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Interviews
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The Play "I'm proudest of having written" Philip Fisher talks to Athol Fugard about his life in theatre and his play Exits and Entrances, which is having its UK premiere at the 2007 Edinbugh Fringe. Athol Fugard may have been working in the theatre for over half a century but his love of the medium shines through as he talks about Exits and Entrances, his 2005 play that is about to enjoy its British premiere at The Assembly Rooms in Edinburgh. The production coming to Scotland is the one that has proved so successful at both the Fountain Theatre in Los Angeles and off-Broadway in a production by Primary Stages at 59E59. This "memoir written as accurately as I could about an old man of the theatre meeting a young aspirant playwright entering it" celebrates theatre and those who make their life in it. It goes back to the days when Athol Fugard was a fledgling playwright in the mid-1950s. As he explains "it investigates my relationship as a member of an acting company and as a dresser to a wonderful old Afrikaans actor called André Huguenet, a grand actor in the old tradition" who was at one time known as the Olivier of South Africa. Their first meeting took place in 1954 when Fugard was 22 and Huguenet, some three decades his senior, was playing Oedipus in Sophocles' Oedipus Rex. The kind old actor "took me under his wing and talked about theatre as my first guide and mentor". The two-hander then advances three years to a time when Fugard was writing his watershed play Blood Knot and Huguenet was starring in The Prisoner by Bridget Boland, playing a role made famous on both stage and screen by Alec Guinness. "We sat backstage into the wee hours of the morning and had one of our best and most important arguments". Tragically, a few months after that meeting, Huguenet took his own life. He had been struggling for some time in a state that was far from tolerant of somebody who was gay, even a great star. Fugard is certainly enthusiastic about Exits and Entrances. Despite a long and glittering career as a writer, he says that "this might be the play I would single out as the one I'm proudest of having written". He goes on to describe the L.A./Edinburgh production as one about which "I am inordinately proud". The playwright's love for this piece is explained when he says that "apart from the personal stories, it is a celebration of theatre and theatre has been my home from the first day I discovered it". Fugard has certainly had an exciting life within the theatre, particularly in his home country where he effectively made himself into an outlaw for so many years. In a nation that segregated black from white, he chose to work with John Kani and Winston Ntshona writing plays that became legendary including The Island and Sizwe Bansi is Dead. His experience with them in apartheid South Africa "made me aware of how potent theatre can be in a world that needed to change. It was hazardous because it helped define me as a target for the government and its security police". Life might have been bad for a Fugard but "it was worse for John and Winston. At least I was protected by my white skin but I still had to live with a lot of harassment". However, the man who now spends most of his time in San Diego has no doubts about the value of this collaboration: "it was worth it for The Island and Sizwe Bansi for me personally and my writing". It was also of major benefit to his country since "theatre is a very powerful agent for change. It created a climate of dialogue when bombs and bullets were replacing words". Fugard has not cut all of his ties with South Africa. He still lives there part of the time although as he says, "I've been coming to the United States for decades. I made a second home here because my daughter and her four-year-old son settled in these parts". Ironically, despite the fact that Hollywood is just up the road and he wrote the novel on which the acclaimed film Tsotsi was based, the veteran is not a film fan. "I'm not interested in film -- theatre is my passion. Film and TV has done a lot of damage to theatre by corrupting writing and acting styles so that many plays now are in fact sitcoms and dialogue just consists of one-liners". He may be 75, but Athol Fugard is still a busy man. Sadly, he can no longer act as he had heart trouble a couple of years ago but he still has great memories of working on the stage rather than behind-the-scenes. "I'm so proud of being virtually the last actor to walk on the Royal Court stage before it was renovated". Many British fans will fondly recall his performance on that occasion playing the dotty old Afrikaner rebel in his own Valley Song. However, while he may not be allowed to act, the writer is in the throes of a new work and has just completed the first draft. He then gets to the part that he really enjoys -- crafting the play and perfecting every word. Athol Fugard may also be coming to Britain before too long as the Peter Hall Company in Bath is producing Victory, the play that he wrote after Exits and Entrances. "I'm sorely tempted to see Delia Monsey's production in Chichester". One can hardly wait for a visit from this charming man and the chance to see a new play. He is truly one of the greats amongst living playwrights so long may he flourish.
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