This month Pieter-Dirk Uys takes his Aids education mission to a higher level Marianne Merten Who will ever forget the biting satire of Pieter-Dirk Uys’s PW Botha and his wagging finger that elicited laughter during the harshest apartheid years? Or Evita Bezuidenhout, the glamorous ambassador to Bapetikosweti, who turned homeland politics upside down. And the personal transition of white liberal Nowell Fine into Comrade Madam as the rainbow nation unfolded? Now Uys is tackling another topic that’s hot on everyone’s lips – HIV/Aids. His new show, For Fact’s Sake, is a volatile cocktail of laughter, in-your-face attitude and a mix of different characters, including a first-time appearance by President Thabo Mbeki, aka the Surgeon with a liking for Shakespeare. But is HIV/Aids an issue to laugh at? Yes, according to Uys, because laughter helps people overcome their fears. Once the bogeyman is out of the closet, there is a little less angst and more understanding. “In the old South Africa we laughed at the fear of politics that could kill. Sex is the new arena of death. There’s no time for confusion. First of all, it will kill. Second of all, it’s only sex. “For Fact’s Sake is not about statistics. It is a satirical look at the facts, fictions, taboos and urban legends around HIV/Aids, sex and condoms – all set to tickle, well, whatever is your fancy. After all everyone’s doing it, one way or the other, even if they pretend they’re not! “People will be entertained. What you get is what you get. There will be flexing of your (laughing) muscles. There is a certain mount of shock, affront and lots of laughter. Women and men laughing together.” (Un)Fortunately it seems politicians have had a humor-bypass. The angry words, enlarged egos and dogma are ample material for any comedian. And for Uys, who has been looking for an interpretation of Mbeki for some time, the president’s “HIV is from Venus, Aids is from Mars” attitude has been a blessing in disguise. The inspiration for For Fact’s Sake comes from Uys’s school tour, which followed hot on the heels of his pre-1999 voter education tour across South Africa in a borrowed minibus. Eighteen schools and 10000 pupils later he obviously struck a note at the highest level when even Minister of Health Manto Tshabalala-Msimang got to hear about it and recently decided to quietly, minus the bodyguards, drop in at one school recently.
Spotting her among the pupils the inimitable Uys simply said: “Everyone’s here from grade one to grade 12 and the Minister of Health and nobody knows anything” before explaining the basics of safe sex and Aids. His no-holds barred approach includes demonstrations of how to put on a condom properly – first on a banana and then a plastic penis, because “a condom on a banana on the bedside table is not going to protect you!” With advice spiked with humour – “Boys go and practise with your condoms so that you know what you’re doing in the dark, otherwise you might end up by putting the condom on your big toe” and “Girls keep condoms with you because the boys will forget” – Uys has brought education and laughter to what is for many South Africans still a “sies” topic. “I was told about the birds and the bees. For years I didn’t understand how the bee can fuck the bird,” laughs Uys. The bottom line is simple: no sex is the safest sex. But this simply is pie in the sky in this day and age. So bring out the funny underbelly of condoms and street smarts!
“The first virus was apartheid and that lasted for 40 years. Then we found a cure: democracy. Now we have Aids. We must just hope we are still around when they find a cure,” says Uys. For Fact’s Sake runs at the Baxter Theatre, Cape Town, for seven performances from October 31 to November 3. For more information Tel: (021) 6857880