Stage: Callum’s Will – Seabrooke’s theatre, Durban High School
(Running at 7.30 nightly only Saturday, November 1, with final performances at 3pm and 6.30pm on Sunday, November 2)
REVIEW BY BILLY SUTER
GOOD to see this engaging, slice-of-life drama again – a play, presented without an interval, that was one of the earliest written by talented and versatile local theatre personality, Janna Ramos-Violante, and which was first staged 14 years ago.
Janna, who has spent recent years in theatre in Austria and is now also pursuing a career there as an independent film-maker, toured Callum’s Will on the South African arts festival circuit and also saw it enjoy a season in Johannesburg.
The drama was specifically created for Durban actor Darren King, whose versatility has seen him portray many a dilly dame in local panto. Here he is in much more serious mode, and on fine form, in a two-hander that originally teamed him with Clinton Small. He is now performing alongside Johannesburg-based actor Tafara Nyatsanza, whose credits include starring in Netflix’s Blood and Water.
The two are under the unhurried direction of Blessing Xaba – yes, Fatty from the Spud movies, one of the phantoms in Durban’s recent The Rocky Horror Show, and the delicious dame in KickstArt’s Jack and the Beanstalk – who, in collaboration with the cast, has updated the material a bit.
A bearded King plays the Callum of the title: a onetime acclaimed ballet dancer, now confined to a wheelchair following a car accident. He is a man who is lonely, depressed, prone to tearful outbursts and often hits the vodka.
Callum is also fastidious when it comes to punctuality, about which he makes no bones when he first meets Will (Nyatsanza), a cheerful, trendy, colourfully dressed, young Zimbabwean ex-pat who is hired by Callum to run errands for him three times a week. Will arrives five minutes early to their first meeting and Callum is most certainly not amused.
In the months that follow, as the play progresses in the (deftly realised) living room and immediate exterior of Callum’s home, we get to know and understand each of these dramatically contrasting characters better. We get clarity on their disappointments and dreams as, slowly, an unlikely friendship blossoms.
Both actors give confident and affecting performances, although Nyatsanza, who has a good stage presence, is often hard to hear in this intimate theatre, and would greatly benefit from louder projection. This jarring note is exacerbated by the fact that King’s projection is impeccable throughout.
I also find this leisurely production just a little too slow at times and just a little too long… much as I appreciate the engaging process of a lot of the action unfolding in extended sequences without dialogue and with lengthy pauses.
Performances of Callum’s Will are at 7.30 nightly until Saturday, November 1, and final performances are at 3pm and 6.30pm on Sunday, November 2. Tickets cost R150 throughout (R100 for students and pensioners). Book by calling 082 324 1709 or email darrenking@telkomsa.net
.....SoSuterBill..... 