Alumni and Student Event

"Sorrows and Rejoicings"

Please join Heinz, MISM and MSIT alumni and students for Athol Fugard's Sorrows and Rejoicing on Thursday, January 16 at the City Theatre. Set in post-apartheid South Africa, Fugard's plays reach out to engage more far-reaching issues of human relationships, race and racism, and the power of art to evoke change.

The evening will include a panel discussion of the dramatist and life in South Africa, a reception with food and drinks and the Pittsburgh premier of Sorrows and Rejoicings. Tickets for the entire evening are $15 for alumni and $10 for students and can be purchased through the City Theatre Box Office, 412 431-2489 (be sure to indicate that you are attending the Heinz School Alumni Event). A limited number of tickets are available, so it's important to place your order soon. Special thanks to Alumni Executive Board member Kerry Spindler, MAM 1996, for bringing this special opportunity to us.

Thursday, January 16
6:15 pm Panel Discussion in the City Theatre's Rehearsal Room
7:15 pm Reception with Food and Drinks
8:00 pm Sorrows and Rejoicings

Panelists include:

Dennis Brutus, South African Activist, Poet and Professor Emeritus in the University of Pittsburgh's Department of Africana Studies
Heidi Halstead, MAM 2002, who interned in South Africa and visited the area featured in the play
Mongezi Sefika ka Nkomo, South African Activist and member of Azania Heritage International
Ingrid Sonnichsen, Carnegie Mellon University Drama Faculty Member who studied with Athol Fugard in South Africa
Jennifer Toda, Carnegie Mellon University Business Administration Student from South Africa

City Theatre is located at 57 South 13th Street, off of East Carson Street on Pittsburgh's South Side. Free parking is available less than two blocks away in City Theatre's lot at the end of South 13th Street (near the river).

Athol Fugard (b. 1932).Born in a remote village in South Africa, Fugard grew up in Port Elizabeth, the setting for most of his plays. He attended Cape Town University, spent two years as the only white seaman on a merchant ship in the Far East, then returned to South Africa. In 1958, he moved to Johannesburg where he worked as a court clerk, an experience that made him keenly aware of the injustices of apartheid, the theme of many of his plays. In that same year, he organized a multiracial theater for which he wrote, directed, and acted.

Fugard's attacks on apartheid brought him into conflict with the South African government. After his play Blood Knot (1961) was produced in England, the government withdrew his passport for four years. His support in 1962 of an international boycott against the South African practice of segregating theater audiences led to further restrictions. The restrictions were relaxed somewhat in 1971, when he was allowed to travel to England to direct his play Boesman and Lena (1969).

A Lesson from Aloes won the 1980 New York Drama Critics' Circle Award. "Master Harold"... and the Boys (1982) premiered at the Yale Repertory Theatre and then was taken to Broadway. He is also the author of Cousins: A Memoir (1997).