Powerhouse Creative Trio to Ignite Cape Town Fringe with CRAZY IN LOVE

Cape Town is in for a treat when a powerhouse creative trio presents the local premiere of CRAZY IN LOVE at the inaugural Cape Town Fringe Festival this year. Theatre legend Andrew Buckland and multiple-award winning visual theatre innovators, Rob Murray and Liezl de Kock, bring this Standard Bank Ovation Award winner to the Mother City for only six performances. Devised and performed by the inspirational pairing of Buckland and de Kock, the production is directed by Murray, with design by Jayne Batzofin.

CRAZY IN LOVE is the tragicomic story of a father-daughter search for a missing bride and mother.When the independent and free-spirited Leon (Buckland) is abandoned at the altar by his bride to be, he is left literally holding the baby. From his grief comes a solemn resolve: to travel the country with his infant daughter, Ginny (de Kock), until he finds his lost love and their trinity can be reunited. His quest quickly becomes an obsession, and for each town where they fail to find her, he tattoos that town's name on his skin. Fifteen years later, Ginny is coming of age and starting to realise the desire to achieve her own independence, while Leon has retreated into alcoholism and despair, his body a roadmap of tattoos. As their individual obsessions spiral out of control and they become lost in their own personal routines and mythologies, a massive shift in their relationship is imminent - if they have the courage and conviction to break out of their own cycles.

CRAZY IN LOVE is the fourth work created by A Conspiracy of Clowns, an "open-door collective" of professional theatre-makers made up of a flexible number of clowns, directors, designers, physical performers and writers nationwide. Other works it has produced have been the smash hit PICTURES OF YOU (multiple Fleur du Cap winner and top selling 2009 theatre production on the NAF Fringe), KARDIAVALE (the cult cabaret clown noir show created under Jayne Batzofin and first presented on the NAF Arena Programme in 2011) and BENCHMARKS (first presented, in association with FTH:K, on the 2011 NAF Main Programme and then at Out the Box where it won a Handspring Puppet Company Award). A Conspiracy Of Clowns promotes a collaborative approach to creating high concept, high production value and original theatre work with a particular focus on alternative approaches to making theatre in the field of clowning, visual theatre, image theatre, puppetry, and contemporary devised performance.

Performers Buckland and de Kock bring some four decades of stage experience between them to CRAZY IN LOVE.

Buckland has been producing original theatre work of a consistently very high standard and which is clearly seen to be at the forefront of theatre developments in South Africa since 1981. Employing a dynamic and exciting combination of visual comedy, sophisticated political satire, clowning, physical theatre, mime and an explosive performance style, Buckland's work has become synonymous with provocative, entertaining and stimulating theatre both in South Africa and internationally. His original plays have won a total of 20 national and international theatre awards including several for best performance, best script, best production and play of the year. Most recently he appeared in Sylvaine Strike's TOBACCO SMOKE, AND THE HARMFUL EFFECTS THEREOF, which wowed the National Arts Festival and will be at Amsterdam Fringe in 2015

De Kock has cemented herself as a versatile, sought-after and multi award winning performer in South Africa. As co-artistic director of A Conspiracy of Clowns, she has performed in all their works to date -PICTURE OF YOU, KARDIAVALE, BENCHMARKS and now CRAZY IN LOVE - as well as all the deaf and hearing integrated works of FTH:K, being nominated for the Fleur du Cap Best Actress Award for her role as the mother in Rob Murray's WOMB TIDE. De Kock was also mentioned in The SundayTimes as one of the best actresses of 2010 in South Africa. Most recently she scooped a Standard Bank Silver Ovation Award for her solo work PIET SE OPTELGOED, which will also be presented at the Cape Town Fringe this year as well as at the Amsterdam Fringe Festival in 2015.

In directing CRAZY IN LOVE, Murray was able to follow one of his theatre-making obsessions in creating the piece. "I've always been fascinated by deceptively small human stories that tell a much larger archetypal tale," he says. "In many ways CRAZY IN LOVE pays homage to these, as well as existing in its own right, in the telling of a very moving and hilarious tale.The scale of it makes it a form of road-movie theatre."

Also known as "Ugli Bob", Murray has worked with award-winning companies such as FTH:K, Ubom! and is presently co-artistic director of the collective, A Conspiracy of Clowns. He has racked up a number of original, innovative, physical and visual creations and in 2010 was nominated as one of 25 theatre-makers internationally for the prestigious Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative. Currently, Murray is putting in the hard yards towards his PhD, doing groundbreaking work in South African visual theatre, as well as developing a new performance group UyabionaKe? (See What I Mean?).

CRAZY IN LOVE arrives in Cape Town hot off its successful run at the Amsterdam Fringe Festival, where is was hailed by the Fringe Review as a must-see and was given an "Outstanding Show" status, ultimately winning the Best International Production award at the festival. Inspired by an episode in John Irving's UNTIL I FIND YOU, and told using a captivating blend of physical and visual performance, CRAZY IN LOVE is a paean to love and its ensuing madness, as can be seen in this taster of the production:

CRAZY IN LOVE will be performed at City Hall 1 on 25 September at 21h30; 26 September at 16:30;27 September at 20h30; 28 September at 10:30 and 16:30 and on 29 September at 18:30. Tickets cost R80 and R65 (concessions). Bookings for the production, which has a 16+ age restriction, can be made at www.capetownfringe.co.za.

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