The new play opening at the Market Theatre this week, Loving Lulu, shows the theatre’s commitment to new writers.
Written by Noxolo Tshabangu and Bruce Koch, the play was developed as part of the Emerging Writers Programme in association with the DOEN Foundation in Amsterdam.
The Market Theatre’s fundraiser, Penny Morris, raised money for two years from DOEN, and this assisted 25 young emerging writers to gain skills, leading to the development of 12 plays.
The Loving Lulu script was given a series of readings and note ses-sions with literary manager Craig Higginson and artistic director Malcom Purkey. And young writer Tshabangu seemingly took away a lot from the experience.
“I really got to learn a lot about story structure and creating characters that are interesting for the actors to play and for the audience to watch,” she says.
This is her first production and she still can’t believe she can write, but having grown up with the legendary Winston Ntshona as her uncle and mentor, she has always been surrounded by theatre and the culture of telling stories.
Loving Lulu revolves around a love affair involving women from different backgrounds and belief systems, one homosexual and the other not. Tshabangu also plays the title role.
“I co-wrote with Bruce Koch because we’ve known each other for 19 years,” she says.
“The idea for the story started when I heard on Radio 702 that a case of a lesbian woman who had been killed in Gugulethu had been postponed. There was also an article about a lesbian killed in Soweto. As a resolution to what do we do with the frustration, we sat down and wrote.
“We decided to do something that would be there for posterity. The journey for me has been that of self-discovery. I believe one tells stories that they know first.
“So this is close to my heart. I’m a lesbian, but I’ve never come across the violence because I don’t stay in the townships. With the play we want to show that lesbians are like any other people. We are human beings first.”
To balance things emotionally, comedy has been applied to the text.
“We don’t want to lecture people. As the saying goes, ‘many a serious thing is said in jest.’ You can question what you laughed about,” she says.
lLoving Lulu opens at the Market Theatre tonight on May 3.