David Bloomberg

(1932-) Cape Town attorney, liberal politician, anti-apartheid campaigner, and a theatre director. Born in Sea Point, Cape Town and educated at Christian Brothers’ College and the University of Cape Town, David Bloomberg . The son of Abe Bloomberg, a prominent lawyer, socialite and one of Cape Town’s most successful mayors, and Miriam Bloomberg, a former ballerina. He entered his father’s law firm, becoming a well known advocate. he was also a member of the Cape Town City Council for twenty years, became the youngest mayor of Cape Town in 1973 at the age of 41, with a conspicuous interest in the arts and celebrated for his defence of the less privileged members of the Cape community. He married Toby Fine, also a distinguished ballet dancer. In 1987, he moved to England with this wife, and finally settled lived in Lugano, Switzerland, though he remained a frequent visitor to Cape Town. He first came into the public eye however as a theatre producer and director. His father had a big house in Constantia, Cape Town, and in the 1960's David converted an outbuilding into a theatre called The Barn, where he produced and directed a number of significant plays, using top-class South African actors, including Helen Bourne, Leonard Schach, Johann Nell, Yvonne Bryceland, Percy Sieff, Erica Rogers, Cobus Rossouw, and many others. Among the plays he directed over the years were ***, ***. (??) He later went into partnership with Percy Tucker and started presenting tours of international artists and entertainers, calling the business South African Theatrical Enterprises. Together they brought Murray Banks to South Africa in 1960. A perceptive and creative director, he travelled abroad looking for plays, and argued against the move towards the cultural boycott. He was for a while also on the CAPAB board and a theatre columnist for the Cape Times. His autobiography, My Life , was published by Fernwood Press, Simon’s Town, in 2007. Other books include Meet The People (1975), Won’t Forgive… Can’t Forget (2006) and The Chain Gang (2011).