'Coming Home' takes on AIDS issue
Athol Fugard's play at Berkeley Rep. also deals with apartheid
Joe Kempkes
Issue date: 2/4/10 Last update: 2/4/10 at 4:42 AM PST
Section: Arts
The Berkeley Repertory Theatre’s current production of “Coming Home,” written by Athol Fugard and directed by Gordon Edelstein, addresses the Republic of South Africa’s battles against apartheid and AIDS.
Just as the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions began to address grievances of decades of racial injustice, AIDS began to claim 1,000 lives a day. In time, nearly six million South Africans became HIV positive.
Fugard’s anti-apartheid perspective began when he was a clerk in the Native Commission Court in Johannesburg.
At his job he saw a first-hand what the policy of apartheid was doing to innocent people.
The South African government required adults to carry passbooks, which ultimately controlled the lives of black South Africans.
Without the proper passbook stamp blacks couldn’t live in certain areas or even live with their own families in some cases.
A white cop could remand a black person to court with a stamp in their passbook without provocation or even suspicion.
“Court” was a one-way trip: You walked in the front door of the courthouse, but when you walked out the back door you were in a prison yard.
Sentences were indeterminate and when you were released you had to leave town (and would be re-arrested if you returned).
Most blacks that went through this processes ended up in shantytowns with no hope of employment, making daily survival difficult.
“Coming Home” is Fugard’s sequel to his “Valley Song” (1995), which embodied the spirit of hope palpable in the immediately post-apartheid South Africa.
In that production, the main character leaves home to pursue her dream of becoming a singer and fulfill the promise of a new life. “Coming Home” sees her return after the shiny horizon loses its luster.
Again she serves as a symbol for the national mood as the optimism of the 1990s fades, and the country, still plagued by racial discord, extreme poverty, and unreliable politicians has become engulfed by the AIDS epidemic.
The acting in “Coming Home” is uniformly engaging and professional but 11-year-old Jaden Malik Wiggins, a sixth-grade student at the Oakland School for the Arts, deserves special mention.
He’s developing a TV show called “The PopLyfe Project” and you can expect to hear a lot from him in the future.
Just as the Truth and Reconciliation Commissions began to address grievances of decades of racial injustice, AIDS began to claim 1,000 lives a day. In time, nearly six million South Africans became HIV positive.
Fugard’s anti-apartheid perspective began when he was a clerk in the Native Commission Court in Johannesburg.
At his job he saw a first-hand what the policy of apartheid was doing to innocent people.
The South African government required adults to carry passbooks, which ultimately controlled the lives of black South Africans.
Without the proper passbook stamp blacks couldn’t live in certain areas or even live with their own families in some cases.
A white cop could remand a black person to court with a stamp in their passbook without provocation or even suspicion.
“Court” was a one-way trip: You walked in the front door of the courthouse, but when you walked out the back door you were in a prison yard.
Sentences were indeterminate and when you were released you had to leave town (and would be re-arrested if you returned).
Most blacks that went through this processes ended up in shantytowns with no hope of employment, making daily survival difficult.
“Coming Home” is Fugard’s sequel to his “Valley Song” (1995), which embodied the spirit of hope palpable in the immediately post-apartheid South Africa.
In that production, the main character leaves home to pursue her dream of becoming a singer and fulfill the promise of a new life. “Coming Home” sees her return after the shiny horizon loses its luster.
Again she serves as a symbol for the national mood as the optimism of the 1990s fades, and the country, still plagued by racial discord, extreme poverty, and unreliable politicians has become engulfed by the AIDS epidemic.
The acting in “Coming Home” is uniformly engaging and professional but 11-year-old Jaden Malik Wiggins, a sixth-grade student at the Oakland School for the Arts, deserves special mention.
He’s developing a TV show called “The PopLyfe Project” and you can expect to hear a lot from him in the future.
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