodes University Drama MA student, Jess Harrison, and performed by the UBOM! Drama Company. Sometimes crass, but always honest; the performers reveal a variety of issues, situations and truths. The show doesn’t give any easy answers, but aims to provoke and present the many variables of being involved in sexual experiences as a young person. These choices, along with different attitudes to relationships, drinking and taking drugs are all presented through the journey aboard the STDiesel bus. Enjoy the ride!
Lead: MIchael
Cast: Sparky Xulu, Elisha Mudley, Thami Baba, Luvuyo Yanta, Seneliso Dladla, Megan Van Wyk
ikrismesi Posini
Rob Murray who brings his incredible talents to the creation of iKrismis ePosino - a comic and heart-warming tale of the true spirit of Christmas. The professional Ubom! company of actors, with their inimitable high energy and physical high-jinks, team up with a gifted group of local community Rhini performers . This dynamic collaboration of talented performers bring to you the moving but delightfully funny story of a small postal community which is forced to work together in the face of seemingly insurmountable odds!
The suspense is almost unbearable – where are the children’s letters to Santa? Will the postal workers put their differences aside and come up with a plan? Are the Christmas lights ever going to sparkle again? Is it finally the end of Christmas as we know it? Join us at iKrismis ePosino to help us save the day!
Lead: Mam Gigi
Through Blue
Inspired by Master Misery, a short story by Truman Capote, Through Blue is part love story, part fantasy, and part gritty reality. A tragicomic tale of broken dreams and lost hope that poses the question:
how long can you survive before selling your dreams?
An alcoholic tramp battling to take responsibility for his life. A newly-married young couple on the brink of the rest of their lives. An activist seeking change in an increasingly violent system. Two henchmen struggling for power in the upholding of that system. A young woman moving to the city to find love, adventure, romance, and her future.
These characters and their narratives collide in a world caught somewhere between past and present, in a visual and clowning tour de force.
Devised by the cast under the direction of Rob Murray
Supporting Role: Husband
The Dogs Must Be Crazy
Under the direction of award- winning Rob Murray, Ubom! Eastern Cape Drama Company recently returned from the Western Cape Schools Festival where they received standing ovations for their satirical romp, “The Dogs Must Be Crazy”. Based on an original concept by Mike van Graan, “The Dogs Must Be Crazy” takes a look at some of the pressing concerns of our age, with hilarious and heart-aching results. Dogs digs up many of our absurdities with an irreverent, energetic, and demandingly physical glee. Bristling with black humour, the production will run at the Rhodes Main Theatre, 12 April, to launch the Reza de Wet Drama Bursary as well as raising funds for the tour the Harare International Festival of the Arts (Zimbabwe) in May.
Lead: Stray Dog
Eco-Wolf and the 3 Pigs
Your favourite “theatre warriors”, Ubom! Eastern Cape Drama Company have just the perfect treat for your little ones, and for your whole family in May. “Eco- Wolf and The Three Pigs” will fill you with cheer and warmth this winter. You just can’t afford to miss it!
Under the direction of multi- award winning Rob Murray, the new cast and crew of the well-established Ubom! Company is well underway to deliver another bumper year of high quality theatrical and educational products. The artists have recently returned from the Western Cape Schools Festival where they received standing ovations for their satirical romp, “The Dogs Must Be Crazy”.
To complement the latter production and build on last year’s fantastic success of “The Land of The Cranes”, Ubom! presents the “noisy, good stomping fun” (CUE: 2007) production, “Eco- Wolf and the The Three Pigs”.
In a delicious twist of the well- known fairy tale, based on the book by Laurence Anholt, Eco- Wolf is forced to save his beautiful valley from the three unscrupulous Pigs who threaten to ruin it forever with their pollution and corruption. This slick, funny and illuminating piece foregrounds the problematic interactions between humans and the environment and is a perfect treat for all from five to ninety five years old! It also promotes an environmental awareness of pollution, recycling, and saving natural resources!
Lead role: Mega Dad
HUSH
Award- winning UBOM! Eastern Cape Drama Company presents HUSH, an electrifying and provocative unearthing of different ideas, attitudes and prejudices concerning HIV and AIDS in a distinctly South African context.Hush is a highly controversial play dealing with stigmas of all labels. No person having seen this work has left the performance feeling unmoved. Bitingly satirical and at times - sickeningly honest, the audience is confronted with a raw look at our contradictory South African reality today. Topics that are overlooked in polite conversation are thrown up in the air and left to smash open upon the stage. Neither patronising nor didactic, Hush instead is surprising, fast-paced and extremely funny offering a high intensity roller-coaster ride of dialogue, song and dance which pulsates with the rhythm of South African youth. Hush is hard-hitting and sure to fire up everyone that witnesses it. Watch at your own risk!
Leads: Dumi, James
JOMBA
The University of KwaZulu-Natal’s arts gateway to Africa and the world, the Centre for Creative Arts, is proud to be presenting its 15th annual JOMBA! Contemporary Dance Experience. JOMBA! fiercely holds onto its status as one of the few remaining dedicates spaces in South Africa where dance and choreography remain nurtured and supported. The festival’s vision continues to be to offer world class dance theatre that challenges audiences out of passive lethargic viewership; asking that we come to the myriad festival offerings (performances, workshops and classes) with the intention to be shocked, surprised, entertained and above all, to celebrate a critical art form.
On the local front, JOMBA! is very proud to be hosting the 2013 Standard Bank Young Artist award winner for dance, Fana Tshabalala. His new work, INDUMBA, premiered at the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown to critical acclaim. Tshabalala’s dance work is poetic encounter with African ritual and contemporary sensibility.
Dancer: 2010
Choreographer: 2011
The Hamlet Machine
