Fugard Theatre

A 335-seat theatre named in honour of South African playwright Athol Fugard opened in 2010.

The building

A National Heritage Site today, it is located in the historic Sacks Futeran building in Cape Town’s District Six, a former textile and soft goods supplier in the early twentieth century, frequented by generations of District Six seamstresses and tailors. This is owned by and forms part of the District Six Museum's Homecoming Centre and it has incorporated the renovated Congregational Church Hall in Caledon Street as its entrance.

Construction of The Fugard Theatre was underwritten by its founding producer Eric Abraham, and is named in honour of Athol Fugard, South Africa's internationally renowned playwright and director. The architect was Shaun Adendorff of Rennie Scurr Adendorff, and care has been taken to preserve this National Heritage Site. Eric Abraham continues to underwrite the operational costs of the venue.

Management

At the helm was South African born and UK based producer Eric Abraham, who heads up Portobello Pictures, an independent film, television and theatre production company with its head office in London. He became involved with theatre in Spouth Africa again through his collaborations with the Isango Portobello company, along with Mark Dornford-May en Pauline Malefane.

Mannie Manim joined The Fugard team on a full-time basis in January 2010 to work with Georgina Rae (General Manager), Shamila Rahim (theatre manager) and the company in developing The Fugard and the local and international profile of the Isango Portobello Company.

At the end of 2010 the relationship between Abraham and his partners in the Isango Portobello company deteriorated and the theatre manager and company company were evicted. In January 2011 Manim also retired and Daniel Galloway was appointed General Manager.

The new management team of 2015 consists of Eric Abraham (Founding and Executive Producer), Daniel Galloway (Executive Director), Stephen Sacks (Financial Director), Lamees Albertus (Theatre Manager and Associate Producer), Greg Karvellas (General Manager and Associate Producer), Ronel Botha (Financial Manager), Iris Bolton (Front of House Manager), Ingrid Stemmert (Box Office Manager) Benjamin du Plessis (Technical Manager), Roberto Grové (Production Manager), James Cooke (Graphic Designer), Elizabeth Ridgway (Office and Events Assistant) and Juanita van Wyk (Resident Stage Manager).

Productions

Opened 12 February 2010 with Isango Portobello's The Magic Flute – Impempe Yomlingo followed by an opening season of The Mysteries – Yiimimangaliso and a world premiere on March 19 of Athol Fugard’s new play, especially written for the opening, The Train Driver, directed by Athol Fugard. Other productions since include London Road (2010), Broken Glass (2011), The Blue Iris (by Athol Fugard, directed by Janice Honeyman 2012). The Shadow of the Hummingbird (Fugard Theatre, 2014), Cabaret (2015), West Side Story (in ArtsCape, 2015).

South African premiéres of Fugard plays at the Fugard Theatre, include The Train Driver (2010), The Bird Watchers (2011), The Blue Iris (2012) and Die Laaste Karretjiegraf (2013), The Shadow of the Hummingbird (2014) and the World premiéres of the Afrikaans versions of Die Kaptein se Tier (2011) and Playland (2014),

Sources

http://www.thefugard.com/

Mariana Malan, Die Burger, 23 November 2010),

Cape Argus (23 November 2010)

Artslink.co.za <news0115@artslink.co.za>

For more information

See The Fugard website at http://www.thefugard.com/ and the Isango Portobello website at http://www.portobellopictures.com/Isango-Portobello

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