Pieter-Dirk Uys’ one-man memoir – The Echo of a Noise – is coming to the Little Theatre in PE: 26,27,28 February at 7pm. Book Computicket / Tickets R130

Pieter-Dirk Uys has taken South Africa by storm with his provocative and deeply personal memoir The Echo of a Noise. It is a story that aches to be heard and Uys knows how to keep his audiences on the very edge of their seats waiting to hear about the great influences in his life: his father Hannes Uys and mother Helga Bassel, and of course his unlikely pen friend, the beautiful Sophia Loren. Audiences are given the opportunity to celebrate a life well lived in all its emotional states. Uys has played to full houses and sold out seasons. His masterful story telling, wit and wisdom are generously shared. As with so many of his performances he takes his audiences into his confidence, breaks the rules and crosses boundaries. Since the moment he first stepped on stage in the 1970s, Uys has been a voice where others have demanded silence. Jokes about the censor board being his own personal public relations department, gently disguise the reality that each time he tread the boards, he crossed lines and stepped on quite dangerous toes. He has always used humour as a “weapon of mass distraction” and describes the laughter he evoked as a relief from the fears that shaped South African society in 1950s, 60s, 70s, and 80s. PDU unpowdered!

EVITA BEZUIDENHOUT & THE KAKTUS OF SEPARATE DEVELOPMENT
22, 23, 24 FEBRUARY at 7pm. Book at Computicket / Tickets R130
- Tannie Evita takes on the roots of our Rainbow
“Uys dons false eyelashes and presidents listen.” LA Times

Evita Bezuidenhout has been part of South Africa’s political sessions of Big Brother since 1981. A former apartheid Ambassador in the Homeland of Bapetikosweti, she is now in the kitchens of Luthuli House where she cooks for reconciliation. She has always reminded us where we come from, so that we can celebrate where we are going. But since her three grandchildren have started asking questions about the past, Tannie Evita realises that while all the people of South Africa are now free to celebrate their roots, their history and their culture, white South Africans still are rootless. Especially the Afrikaner whose official history was probably made up behind a desk in Pretoria as propaganda.
What was fake news?
How many details were alternative facts?
Did Jan van Riebeeck bring civilization to South Arica in 1652? Or was he just a Dutch convict who came to steal chickens from the Bushmen?
Why did 127 branches of the Great Trek start in Cape Town on the same afternoon?
Was English cooking the British Empire’s weapon of mass destruction during their invasion of the Cape?
Was Paul Kruger the first Broeder to practise state capture?
Was the Battle of Blood River that? Or was it a braaivleis of reconciliation?
Does the Queen of England still wear stolen goods glittering in her crown?
And why does President Donald Trump keep sending tweets asking for a personal meeting with Nelson Mandela?
The problems of the past, the issues of the day and the hopes for the future – all in the hands of the most famous white woman in the African National Congress, who now proves that there is freedom of speech in Luthuli House. It is just sometimes after speech that freedom goes.

MEDIA COMMENTS:

“With its lights and shade carefully balanced, its quirkiness countered by serious issues, and its relentless pace, Evita Bezuidenhout & the Kaktus of Separate Development has Uys at his ebullient best to entertain his audience while exercising its collective mind.” - Beverley Brommert/Cape Argus/27.6.2017

“Since the early days of Pieter-Dirk Uys’s alter ego, Tannie Evita has always reminded us where we come from, so that we can celebrate where we are going. There are laughs aplenty and with good reason, as Tannie Evita got in both off-the-cuff and scripted gems.” – Orielle Berry/Cape Times/27. 6. 2017

“The show is a tongue-in-cheek intellectual commentary that in a public service setting makes you flinch and giggle simultaneously, as Tannie Evita ridicules both the past and the present. She delights in unashamedly peeling away at the layers of privilege and prejudice in a take-no-prisoners manner … in an intriguing showcase of satire.” – Barbara Loots/Theatre Scene Cape Town/26.6.2017

“Pieter-Dirk Uys is on top form, as always, and his flair for speaking his particular style of truth to power is a positive breath of fresh air.” - Karen Rutter/Weekend Special/25.6.2017

“What is astounding, though, is the way Uys uses his improvisational skills to carry the show through. You can’t help but feel that the whole thing is a very natural conversation between friends. If the idea was to create intimacy, he succeeded.” – Adriaan Roets/Citizen/1.6.2017

“With Evita Bezuidenhout & the Kaktus of Separate Development Pieter-Dirk Uys presents a production that is as slightly woven as Afrikaner correctness, but brilliantly disrespectful and laced with a moral twist to fit into our contemporary vernacular.” Benn van der Westhuizen/What’s On in Cape Town/29.6.2017
“Weaving through the spiky material, which is delivered with an honesty that had the audience gasping, Pieter-Dirk subtly expounds his message. And yes, there is one. Democracy first. Democracy always. Dmeocracy forever.” Jennifer de Klerk/ Artslink/29.5.2017

“If anything, Uys teaches us to laugh at ourselves and not take ourselves too seriously. This an absolute treasure. The show is brilliant. * * * * * ” Leon van Nierop/Artslink/26.5.2017

Masters Graduate Exhibition, Visual Arts Department at School of Music Art Design by Robyn Larkin.

Opening Function: 7 February from 18h00 to 20h00.
The exhibition will run weekdays from 08h00 - 16h00 until 27 February 2018