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Speaker 1: It's seven o two more than a radio station. Let's

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Speaker 1: walk the talk, right, you have something you can put

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Speaker 1: in your diary. There are some stories in South Africa

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Speaker 1: that just never lose their power, and Safia Town is

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Speaker 1: one of them. This iconic production. It's back on stage,

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Speaker 1: but this time with the bold, fresh young cast bringing

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Speaker 1: new life to a story that takes us right back

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Speaker 1: to Corfiti, a place that was once buzzing with jazz, politics,

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Speaker 1: culture and the kind of freedom that a party tried

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Speaker 1: to crush. They didn't get it right. If I think

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Speaker 1: back to Safia Town, Hillbrow during those days, they tried

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Speaker 1: so hard, they didn't get it right.

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Speaker 2: Well.

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Speaker 1: Joining us is Malcolm Perky, actor director, playwright to drama

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Speaker 1: lecturer and theater administrator Malcolm High. Good morning, welcome to

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Speaker 1: seven o two.

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Speaker 2: Oh, good morning to you, and thank you so much

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Speaker 2: for having me. How are you?

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Speaker 1: I'm good, Malcolm. I've kind of answered the first question

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Speaker 1: I want to ask you, but I'm gonna ask you anyway.

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Speaker 1: Let's start here. Why do the fire Town still matter

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Speaker 1: today decades after it was first written?

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Speaker 2: Well? It was created in nineteen eighty six by a

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Speaker 2: glorious group of people led by me, and it opened

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Speaker 2: at the Market Theater in February of that year, and

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Speaker 2: it was clear immediately that it was going to be

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Speaker 2: a smashed it. And the reason, I guess is because

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Speaker 2: because it's about a particular destruction of a particular wonderful

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Speaker 2: area by the Africana Nationalists of the day in nineteen

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Speaker 2: fifty early fifties, that's a very big and important story.

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Speaker 2: But it wasn't We couldn't make it work until we

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Speaker 2: found an article about two black.

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Speaker 1: Sure, Malcolm, we Sontalucia a little, I said it, what Malcolm,

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Speaker 1: just to a jump to the left or jump to

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Speaker 1: the right unless you can get that sul phurone saltiedize right.

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Speaker 1: How's that now? You were telling us about the eighties

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Speaker 1: or nineteen eighty six?

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Speaker 2: Take it from there, take it from there in eighty six.

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Speaker 2: I'm sorry, can you hear me?

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Speaker 1: Now? Perfectly go for it, okay.

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Speaker 2: So in nineteen eighty six we made this play and

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Speaker 2: it opened in February of that year at the Market

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Speaker 2: Theater and was care immediately it was going to be

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Speaker 2: a smash hit. And the reason it was a smash

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Speaker 2: hit because it not only dealt with a huge social issue,

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Speaker 2: and political issue, which was the destruction of Spiretown by

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Speaker 2: the Africana Nationalists. But it also told the story of

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Speaker 2: a young Jewish girl who chose to go and live

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Speaker 2: with a family there, based actually on a historic article

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Speaker 2: about two journalists Nata cars and Lewis and Corsi from

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Speaker 2: Drum magazine who invited her in. They put an advert

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Speaker 2: in the Star newspaper and that once we saw that

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Speaker 2: historic moment and the possibility that someone actually went, we

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Speaker 2: had the hook for our story. And the reason it

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Speaker 2: works is because it's about a clash of cultures. It's

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Speaker 2: about you know, a breach of a part eight, It's

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Speaker 2: about about telling each other stories about different lives. That's

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Speaker 2: it certainly did.

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Speaker 1: And like I said in my intro, if you go

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Speaker 1: back to Sapphia Town during those days Hillbrow as well,

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Speaker 1: the culture, the music, the themes that that came out.

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Speaker 1: Do you think we've lost a bit of that now

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Speaker 1: because there is no struggle at the moment. There's there's freedom,

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Speaker 1: which is lovely, but we're not pushing out those themes.

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Speaker 1: Do you do do you see similarities with what we're

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Speaker 1: experiencing today.

