969 Festival is back, better and edgier than ever
JOBURG – This year's 969 Festival offers a talent-filled, thrilling line-up at Wits
Wits is packing 21 exciting productions into 12 days, which is set to make up the legendary 969 Festival.
The 969 Festival will run at Wits Theatre, with one site-specific production, from 13 to 24 July and this year it celebrates its 13th anniversary.
The festival, which has been running for more than a decade, is a celebration of the best productions to make their way to the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown – this year taking place just one week prior to the 969 Festival – and so named because there are 969 kilometres between Johannesburg and Grahamstown.
“The 969 tries to bring you the peek of the festival. Now how does someone do that when the festival hasn’t happened? That requires genius,” said Gita Pather, theatre director at Wits University.
Pather went on to explain that the arts community is one that is undying in its support of its fellow actors and hopes that this year this community will be able to bring in people from outside this circle to see what talent and stories the rest of the country has been missing out on. “This year we pledge to get people into the theatre to buy tickets and watch these productions,” she said.
And what exactly is it that you will be missing out on if you don’t buy your tickets today?
bRENT – A Mobile Thriller is a production that can take only three audience members during each show and put them in the back seat of a car and take them through an exciting journey through Johannesburg.
Amsterdam is a production that Pather was quite excited about, as she talked about the festival, and noted that it’s a great time when black women can start to write stories that don’t relate to the struggle once faced in South Africa, but rather tell a story where she gets to ride into the sunset – almost fairy-tale-like.
The Village is produced by a group of five energetic women and gained the favour of the crowd after they performed a short excerpt from the show.
These are just a few of the riveting, thought-provoking, funny and downright entertaining shows that you can see at this year’s 969 Festival. Don’t miss out.
