Eclipsed

“…once it’s decided that a group of people is undesirable and you dehumanise them, then you’re actually entering the terrain of torture” Coralie Trotter

This piece is has been hailed as the new wave of protest theatre to emerge from a post democratic South Africa. It is a research-based production exposing the horrific mental health care “genocide” that became known as the Life Esidimeni Tragedy in 2015 in which thousands of patients were relocated from functioning mental healthcare facilities to unlicensed and corrupted NGO’s. They were transferred to these completely inadequate facilities on the backs of trucks, tied up with sheets and without their medical files accompanying them. 144 patients died of dehydration, starvation and exposure.  The practitioners, politicians and mental health MEC’s who orchestrated this operation have still not been held accountable.

Directed by: Sylvaine Strike

Produced by the Market Theatre Laboratory, devised in collaboration with Gina Shmukler, Phumlani Mndebele and the Market Theatre Laboratory 1st year students 2019

Market Theatre Laboratory 1st year students 2019 

 

Set design: Sylvaine Strike and Andrea van der Kuil

Costume design: Andrea van der Kuil and students

Choreography: Phumlani Mndebele

Text and research: Gina Shmukler and Sylvaine Strike

Reviews

  • But more than just a conveyor of a message, this play encapsulates the eerie muscularity of choral work as it offered a segueing of choreographic wisdom, the sinister reuse of mundane objects such as lever arch files, and a deep understanding of the potency of the names of the dead. All of these elements cohere to give the work a sense of sacredness but also a sense of accountability.

    Robyn Sassen - https://robynsassenmyview.com

  • It is a great rarity for a theatrical work to be able to touch the nub of a complex issue that bruises a society, with potency, conviction and directness

    Robyn Sassen - https://robynsassenmyview.com/2019/11/23/horror-in-the-mouths-of-babes/?fbclid=IwAR3ZkNwwA01QVWtLg9ub3R3B5pLT1BB7zSl8elXfLHO7k19OKp8yJijdl10