Borderline
Director: Vanessa Harris
Cast: Pierre van Heerden
Venue: The New Kalk Bay Theatre and Restaurant, until August 22
RATING: ***
Although this happy one-hander is essentially a tribute to the music of The Beatles, it is rather more than that: Borderline creates not only a convincing context for celebrating the Fab Four, but also features a credible character who is likeable and gifted with vocal talent.
Whether audience members are of the generation to recall their youthful appreciation of The Beatles’ songs, or simply discovering those infectious rhythms and timeless lyrics for the first time, there is no questioning this show’s breadth of appeal.
Vanessa Harris’s direction has ensured meticulous attention to detail, apparent in the period telephone and transistor radio evocative of the mid-1970s. A back-ground screen alerts the audience to the political environment in which Pierre van Heerden (both the performer and the persona) experiences his rite of passage when serving in the armed forces under apartheid.
A piquant detail is the fact that The Beatles’ music was banned by the South African government because of the group’s assertion that they were more popular than God – yet it is that music which brings the young soldier through the serial traumata of army life.
A strength of Van Heerden’s performance is his versatility when sliding from one character to another: he impersonates the lead’s ponderous, pipe-smoking father, the coarse-grained, squinting Sergeant-Major Bull, and the individualistic army cook with as much authority as that investing his central role: all secondary personae are warm with conviction.
Then there is the singing. Van Heerden’s supple voice is comfortable in every register and equally appealing in high-octane, full-throated rendition and in pianissimo.
One of the most poignant moments of the evening comes with Imagine, following the senseless death of a young fellow rookie in basic training.
This is a far cry from the first, suitably tentative All My Lovin’, intoned by the adolescent Pierre on the eve of his departure for the army.
The succession of Beatles’ hits is varied and representative of the group’s evolution: Let it Be, A Hard Day’s Night, Yesterday, and She Loves You, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah among others, all play their part as accompaniment to the lead’s coming of age as he deals with physical discomfort, death and the treachery of the girl he left behind.
Finally, based in London thanks to his late mother’s British passport, Pierre (sporting a Bohemian coat complete with peace-sign badge) looks back on those army years and belts out Hey, Jude with a gusto undiminished by the preceding strenuous performance.
This is a delightful period piece.