Theatre Council of Natal

Acronym: TECON. One of a number of arts and culture organizations associated with the Black Consciousness Movement in the 1970s-1980s.

Arguably one of the most important protest theatre movements of the 1970s, it was founded by Roy Jagesar, Smiley Peters, Rad Thambadoo, Srini Moodley, Sam Moodley, Ronnie Govender, Benji Francis, Saths Cooper and other students of the University of Durban-Westville in 1969. (Kruger 1999 says 1970). Tapping into notions of what later became known as Indic Theatre and espoused by Organisations such as the Shah Academy and the Avon Theatre Group, they identified with the essence of the black consciousness movement and gradually shifted from a more literary to a more militant stance and direct efforts at conscientization. The first production was Twelve Angry Men (August 1970) directed by Ben Persad and presented at Bolton Hall. (Kruger 1999 has Osborne’s Look Back in Anger as first production?*). This was followed by In the Heart of Negritude featuring the poetry of Aimé Césaire and Lépold Senghor (1970) and Antigone ’71 (1971) a South African version of Anouilh’s French play, and Black on White (1971). From this time onward TECON became a Black Consciousness organisation open only to members from the Black community. It presented works at the Himalaya Hotel and at the YMCA - Beatrice Street. In 1972 they co-sponsored a festival at the Orient Hall, Durban, to found the South African Black Theatre Union (SABTU). Their production there was W.W.Mackay’s Requiem for Brother X, one they repeated at the second festival in Cape Town in December that year. According to Kruger (1999*?) two of the officers of TECON (Sam Moodley and Saths Cooper) were banned in March 1973 and claims that TECON itself became a banned Organisation and effectively ceased to exist **??. However on 25 September 1974 members of TECON were (once more?) detained on a charge of being members of a subversive organisation and during 1975 and 1976 they produced Govender's The Lahnee's Pleasure, which enjoyed an extensive run and Fugard's Statements. However, after the Soweto riots and during the run of the latter play, TECON was finally brought to its knees by the combination of detentions, confiscation of material, and general harassment of its members.

Sources

Loren Kruger, 1999, (DS)

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