Imaginary Stage (formerly Post Punk Productions) is a collaboration between Renos Spanoudes and Anton Krueger. Anton Krueger recently completed a doctorate in post-apartheid playscripts and currently lectures in the Drama department at Rhodes University in South Africa. Over the last ten years, Anton has published a number of plays and both the texts and their performances have been nominated for various awards, including Amfest, Sanata, FNB Vita and the Mondial du Téater. Irineos Nicolaos Spanoudes (Renos) is the son of immigrant Greek Cypriot Parents. He is a teacher, writer, trainer, lecturer, facilitator, actor and presenter. He won a SANCTA award for Best Solo Performer and has received two other Best Actor nominations (in South Africa and Venezuela) for his performance in LIVING IN STRANGE LANDS.

Lynne Maree, a well-known South African actress and theatre director has joined up with Imaginary Stage to direct this latest version of LIVING IN STRANGE LANDS, especially for its performances in Argentina.

"LIVING IN STRANGE LANDS"

In 1966, Dimitri Tsafendas irrevocably altered the course of South African history when he assassinated then prime minister Henrik Verwoerd, the founder and architect of Apartheid. Whether this was an act motivated by madness remains a mystery. This thoroughly researched production presents the possibility that he may have been a sane man living in a strange land. Living in Strange Lands finds Tsafendas in his prison cell soon after his assassination of Prime Minister Henrik Verwoerd. It allows him to tell his own story, from when he grew up in Mozambique to when he joined the Communist party, and, later, of his many travels all over the world and his subsequent fascination with languages. In the course of the narrative, the play explores questions of identity and belonging.

As a counter measure to the brutality of a prison guard whose entrances punctuate Tsafendas' narrative, is the story of when Dimitri fell in love with a “coloured” girl, Helen Daniels. During the course of his life, he had often shuffled between identities – as a child he was classified “coloured”, and then later, as “white”. After he fell in love with Helen Daniels, he tried in vain to get himself re-classified as “coloured” again, so that he could marry her. The refusal of the Department of Home Affairs to re-classify him may have been the final blow which lead him to buy two daggers, walk into the houses of parliament and stab Henrik Verwoerd to death. The play is a docudrama which incorporates archival texts from the life and trial of Tsafendas. A shifting backdrop is also used to project images and texts from his life, as he struggles with the question of what it was which led him to commit this desperate act. A haunting musical soundscape, including prayers of forgiveness by Tibetan Monks from Dharamsala, complete the theatrical experience.

Cast: Renos Nicos Spanoudes and Anton Krueger.
Written by: Anton Krueger.
Directed by: Lynne Maree.
Appropriate for: 13 years and older.
Duration: 70 mins.
Language: English – subtitles in Spanish.

The text of the play was published as Living in Strange Lands: The Testimony of Demitri Tsafendas by Playscripts, New York in 2003.

EXCERPTS FROM THE PRESS::

• “Pick of the Week...mesmerising and illuminating..”
Wilhelm Disbergen, Mail and Guardian

• “This docu-drama doubles as a study in personal and political madness...[it] ring[s] with social and personal truths...harrowing ritualistic imagery and a luminously intelligent text...a dramatic tour de force.”
Adrienne Sichel, The Star (Johannesburg)

• “A remarkable one-man play...Both subtly detailed and effectively impressionistic, the play is a fine piece of writing...this imaginative and intimate portrait of an ill-fated man is the sort of South African theatre of which we can be proud.”
Darryl Accone, Art Rap

• “The writer is careful not to condone the murder, but he does paint a sympathetic portrait of the man as a tragic victim of circumstance; a diseased victim of a diseased society; a gentle introspective man sporting a touch of insanity who, in his own mind, was a lone soldier on a noble, heroic mission... See this exceptional play.”
Christina Kennedy, The Citizen

• “Identity, history, race and class combine with personal tragedy in this compelling one-man show.”
Acemail

• “An affectionate portrayal of Verwoerd's murderer in an insightful testimony of mixed identity…Unexpectedly uplifting.”
Cue, National Arts Festival, Grahamstown

Other selected productions:
• Every year, Every day, I am walking
• Gumbo