Naledi award winners shine

Mies Julie won three major awards: Best Male Actor in a Leading Role, which was won by Bongile Mantsai; Best Director for Yael Farber; and Best Production of a Play. Jersey Boys, produced by Showtime Management, won Best Production of a Musical, with Grant Almiral winning Best Performance in a Musical, and Bryan Schimmel and Rowan Bakker jointly winning Best Musical Director.

Other big awards went to Vinette Ebrahim for My Name/Naam is Ellen Pakkies, and the Executive Director’s Award was presented to that play’s writer Lizz Meiring for the sterling work she has done in raising awareness about abuse against women with the piece.

Meiring announced that as a direct result of her Naledi nominations, she had obtained funding to make a movie of the play, and said that a percentage of all proceeds from the movie would go to the real Ellen Pakkies, who still resides in Cape Town. Pakkies’s tragic story reverberated around the world after she killed her tik addict son, Adam, in 2007.

Mbongeni Ngema, seen here in his stage drama The Zulu was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award at last night’s Naledi Awards. Picture: Val Adamson.

A Lifetime Achievement Award was presented to Mbongeni Ngema for his vast body of international work, which includes Sarafina! and, more recently, The Zulu, which he wrote and performed.

The panel of judges for the 2013 Awards were: Renos Spanoudes, Welcome Msomi, Peter Feldman, Carolyn Steyn, Dorianne Alexander, Lakin Morgan, Ferosa Marais, Dr Lance Maron, Mandla Motau, Lali Dangazele, Rudi Sadler and Helen Heldenmuth.

Entertainment at this year’s Awards featured stars from nominated shows, such as Bianca le Grange from Blood Brothers; Angela Killian from Sunset Boulevard and Carly Graeme and Bongi Mthombeni with a medley from Starlight Express. Special treats were an item of ballet from the Joburg Ballet, with prima ballerina Burnise Silvius and Jonathan Rodrigues and students from the National School of the Arts performing an item from Sweet Charity.