Edgar Hyman

Edgar Maurice Hyman (1870-1936). British-born theatrical manager, cameraman and showman

Biography

Born in London. He worked for a time at the Theatre Royal, Woolwich before traveling to South Africa to join his brother, Aubrey.

He was a stockbroker in Johannesburg and the director of of several gold mining companies.

He died in Johannesburg.

Contribution to SA theatre, film, media and/or performance

Impressario

From 1894, Hyman was the manager of the Empire Theatre of Varieties, Johannesburg (formerly the Globe Theatre). He had leased the theatre with business partner George Alexander. They also leased the Gaiety Theatre in 1894 and acquired Searelle's Theatre Royal in 1895, renaming it Royal Theatre of Varieties.

Film-maker

Carl Hertz gave South Africa's first film shows in May 1896. Greatly impressed by this novelty, in 1897 Hyman acquired a camera from Charles Urban (through his brother Sydney, who acted as his British agent). Hyman was undoubtedly making films by the following year, among which were street scenes in Johannesburg. These included A Rickshaw Ride in Commissioner Street and The Cyanide Plant on the Crown Deep. This would suggest Hyman was South Africa's first film-maker.

In September 1898 he claimed to have filmed President Kruger leaving his house in Pretoria en route to the Raadzaal, though Joseph Rosenthal in an interview stated that this film was his own work. What is certain is that in January 1899 Hyman, together with the Empire's musical director, David Foote, gave a show of this and other films to the President himself and his guests in the Residency, Pretoria, and Kruger was said to be most impressed, especially with the film of himself.

The War

Later that year, with the Boer War about to flare up, Hyman was on his way back to South Africa after one of his periodic visits to London. Arriving in Johannesburg he found the Empire Theatre closing in preparation for the coming hostilities, and was forced to decamp with the company to Cape Town, where he found another hall in which to give shows. Thus Hyman was in the right place to witness the first British and colonial troops arriving in South Africa. In November he filmed Sir Redvers Buller in Cape Town, and over the next couple of months recorded a variety of British and colonial regiments disembarking or marching through the city.

Hyman himself followed the troops to the western front some time in December, he seems then to have joined up with Joseph Rosenthal at the Orange River, and ended up filming the raising of the British flag over Pretoria in June of 1900.

Impressario once again

After the war Hyman continued in the music hall business. In 1903, he opened the Tivoli Theatre of Varieties with Arthur de Jong and ? Logan, and in 1904 was making plans to open a new Empire venue in Durban.

In 1912 formed a new company (Empire Theatres Company) running a chain of theatres and distributing films in South Africa, but the following year this company went into liquidation. It was a sad reverse for the man who had helped bring the cinema to South Africa. The company was bought by I.W. Schlesinger and A.H. Stodel (Harry Stodel) as part of their newly established African Theatres Trust.