Westbury, the place of inspiration for creatives
“I had a lot of doors slammed in my face and lost opportunities. I’ve been steadily building myself as an artist and as a brand and person. "
Westbury has many creatives coming out of it, Roystan Le Bon happens to be one of those creatives who are doing big things while trying to uplift others.
“I turned to arts at a young age, to pursue my ambitions of Westbury having its own school of arts. A place where children can go and express themselves,” “I had a troubled past and had some run-ins with the law in my teen years (age 14) but for me, it was the best path I could have taken at the time. It was difficult time in my life and I had to go to prison, I came out at the age of 23 and dived straight into acting. I went to the Victory Sonqoba Theatre under the mentorship of Bongani Linda. We would perform at schools and corporate events. I came up with a lot of well-known actors. It’s a journey of really working from the ground up. I’m still living in Westbury because I feel that it’s the best place to be inspired,” said Le Bon.
Since hitting the music industry in 2006 with his group ‘Black Diamond’ , the group released their CD independently and sold over 10 000 copies. The group also performed at the MTV Hype Music awards and hosted shows for up and coming artists as well as known artists in Melville.
“I had a lot of doors slammed in my face and lost opportunities. I’ve been steadily building myself as an artist and as a brand and person. What I do now is that I’m full-time back into acting, two weeks ago I did a two-man play with a Fatima Abdul in her production.”
“My own productions are yet to come out, I’m foreseeing a movie. The script is already done and I’m in the post-production stage so it’s a movie about Westbury and how I grew up. Its about ambition and how we can pick ourselves up.,” said Le Bon.
The artist is involved in many projects with other up-and-coming artists and believes that everybody has their fifteen minutes of fame, we just have to be patient and wait it out, when its your turn it will come.
“Everything that I wanted to happen, happened, it wasn’t in my time but God’s time,” he added. When asked about prison, Le Bon said: “It was a turning point in my life because I had a lot of time, and I think that a lot of what our teenagers outside here today want to springboard so quickly into adulthood that they’ve never even taken the time to know themselves as individuals that’s why its so easy for the world to swallow them in. They don’t have that rooted sense of I know who I am. Sometimes they make the wrong choices because they are ill-informed.”
Le Bon is also a presenter at the local radio station (Kofifi FM on the Lifestyle Branch show on a Saturday between 9am to 12pm) and is working on launching a Gun Free Campaign, the #gunfreehomedrugfreezone will be a concert.
According to Le Bon, it would be to promote no guns in homes. “I’m hoping that it goes further than Westbury because it is actually shocking to know how many guns are available and to who they are available to,” he said.
Le Bon is hoping to have this concert at the end of the month or the beginning of October. One other thing that the production company is going to focus on is Bullying Workshops at the schools so it will be motivational speaking, a short play, question and answer sessions.
The Production company’s name is Bliss Productions, and Le Bon is one of the stakeholders of the up and coming production company. The artist also has a registered recycling company called ‘Keep it Sharp’. There are so many good things in the pipeline for Le Bon and he is passionate about fulfilling his ambitions.
