Jason Potgieter

From ESAT
Revision as of 16:54, 8 January 2024 by Darryl (talk | contribs) (→‎As actor and playwright)
(diff) ← Older revision | Latest revision (diff) | Newer revision → (diff)
Jump to navigation Jump to search

Jason Potgieter (1980-2021?). Actor, playwright, director, puppet theatre practitioner, teacher.

Biography

Jason attended Camps Bay High School in Cape Town. In 1998, his last year at school, his aim was to go to Cornerstone Christian College the next year to study theology and psychology and at the same time pursuing acting, and hopefully at the end of it all, combine them.

Jason was diagnosed with leukaemia when he was in grade 9 and was confined to an isolation ward for a long period.

He studied theatre and performance in Cape Town, and trained as a puppeteer with Handspring Puppet Company.

Jason taught puppetry and facilitated object workshops around the world, including at Western Michigan University in 2012, in 2014 (as puppet director for their production of The King Stag), and again in 2017 (as puppet director for their production of Jeremy Thatcher, Dragon Hatcher).

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

He was creative exchange manager/curator of Iqonga/Platform at Out The Box Festival of Puppetry and Visual Performance in 2010.

He was one of the founder members of The Mechanicals Collective. He also performed with Puppetry South Africa and Hearts and Eyes Theatre Collective.

He created several performance installations and public art pieces, including:

As actor and playwright

Acting work includes:

As director

Jason directed:

As puppet theatre practitioner

For Handspring Puppet Company:

He also manipulated puppets for the satirical puppetry series ZA News

Awards

In 1998, he won the floating trophy at the annual Dalro national acting competition, organised by the drama department of the Pretoria Technikon.

Sources

Interview with Bianca Coleman, Cape Argus, 25 August 1998.

Cape Times, 25 November 2004.

Cape Argus, 21 March 2006.

'Let's hear it for more of the same', IOL, 19 August 2008

Cape Times, 4 November 2008.

'Directors and Directing: Playwrights', Symposium programme, 2012 https://humanities.uct.ac.za/sites/default/files/content_migration/humanities_uct_ac_za/1401/files/GIPCA-2012-DIRECTORS-AND-DIRECTING-PROGRAMME.pdf

ThinkFest programme, 2012.

'Time Off for Bad Behaviour', Alexander Bar and Cafe, https://alex.lateforlunch.life/show/TimeOff/

'WMU University Theatre's 'King Stag' a fable made fun by men, beasts, puppets and comedic actors (review)', mlive, 4 April 2014

Intermission Facebook Page, 4 November 2014

'WMU Theatre produces world premiere for family audiences', WMU News, 20 February 2017

Go to ESAT Bibliography

Return to

Return to ESAT Personalities P

Return to South African Theatre Personalities

Return to The ESAT Entries

Return to Main Page