Director: Bobby Rodwell
Written by: Nonzi Bogatsu, Dorothy Brislin, Zubeda Dangor, Catherine Mlangeni and Bobby Rodwell
Cast: Charlotte Butler, Nomonde Mbusi, Nandi Nyembe, Leeanda Redy
Venue: Market Theatre, Tuesdays to Saturdays at 8.15pm till May 6
Rating: ***
As you walk into the Laager Theatre, do yourself a favour and read the graffiti on the floor. It will set the mood for this one-act play featuring four women drawn into a conversation in a purgatory-like location.
Each of them talks to and past each other, but their unfolding experiences are sewn into one story in an intimate setting.
Amanda (Charlotte Butler) is the shoo-wow Capetonian, clutching her brightly coloured patchwork bag like a security blanket and wandering around the stage with a Bambi-caught-in-the-headlights stare.
Fikile (Nomonde Mbusi) is the bright young thing who speaks her mind and her thread is the one that sews the other three together.
mamGladys (Nandi Nyembe) is the salt-of- the-earth type while there is more under Zainab's (Leeanda Reddy) doekie than is apparent at first.
While Fikile and mamGladys's stories are told in a fairly straightforward manner, Zainab's story lies in what she doesn't say and Amanda's is the most physical performance.
Each of the women has, at some point, suffered at the hands of a man in her life who abused her in some way, emotionally or physically, and that has, consequently, shaped the way they respond to life.
Mbusi had the sharpest lines and her wit drew the most laughter while Nyembe's performances seemed the least like acting, it was like she was really talking about her life experience.
As an exercise in drawing together four disparate experiences into one cohesive story, the script works. The dialogue flows and Fikile, especially, is unapologetically non-PC, which was refreshing.
But if this play was meant to foster debate around gender and power structures, the mere retelling of events is not enough.
As we left the theatre the three young men preceding me were more fascinated by the use of an original song they'd only ever heard as a club mix and their gleeful discussion of a pick-up line one of the women mentioned as off-putting, left me rather dismayed. As Amanda had asked: "What is the point?"