AFRICAN Hamlet

The African Hamlet premiered at the French Cultural Centre in Blantyre in a performance sponsored by St Andrew’s International High School, and then toured Malawi with support from the British Council. This is the first time a Shakespearean play has been produced using an entirely Malawian cast. The 25 strong company fuse African musical and performance traditions with European techniques and performance styles to create an exciting and involving show. The production uses original music, written and performed by the company and played on traditional drums, pipes and percussion. Songs are used throughout the performance, both on stage and in the background; in Chichewa and Yao they bring the play directly into modern day Malawi. The movie clips here were taken during rehearsal.

The production style incorporates vivid physical movement sequences, always to aid clarity.

The show opens with the coronation and marriage of Claudius, with the entire company joining the celebration with singing, dancing and drumming. Later in the play Ophelia’s death is shown on stage - while she dances and swirls, she is enveloped in streams of heavy blue cloth until finally being carried off as a rag. In the background a haunting song in Chichewa (the local language) can be heard with drumming echoing traditional grieving funeral songs.

Samuel Brown Kuseka as the Ghost

Du’s well-known father had been assassinated as a result of political activity so the casting of Du in the lead role was a political act in itself. Never was the story so obviously relevant or the atmosphere in a theatre more electric – there were government ministers in the audience to whom Chisiza spoke directly in an act of breathtaking political defiance.

celebrating the wedding of Claudius and Gertrude

Hamlet has an extraordinary history in Malawi, and still holds biting relevance in the current socio-economic climate. During one-party rule under Banda, a time when there was no political freedom and many artists were held as political prisoners in Malawi’s notorious jails, a play based on Hamlet was produced starring the young Du Chisiza.

Now a fledgling democracy, the Malawi government is proud to allow artistic freedom although there is still much censorship and the ruling party’s ‘Young Democrats’ can be violent if they consider their leader or their party to be slighted in any way. Which makes it all the more interesting to produce classic theatre with modern political themes. Satisfyingly, the presence of Du’s son, Thlupego Chisiza, in our company brings the story full circle.