{"id":1320,"date":"2016-07-02T21:44:14","date_gmt":"2016-07-02T19:44:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/?p=1320"},"modified":"2016-07-02T21:44:14","modified_gmt":"2016-07-02T19:44:14","slug":"coat-of-many-colours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/?p=1320","title":{"rendered":"Coat of Many Colours: Bit of a fib"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Coat-of-many-colours\"<\/a>Sweet am-dram dealing lightly with the heavy issues of contemporary shack life acted with feeling and ending happily with a religious message pretty much sums up Coat of Many Colours.<\/p>\n

It played out in the low-ceilinged Glennie Festival Centre (proabably the second-worst fest venue after Dicks) where only the front row could see all the action on the barely-raised stage. Having followed two large groups of primary school kids into the venue, I was right at the back, blocked by pom-pommed beanies but it meant I did get a good earful of the fervent whispers enquiring if the 14-year-old protaganist really was pregnant and all the giggles when the subject of sex education was raised.<\/p>\n

The Dinaledi Dramatic Arts group opted for a literal set coupled with earnest acting by Daniel Mooi, Khanyisile Vilakazi, Nontobeko Mavundla and Palesa Kwena who had the tweens craning their necks to see what was going on.<\/p>\n

Martin Koboekae and Daniel Mooi’s script was a straightforward trajectory that skipped a number of chasms, giving the impression that Coat of Many Colours was created for Grade 7s although it’s not listed under family fare, which would be a more comfortable home.<\/p>\n

Koboekae could benefit from some lessons in directing and a study of Poor Theatre would help sort out a cumbersome set and the use of traditional conventions that do more harm than good in a work such as this. Also, the fact that everything turns out allright in the end felt rather dishonest and I had to stifle an urge to tell the kids they were fed a lie. But that’s their teachers’ job, I hope they do it.<\/p>\n

Coat of Many Colours plays tomorrow, and then again from Wednesday to Saturday. Programme notes and bookings here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

— Steve Kretzmann<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sweet am-dram dealing lightly with the heavy issues of contemporary shack life acted with feeling and ending happily with a religious message pretty much sums up Coat of Many Colours. … Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1321,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mi_skip_tracking":false},"categories":[10,11],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1320"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1320"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1320\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1320"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1320"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thecritter.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1320"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}