Ababhemi!

Ababhemi! is a play conceived by Darlington T. Michaels and Duma Mnembe.

The original text

The play follows a young protagonist who was born in the Free State in socially depressed circumstances. His mother dies when the boy turns six and being fatherless and feeling unloved living with “strict” extended family, he flees and fends for himself. He ends up on the Johannesburg streets, where he joins one of a number of glue-sniffing bands begging on the city streets.

Performance history in South Africa

1988: National Arts Festival Fringe, where it was a runner up for the Amstel Pick of the Fringe award.

1988: Produced at the New Black Sun, Orange Grove, Johannesburg, directed by Darlington Michaels, starring Kholofelo Kola, Peter Mashigo, Lulama Yamani, Ellen Bile. The production also toured Soweto and other townships.

1991: Tilman Hanckel, the cultural counsellor at the German Embassy in South Africa organised a visit by the cast of Ababhemi to the centre for African Culture and Communication in Dusseldorf. The production was performed in community centres and festivals in Germany.

Sources

Review by Adrienne Sichel, The Star, 27 October 1988.

Beeld, 2 November 1988.

Andile Xaba. 2021. 'Collective memory and the construction of a historical narrative, analysis and interpretation of selected Soweto-based community plays (1984–1994)'. Unpublished PhD thesis.

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