Puppetry of the … what?
If you consider yourself prudish or body-shy, get over your fears by hanging loose at the Puppetry of the Penis in SA this Spring: For over a decade the Cape Town International Comedy Festival has put the Mother City on the world entertainment map with Africa’s largest and funniest comedy festival. This year the Comedy Festival’s Danger Zone will make sure you never look at male genitalia in the same way again, when it presents the global comedy hit Puppetry of the Pen!s. Despite its provocative title, the below-the-belt show is neither rude nor lewd , however it is – by necessity – performed in the nude. The ingenuity, resourcefulness and dexterity of the show’s creators, Simon Morley and David “Friendy” Friend has had audiences gasping with laugher since its extraordinarily successful debut at the 1998 Melbourne International Comedy Festival. With a stretch of the imagination and some other bits, they manipulate their genitals into various “installations”: get an eye-full of the Eiffel Tower, marvel at the slow-emerging molusc and be reasonably repulsed by the hamburger. A camera and a large screen mean that even those at the back of the theatre peeking through their fingers absorb every detail. After being a runaway hit at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival and voted “Outright Best Show”, it ended up touring Australia for eight months. The show was then unleashed at the 2000 Edinburgh International Fringe Festival where West End producer David Johnson realized the potential of the sell-out show and the world was no longer safe from the Art of Genital Origami! Since its West End debut in 2001, the show’s popularity and subsequent growing international demand has meant that the duo has been exposing themselves to a wider, global audience. Puppetry of the Pen!s is one of the most successful, confronting and bizarre theatrical experiences of our time with up to 8 companies running at one time. It has been presented in 7 different languages in over 20 countries. South Africans will join the legions of POTP fans that include celebrities Naomi Campbell, Elton John, Bono, The Beckhams and Hugh Grant, whose member has also enjoyed the spotlight for illicit puppetry of its own! This time around the show will be hosted by one of the UK’s hottest female comedians, Ninia Benjamin. Dubbed “The Comedy Assassin” by the British media, Ninia Benjamin is well-known to many South Africans as one of the hilarious 3 Non-Blondes on BBC Prime. POTP will continue their tour of South Africa after performing at the Cape Town Comedy Festival to include showing Johannesburg audience members, theirs. Puppetry of the Penis Tour dates for South...
What’s your Best Kept Secret?
What’s it all about? A little birdy told us it’s got to do with hot nights and pulsing shaking dance moves… Go and tell them your Best Kept Secret here to stay in the loop and stand a chance of winning some VIP treatment… Let’s hope the music will be as good as the funk on the...
A Soulful event for designers & fashionistas alike
So the question remains, how on earth do we make money from our art? Represent’s resident fashion fundi Vincent Zondo reckons part of the magic formula is a robust PR and marketing plan. He lets us in on a must-attend event (THIS SATURDAY in Jozi) for everyone and their muse working in the fashion and clothing industry, the OldMutual SoulSessions, taking place this weekend in Jozi and then in Durban and PE in the following two weeks. Click here for more info and make sure to pay the very affordable price to get the lowdown on getting your genius out there. Represent! Last year at Fashion Week, in between all things fashionable – I managed to catch Chris Viljoen – ELLE magazine’s Fashion Director to get his view on the shows, designers and collections that we had just seen. The (important) fact I wanted to probe was his opinion on how our local fashion designers faired compared to international designers, particularly on the business side of the trade. Chris represents true international fashion exposure, I mean, thanks to him and ELLE (The bible) we got a glimpse of some of the hot-off-the-ramps trends that graced Paris fashion week, nice! His response highlighted the realities facing South African fashion designers and entrepreneurs alike…how to make a business out of fashion. Now, fashion designers and fashionistas…do Pay attention here: “Our designers have a long way to go when compared to fashion houses like Marc Jacobs, Paul Smith, Gucci or Prada and other independent designers internationally as they operate as mobile brands” said Chris. I concur. I think that the success formula has to include independent designers acquiring a Publicist that goes all out to ensure consistent media exposure, you know, the experienced marketing types with ties strong enough to hook up unique brand opportunities – whether its dressing Halle Berry to the Oscars or Paris Hilton for that hugely publicised VIP event; a continuous efforts is made get the designer’s brands to attain some form of association with that ‘glam space’ of fabulous fashion. Hence I say their approach to fashion and business is far more advanced than ours (which is still in it’s teens?). Also most noticeable about these designers is that they know just how to network, are super business savvy and good at working opportunities that can help them get ahead of the pack. This is FASHION and competition is always cut-throat – the work doesn’t stop when fashion week ends. A step in the right direction – here’s how. Now, as much as we are all aware that we have some catching up to do and the...
