Director, Performers, and More Announced For The 54th Fleur Du Cap Theatre Awards

The 54th Fleur du Cap Theatre Awards ceremony will be hosted at the Artscape Opera House on Sunday evening, 10 March 2019 celebrating vintage wines and theatre.

For more than 50 years the Fleur du Cap wine brand has been making award-winning wines and this quality is proudly expressed in its association with the Fleur du Cap Theatre Awards.

Mbongeni N. Mtshali, who will direct the ceremony, is a Fulbright scholar currently in doctoral candidacy for a Ph.D in Performance Studies at the Northwestern University in Chicago. He is the founder and creative director of Shortened Tongue Contemporary Art+Lab, an experimental interdisciplinary performance company based in Cape Town and he currently teaches in the Centre for Theatre, Dance and Performance Studies at the University of Cape Town. Mbongeni has collaborated as a researcher, dramaturge, performer, curator, choreographer, and director-scenographer on various projects. He most recently performed in Home/Affair, a solo performance ethnography based on the true life stories of queer African refugees seeking asylum in South Africa. Mbongeni's choreopoetic ensemble work in (s)kin garnered him the prestigious Fleur du Cap Theatre Award for Best New Director in 2016, as well as a Standard Bank Silver Ovation Award at the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown in 2017.

José Dias, Musical Director of the evening, is a regular presence in all major concert halls and arts festivals in South Africa. In recent seasons, international performances have taken him to Portugal, Mozambique, Israel, Switzerland, Belgium and Austria, including extensive tours of the Netherlands and Germany, with repeated appearances in such historic halls as the Berliner Philharmonie, Münchner Philharmonie, Beethovenhalle in Bonn, Baden-Baden Festspielhaus, among many others. José is in high demand as soloist, chamber musician and vocal accompanist. He has been the musical director of Cape Town Opera's internationally acclaimed touring production African Angels, as well as Biblioteek Productions' operatic productions, most recently Poskantoor, La Voix Humaine and The Recycled Magic Flute. Recently he wrote new music and was responsible for the musical direction of Piekniek by Mpande, a modern day reimagining of the seminal Afrikaans protest cabaret Piekniek by Dingaan.

Cape Talk presenter and member of the Fleur du Cap Theatre Awards judging panel, Africa Melane, returns to host the evening with a variety of co-presenters who have been recipients of the Innovation in Theatre and Encore Awards in the past decade.

The performers on the night will include Dr Dizu Plaatjies, Nomfundo Xaluva, José Dias, Sibonele Dance Group, Township Opera Company and Zip Zap Circus.

Winners are chosen from productions performed at professional theatre venues in and around Cape Town. Theatre practitioners are recognised for their acting, directing, staging and technical abilities. Winners receive a medallion and a R15 000 cash prize. Awards are considered in 26 different categories, including awards for Lifetime Achievement and Innovation in Theatre. The recipients of these special awards will be announced at the ceremony.

Tickets for the cocktail function and ceremony are available to the public at R250 per person. Bookings can be made at Computicket on 0861 915 8000, online at www.computicket.com, at any Shoprite Checkers outlet as well as the Artscape Box Office (+27 21 410 9838) and Dial-a-Seat (+27 21 421 7695).