Review: Kafka’s Ape, Alexander Bar until June 22, after that at National Arts Festival in Makhanda, formerly known as Grahamstown
Adapted and directed by Phala O. Phala; original design by Liesel N. Retief
Performed by Tony Bonani Miyambo
If Tony Miyambo’s performance in Kafka’s Ape wasn’t so riveting the goings on on-stage would quickly have faded into a sideshow to the fireworks set off in my head.
I felt like I was transfixed, yet somehow I was also engaged in an intense Q and A with myself throughout. The show set off a quickfire interrogation of myself (“Did you really think that?”, “Oh no, don’t go there”, etc). Very confronting indeed.
Billed as “a performance about a primate’s struggle to overcome the confines of captivity”, this play is about the cruelty, beastliness even, of humans.
Miyambo’s extraordinary ape-like antics and sounds are both convincing and confusing. Through his eyes we get a disturbing look at that most primitive and barbaric of creatures, mankind. We can almost see the soul of the ape; man, on the other hand, is a drunkard and a fool.
Watching a black man discussing being captured and enslaved is so close to home and it’s downright confronting. Man versus beast is a proxy for that other great battle, man versus man, in this adaptation of Franz Kafka’s ‘A Report To An Academy’.
First my heart was cracked open, then my head. If Kafka’s Ape is hard to watch, performing it must require a pair that are made of steel.
I left wondering: Are we just the product of our lives, experiences and surroundings, or do we indeed have our own beautiful, independent souls?
Kafka’s Ape is on until June 22 at the Alexander Bar, which has a special place in the hearts of Capetonians with a love for independent theatre. Even on a blustery Tuesday night in winter Alex delivered with an interesting cast of theatregoers watching sensational independent theatre.
When it comes to quick fixes, William Kentridge’s multi-panel digital video More Sweetly, Play The Dance is the hit of hits. It will bring me back as long as it is here (the plaque says it is on loan from the artist and the Goodman Gallery). Like a hit of something forbidden, the thrill of watching this particular tragi-comedy of pure South African-ness thrills almost as soon as it is delivered: half pleasure, half pain; half pride, half shame.
We were alerted to the wine pairing in the café at the top of the gallery by a little, almost matter of fact mention in the members’ newsletter. An amazing deal, R250 for a three-course meal, each course paired with a glass of wine. All of this in that delicious space with its glorious geodesic windows that protrude from the building in a visual representation of the former grain silos full-to-busting with grain.
Consider this extravaganza of a starter: scorched seabass, truffle crumbles, lemon-infused crème fraiche, pickled ginger puree, beetroot and baby leaves. And so it continued, a delicious journey through flavours and sensations. I have to be honest, though, the extra special ingredient on the day was our server, Richard.
No one was more surprised than me when the delicious main course played second fiddle to the vino, the Shiraz Mourvèdre Viognier 2015, even though the sous vide sirloin with caramelised pear croquettes (a revelation), the sweetest red pepper puree and the finest of green beans was a total knockout.
That surely must be the climax, I thought, but then the dessert, aah the dessert: strawberry and cream vanilla cake, wild strawberry moose, honey and vanilla parfait, black basil crumbs and strawberry compote.
I am just back from my first visit to Nude Foods, the grocery store we have all been waiting for! I do mean all of us. Cape Town’s new plastic-free grocer is heaven for hipsters, for sure, with its hemp seeds, healthy hair products and earth-friendly body and home products, and a veritable lezzer nirvana with all those non-GMO pulses and legumes and natural fibre face clothes.
But even if you are a totally unreformed meat-eating, booze-guzzling, SUV-driving capitalist you will probably like the raw understated style of the green-green grocer with its exposed brickwork and sexy container-ing of extra virgin olive oil, balsamic and friends.
After being offered a glass straw at the Alexander Bar last week I was delighted to see bamboo straws at Nude.
How I wished I didn’t have to read the surtitles in Moedertaal. Whenever I listened to the Afrikaans words spoken by Sandra Prinsloo I understood snatches of a beautiful, lyrical Afrikaans that cannot be translated. When I heard the Afrikaans and saw the translations in English I wanted to shout out: “That is not what she said; it is definitely not what he meant!”
Their story is three-quarters familiar, populated and coloured in by many versions and vignettes of our white South African stereotypes. The rest of it we watch from a distance, sometimes amused, often horrified. This quarter is the deeply personal, unique happiness and pain that can never be shared, the private journey between two people in love, touched occasionally by a third: a parent, another lover or, most importantly, a child.
Gangsters and their molls, bootleggers, poets and playwrights, flappers and assorted dandies … just another night at your favourite tavern in town, you might think, but Cape Town’s monthly swing nights, which are launching on 1 September at the Reserve at the Taj, promise a whole lot more.
These Prohibition era nights (sans Prohibition of course) will bring a little Speakeasy-style decadence to Cape Town’s kinda sleepy city centre.
Cheers to Sarajevo, which is showing at the Alexander Bar until Saturday July 8, is one of those universal stories about people who are not supposed to fall in love. This story about a love affair between a Serbian man and a Bosnian woman during the captured and corrupt times of the Yugoslavian war feels very relevant and personal.
Cape Town foodies will be interested to hear the news that the chef and owner of Bistrot Bizerca, Laurent Deslandes, will be joining the team at HQ, another Mother City favourite, as group executive chef.
HQ said in a statement on Thursday that Deslandes’ “passion for cuisine” had already been experienced on HQ’s tapas menu and at signature monthly events such as Fine Wining and Raise the Steaks. Thursday’s statement signalled the start of a deeper association after Bizerca stopped trading at the end of March.
In addition to being a milestone and validation for Yoco, the company’s chief executive officer and co-founder, Katlego Maphai, pictured, said that being able to attract top-tier foreign VC investors was a “vote of confidence in South Africa’s growing fintech and startup ecosystem”.
“There is a massive opportunity to expand access to, and the quality of, financial services through the digitisation of SME payments and payments data in Africa, where cash still predominates in many economies,” said Engel, pictured, of Quona Capital, which manages the $141 million Accion Frontier Inclusion Fund, the first global fintech fund for the under-served.
Yoco co-founder, Carl Wazen, pictured, said the funding had been earmarked to expand the footprint and services offered by the fast-growing fintech company that currently processes more than R1 billion in transactions per year.
Although, Velocity’s Luchsinger, pictured, said “we know that Sub-Saharan Africa is different from the rest of the continent”.