Don’t Miss Jazz on the Lake
It’s a yearly Represent ‘favourite must-do mahala event’, Jazz at Zoo Lake, do yourself a favour, pack a picnic basket, grab your friends and go and celebrate Jozi’s 80th birthday this year on Sunday the 7th of September. We’re chuffed the line up is much improved, featuring Simphiwe Dana, Jimmy Dludlu, Don Laka and Zamajobe to name but a few… go on and Represent! (Residents included!) Read all about it at Johannesburg Tourism site here or the awesome Joburg.org site here. See our photostory on our RepresentFlickr site from Jazz at the Lake in 2005 here....
Get ready for the MAMA’s – MTV Africa!
Our dedicated scribe of the moment, Reuben ‘The Matrix’ Malema, attended the MTV press announcement of the ‘MAMA awards’, MTV’s pan-African music awards brought to you by MTV and their sponsor ZAIN (a telecommunications company…). He reckons healthy competition is the way forward to uplift and keep on diversifying and enriching our music scene, we have to admit, we agree! See our photostory at our RepresentFlickr set here. Read all about the event below – the official media release follows. Sharpile RTMM! It’s official, MTV Networks Africa is here! And if all the over-the-top hoo-hah of Tuesday night has any truth to it, then the end for the MTN SAMA Awards is definitely not nigh but rather in a very real way so resoundingly here. The setting of MTV’s “take-over-Africa” spectacle was the Japanese themed Tokyo Sky of Fourways, Johannesburg. Ja, the ambiguity was very clear: the guillotine’s blade has gut-gushingly fallen on the video-jockey controlled entertainment industry in this part of Africa! I have to admit though, with all the fine sushi, on the house liquor en masse (Double Remmie Martin and Lemonade…one more please sir!), the glitz and splendour that was blatantly flaunted, the Network has a lot of credibility and plenty to offer Africa’s musicians in sharp contrast to the MTN SAMA Awards that favours the same few artists all the time and only focuses on SA. Let us not forget the controversy-riddled quagmire of the recent MTN SAMAs which did not help the situation either, in fact if anything – this year’s SAMAs managed to quicken the event’s long awaited coup de grace. Competition is often a healthy thing and in this case it’s long overdue. The Media targeted event (Nou Ek Spog!) had the makings of a typical TRL show on MTV Base. The MC was as chirpy as all the free flowing video mouthpieces on the network’s channels. The program direction was lively with a twist of spring. The audience (le paparazzi!) was very receptive, although at one stage a tad disappointed (we’ll come back to this one…). Mr. Alex Okosi, a Nigerian born, American raised, British groomed and now South African Corporate Executive is the driving force behind MTV Africa’s no-holds-barred takeover bid. His passion and inspiring vibrancy is believable enough to prop-up one’s expectations of the fresh wave of reprieve that has at last beached on our shores. An array of Dj’s and musicians were bopping away, including Cleo, KB, boys from Skwatta Kamp and Brickz. One particular artist caught my attention, the 12 year old In-cha who is an ingenious (lest I be tempted to declare her a maestro) violinist....
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