Playwrights shift focus to females on stage

Over the next two weeks, theatre goers will see no fewer than three stage premieres of original plays by Kenyan writers.

Two of them premiered last night. One is John Sibi-Okumu’s brand new script entitled Elements starring the Francophone actress from Guadeloupe, Nathalie Vairac, at Alliance Francaise. The other is Walter Sitati’s episode two of What is your Price? which he wrote especially for his theatre company, Hearts of Art, and is the long-awaited follow-up to the cliff-hanging drama (episode one) which premiered earlier this year at Kenya National Theatre.

When Sibi-Okumu also wrote his play, he was thinking of a woman who bore a striking resemblance to the lovely cosmopolitan actress, Vairac, whom he wanted to give the opportunity to reveal her extraordinary acting skills in Nairobi.

Kenyans have recently been seeing a few remarkable stage, film and television actresses. But rarely have local playwrights composed compelling monologues for one specific actress. That’s what Sibi-Okumu did.

You only have tonight to see Sibi’s new muse on stage in Elements, at least until another venue can be found. The script is in French but English sub-titles will be streaming right above the Alliance stage.

Sitati too has several strong female characters in What is Your Price? at the Kenya National Theatre on Saturday and Sunday. Played by Ellsey Akatch, Beatrice Wacuka and Helen Wanjala, Sitati’s women reveal a wide range of temperaments and types, the implication being that women can be complex characters with the capacity to transcend traditional gender stereotypes.

CLIMAX

Sitati assures me that the climax of What is your Price? will come in episode two, so we won’t have to hold our breaths to find out what ultimately happens to his lead characters, advocates Michael (played by Sitati) and his brother Gerard (Elvis Gatere).

The third playwright is Sitawa Namwalie. His Silence is a Woman premieres next Friday at the Michael Joseph Centre. It had been planned to premiere last month at the Storymoja Hay Festival, but due to the tragic Westgate siege, the show was cancelled.

Sitawa’s script is not a play per se, but a series of her poems, all flowing from the same source and grapple with similar spell-binding themes. Sitawa is on stage with Mumbi Kaigwa and Melvin Alusa as well as with instrumentalist Willie Rama on percussion and Boaz Otieno on the single-string harp, orutu.

Sitawa’s Cut off my Tongue, followed the same poetic structure.

Finally, Fanaka Arts and Friends Ensemble will be staging another farce next weekend at Alliance Francaise, directed by Ellis Otieno. Husband Caught in the Net has an outstanding cast including Sam Psenjen, Wairimu Karuga, Kevin Amwoma, Maggie Karanja and Joe Kinyua. But it sounds like yet another show that makes fun of infidelity and is adapted from a script by an American or British playwright.

Continuing at the Professional Centre is Phoenix Players’ Apples in the Desert, by Israeli playwright Sayvon Liebrecht. It reveals how women are finally breaking free from constraining traditions and expressing themselves as strong, intelligent and courageous human beings.