Suzy Bell On show in Durban
IF there are at least two reasons for deciding not to emigrate to New Zealand, they are Durban actors Bheki Mkhwane and Ellis Pearson. But while us fickle Durbanites flocked to see the Americans (Jim Rose Circus) in their hundreds at the Playhouse Opera last week, this smaller, less hyped, and far more arresting South African duo performed in the same building at the Playhouse Loft.
Pearson, with his rooster-red Mohican tuft, and Mkhwane are masters of mime and musicality. Just close your eyes and you could be in the Umgeni Bird park. Whistles create weavers, flapping wings of black umbrellas create crows, and trumpeter hornbills play jazz. There are beer bottle chimes, the rhythmic rustling of packets, and with a slap of the cheek or a firm fist knock on the head, we have a drum solo.
The rhythm of language swings from Zulu to English, as this slick, highly comic double-bill, Holy Moses! and Squawk!!, bristles with powerful imagery that is as South African as putu or pap.
Its amazing how you can make music out of nothing if youve got rhytmn! gushed a Frenchman during interval. Well, not exactly nothing, but the theatre of your imagination and the energetic gusto of two superb talents, Mkhwane and Pearson.
If only Id brought my kids, whined another grown-up. A young red-head invited up on stage was beaming happily when she became part of the impromptu live band.
Squawk!! is about corruption and bribery, peace, community and co-operation. Its a sharp tale set in the bird kingdom where Pearson is brilliant as a restless chicken, an egotistical peacock and Mkhwane is masterful as an inebriated duck, a wonderfully wise eagle and equally as a brute of an ostrich.
The dialogue is clever and fast-paced no wonder, it was devised by this talented two-some.
The second show, Holy Moses, sees Mkhwane as Moses Mkhize, who is adopted by a Muslim family but steals all the shoes at the mosque and sells them on the street. Disgraced, he runs away and lands up converting himself into a smooth-talking preacher-man. In his prayers to the Almighty, he requests: a jacuzzi to wash away our sins and a colour TV to light our way to heaven
He then tries his luck at being a eholy water healer and talks his way into becoming the minister of water affairs. He preaches to the people of: the dove of peace with the wings of a chicken, while Ellis plays a host of inventive cameo roles.
This highly entertaining, imaginative double-bill is for the entire family, but ends this Sunday (June 28) before Squawk!! deservedly tours the West Coast of America and the Pennsylvania schools.
Holy Moses & Squawk is on at The Playhouse Loft until Sunday June 28. Tickets: R20 at computicket.