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mariocki · 3 years ago

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Play for Today: Victims of Apartheid (BBC, 1978)

"He's scared shitless man, he thinks he's going to be arrested for sitting with white folks. He can't get used to the idea that in this country, there is no colour bar."

"Hahaha!"

"There is no colour bar in this country! There is racialism, but there is no colour bar."

"You got racialism, who needs a colour bar?"

#play for today #Victims of apartheid #Single play #Tom Clarke #Stuart burge #john kani #John matshikiza #Coral atkins #Lionel ngakane #Holly Wilson #Philip barker #Minah bird #Mona Hammond #Peter Jeffrey #Peggy phango #Norma West #Jacqui cook #Oscar James #Cynthia Powell #Sonia Watson #Jamila massey #A brilliant‚ dense‚ thoroughly urgent script; as good as any that passed through the PfT studios; as important today‚ depressingly‚ as it #Was then. Yes‚ on one level‚ this is a direct criticism of apartheid and the crimes committed by that government and the impact on the #Victims; it is also‚ though‚ a biting stab at the institutionalised racism and unconscious bias at large in UK society in general and‚ more #Specifically‚ within anti racist circles: the white liberal paternalism and naval gazing against which Steve Biko had railed (his murder #Was still very fresh when this first aired) and which remains an issue in today's leftwing movements. Writer Clarke deftly skewers the self #Important white saviour narrative‚ or even the well meaning and decent but inherently racist type (Peter Jeffrey's anti apartheid clergyman #Who loves his black brothers but nonetheless fails to remember or correctly pronounce their names). There's anger here‚ of course‚ but also #Empathy and simple grief. The cast (including several actor writers from S. Africa‚ not least the late Matshikiza) are uniformly excellent #But it's Kani‚ in an astonishing performance that runs through a spectrum of emotions‚ who holds it all together like glue. A special thing

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