Elysium Theatre and Queen's Hall Hexham presents
The Island
by Athol Fugard, John Kani & Winston Ntshona
directed by Jake Murray
performed by Ewen Cummins and Daniel Poyzer
For the third play in Elysium Theatre's Athol Fugard series, a play set on the Robben Island, the place used by the Apartheid South African regime held its political prisoners, Nelson Mandela. Athol Fugard developed this play with two collaborators John Kani & Winston Ntshona, for touring to very basic venues in South Africa, the whites getting all the good theatre. We, of course, had the privilege of working on a grander scale.
I'll admit this was one of the easier sound jobs for me, partly because I could repurpose some sound effects I already had and partly because of some obscure knowledge I have of sound effects in open source computer games - but mostly due to a pretty awesome piece of music created by Tayo Akinbode, who also helped me out a lot with editing of his music on the fly. Also feature the voice of Paul Herzberg as one of the less nice guards.
This is the only Elysium play where my job was basically finished before the first performance. Usually I start off operating the sound myself and do a handover later - this time, however, this happened ahead of schedule, meaning I could just sit back and watch.
Performances
Queen's Hall, Hexham: 15th - 17th 2023 (operated by me)
then 14 other venues until 18th March.