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Speaker 2: Well, I can start by saying it's it's playing at

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Speaker 2: the BITS Theater starting on the eleventh of April in

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Speaker 2: its fortieth anniversary. And the reason it's playing is partially

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Speaker 2: because it's a national set work for grade eleven for

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Speaker 2: further additional language, which is a new code for English

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Speaker 2: for most people, and it's it's still works. And the

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Speaker 2: reason it works is because there are big, big themes

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Speaker 2: about about learning to live together and learning to cope

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Speaker 2: with very, very difficult social circumstances. But as the struggle

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Speaker 2: is not over, I mean, we've achieved a huge amount,

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Speaker 2: and no one should ever say we haven't. But if

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Speaker 2: you think about fees must fall and the university struggles

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Speaker 2: at the moment, and the students struggles at the moment,

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Speaker 2: and the struggles for water and the struggles for electricity,

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Speaker 2: we have a profound set of new struggles. But the

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Speaker 2: essentials are the same. How do we find a way

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Speaker 2: to live? How do we find a way to live together?

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's true. A part eight is long gone

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Speaker 1: that it still does exist in racism and things like this.

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Speaker 1: Now the play blends drama with music. I mean, how

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Speaker 1: important is it that that sound and that atmosphere is

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Speaker 1: brought back because I suppose for youngsters. For them they'll go, ohh,

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Speaker 1: this is new, this is amazing. But it's not. It's wonderful.

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Speaker 2: I mean, it is a lesson in our extraordinary history.

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Speaker 2: But obviously theater must be much more than a lesson.

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Speaker 2: And we've thought that while all the plays we made

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Speaker 2: in Junction Avenue were about history and about history from

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Speaker 2: below and about talking back to a Part eight and

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Speaker 2: engaging with the crisis of our country, if we didn't

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Speaker 2: make them compelling, and we didn't make them funny, and

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Speaker 2: we didn't make them theatrical, and we wanted a complex

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Speaker 2: view of the world, and that's what the Sapphire Town

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Speaker 2: is in particular. You know, one of its precursors, Marabi,

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Speaker 2: played at the Market recently to full houses, and that

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Speaker 2: was a play we made in nineteen eighty two. And

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Speaker 2: Morabi was almost like the set of lessons that we

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Speaker 2: needed to learn in order to create Expiretown. The story

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Speaker 2: of destruction, the story of a family, the story of individuals,

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Speaker 2: conflict between tradition and modernity. These are all the themes

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Speaker 2: that still exist. Yeah, everywhere.

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Speaker 1: If audiences walk away remembering just one thing from Sapphire Town,

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Speaker 1: what should it be.

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Speaker 2: That there was a chance of living together across the

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Speaker 2: racial divide in the fifties, which the African nationalists destroyed

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Speaker 2: and they named Sapphiretown Triumph Triumph, which is quite something.

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Speaker 2: You've got to admit, how utterly peculiar of them. Also,

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Speaker 2: if I may say, if you want to cause a

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Speaker 2: revolution in nineteen seventy six, the one way you do

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Speaker 2: it with almost instant energy is you start trying to

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Speaker 2: teach maths and science in Afrikaans to our whole generation.

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Speaker 2: I mean, it was almost as if they internally, in

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Speaker 2: their own political thinking, they had a kind of a

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Speaker 2: death wish. It's so unusual, and South Africa is for

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Speaker 2: me so glorious wonderful because of all its contradiction and complexity.

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Speaker 1: No I like it now the cost am I writing

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Speaker 1: saying the cast is quite.

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Speaker 2: Young and the cast is well. First of all, the

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Speaker 2: production is a state theater production, and it's playing in

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Speaker 2: the theater under Aubrey Sahabi's direction, and of course it

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Speaker 2: has to have we might call age appropriate casting. So

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Speaker 2: the cast is another generation of performers, I mean, my

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Speaker 2: original performers, including Arthur Maleppo and Ramula Macheny and so on.

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Speaker 2: You know not, no, no longer age appropriate. So the

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Speaker 2: company that Aubrey's put together is definitely of the new

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Speaker 2: generation and definitely much younger than my maybe I would do.

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Speaker 2: And he's also added a band, which is wonderful because

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Speaker 2: we originally performed a cappella and he's got a band

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Speaker 2: and the music is fantastically re energized.

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Speaker 1: That sounds of it really does, Malcolm. We'll have to

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Speaker 1: leave it there, Malcolm perky, actor, director, playwright, educator. Welcome,

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Speaker 1: Thank you so much, appreciate you taking the time to

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Speaker 1: chat to us about Safire Time. Now. It's at the

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Speaker 1: Vitz Theater that's University of the Vitvartis runs. There is

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Speaker 1: an age restriction sixteen plus. It's from the eleventh to

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Speaker 1: the twenty fourth of April, then the fifth to the

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Speaker 1: eighth of May. So get on down there and take

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Speaker 1: a look. That's Safia Time. I can guarantee you it's

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Speaker 1: going to be quite an intriguing experience. Seven two podcasts

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Speaker 1: are on seven O two doz