B. Mollan

B. Mollan (fl 1860s) was a Cape Town based playwright and performer.

Contribution to South African theatre, media and performance

He wrote a very successful skit called Governor von Brute, or Things as They Might Have Been (also known as Governor von Brute or Things as They Might Have Been) based on the historical play Governor van Noot, or Things as They Were (also known more succinctly as Governor van Noot or Things as They Were) by C. Utting (1866).

According to William Groom he was also the author of the pantomime Little Jack Horner, or Harlequin A.B.C., though there is some doubt about this. He most probably contributed to a text for "Little Jack Horner" originally devised for the 1857–8 Drury Lane production in London, when the pantomime was produced in Cape Town by Alfred Ray and R.S. Cooper in 1865.

[TH, JH]

Sources

F.C.L. Bosman. 1980. Drama en Toneel in Suid-Afrika, Deel II, 1856-1912. Pretoria: J.L. van Schaik: pp.53, 192-3, 226, 228, 295

P.J. du Toit. 1988. Amateurtoneel in Suid-Afrika. Pretoria: Academica

Jill Fletcher. 1994. The Story of Theatre in South Africa: A Guide to its History from 1780-1930. Cape Town: Vlaeberg.

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