Shakespeare ZA is excited to share an announcement from The Quickening Theatre Company, which has commenced a new project – the Classical Incubator – to explore fresh and vital interpretations of classical texts for South African audiences.
For the rest of 2024, the focus is on SheShakesHerSpeare: a series of monologue performances by a group of female actors mining Shakespearean text, story and context from a female point of view, and thus re-imagining selected Shakespeare plays.
The Quickening, which launched this year with a production of Duncan Macmillan’s Lungs, is “dedicated to producing local and international contemporary works, and to revitalising Shakespeare and other classical playwrights in productions that resonate with us all and reflect the here and now”. Co-founders Bianca Amato and Kensiwe Tshabalala are “committed to sophisticated storytelling, rigorous investigation of text, and exceptional theatrical execution”.
The SheShakesHerSpeare performances will be posted on The Quickening’s Facebook and Instagram accounts.
Bianca Amato is a critically acclaimed actress and director based in Johannesburg. Amato graduated with distinction from the University of Cape Town Drama School and worked as an actor in South Africa until she moved to New York City in 2002. She spent the next fifteen years honing her craft with renowned practitioners, playwrights and directors Tom Stoppard, Jack O’Brien, Sir Peter Hall, Josie Rourke, Jim Houghton, Joe Dowling, Arin Arbus, Oscar Eustace, Athol Fugard, Maria Aitken and Guilermo Calderon, among many other luminaries. She shared the stage with Bill Irwin, Billy Crudup, Ethan Hawke, Martha Plimpton, David Harbour, Lynn Redgrave, and Miriam Margolies. She worked at some of New York’s most beloved theatres, both On and Off-Broadway, including the Lincoln Center and the Public Theater. Amato is the founder and director of NarrateAfrica, a company that records African and South African audiobooks with African narrators for the global market. She has personally narrated more than 100 audiobooks.
Kensiwe Tshabalala is a performing artist, director, producer and choreographer who has trained and performed in Europe and the US. Tshabalala obtained her Musical Theatre Degree from the Tshwane University of Technology and her Master’s Degree in Acting for Film from the New York Film Academy. She performed on New York’s Off-Broadway stages for three years, followed by another three in Los Angeles where her professional dance career flourished. Her portrayal of Cassandra in Vanya & Sonya & Masha & Spike (directed by Bobby Heaney) garnered her Naledi and Fleur de Cap Award nominations. She has also worked with director Janice Honeyman in the Naledi-nominated Adventures in Pantoland (2022), in the role of Mrs Darling in Peter Pan (2023) and in Hlakanyana, which was awarded eight Naledis. Her television experience includes Orange is the New Black and Generations. Tshabalala also directed and produced Through the Lens, a dance documentary about talented youths competing in international competitions.