Natal Theatre Workshop Company
Natal Theatre Workshop Company (also referred to simply as the Theatre Workshop Company) was a Durban theatre company.
Founded by Elizabeth Sneddon in 1951 to perform classical and modern works. , later joined by Pieter Scholtz.
Its first theatre, the Theatre Workshop, consisted of converted lecture rooms in the University of Natal’s City Buildings, Warwick Avenue, to perform classical and modern works (including Athol Fugard’s The Blood Knot (1961)). The Natal Theatre Workshop Company’s greatest success, Welcome Msomi’s Umabatha (1970), was presented in the University's Open Air Theatre and London (in 1972). Productions were also presented at the Theatre Royal, Criterion, Durban City Hall and on the University of Natal's Durban campus before the acquisition of City Centre as its home between 1973 and 1981.
Also presented works by i.a. Feydeau, Beckett, Pinter, Pieter-Dirk Uys, Douglas Livingstone and Geraldine Aron (e.g. Along Came a Spider, Hotel Paradiso), by such directors as Pieter Scholtz, Ann Wakefield, Norman Marshall, John Rogers and Ian Steadman. The Company also presented a varied educational programme for schools throughout KwaZulu-Natal, including a version of The Story of an African Farm. They were the first to stage The Sea my Winding Sheet by Douglas Livingstone.**
[McM]
Sources
Sydney Paul Gosher, 1988[JH]
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