Albee’s classic to debut at Baxter Studio
THEATRE lovers are in for a treat when the award-winning play, Goat, or Who Is Sylvia? is staged at the Baxter Golden Arrow Studio from April 24 until May 18.
Written by Edward Albee, the fourhander won the 2002 Tony Award for Best Play, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Play and was also a finalist for the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.
Fleur du Cap Best New Director award-winner Mdu Kweyama (Reza de Wet’s Missing, Woza Albert!), is the director, featuring a cast headlined by Lionel Newton and Jennifer Steyn, with Paul Savage and Sihle Mnqwazana.
The play, described as a modern classic, challenges taboos and moral judgment. Known for works such as Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Albee’s marital drama shows a family in crisis as their lives spiral out of control when the patriarch falls in love with a goat. Cleverly written with grammatical and language games amid existential chaos, Albee tackles the theme of tragedy, while dealing with issues of the family, social taboos and vengeance. Albee’s work typically criticises the American dream.
Newton (The Miser, The Well Being) tackles the complex role of middle-aged architect, Martin, with Steyn (The Inconvenience of Wings, A Doll’s House), in the role of stay-at-home wife, Stevie. Sihle Mnqwazana (The Fall, Black Dog/Inj’emnyama), plays the gay son, Billy, with Paul Savage (Kaapse Stories, Kat and the Kings) as Martin’s best friend, Ross.
Albee, who died last year at the age of 88, wrote The Goat, or Who is Sylvia? in 2000 and the play premiered on Broadway, New York, in March 2002.
It was so successful that it closed nine months later, in December. It also had a run in London, on the West End.
“Tackling a play by one of America’s greatest modern playwrights, Edward Albee, is quite a daunting task. The play’s phenomenal success and the celebrated actors who have performed in it since it was first staged some 17 years ago, are a testament to its brilliance. The deeper I dig and as we unpack the work in rehearsals, the more I realise just how complex and clever the writing really is. I am grateful to be working with a formidable cast and team to help create a powerful piece of theatre,” said Kweyama.
The Goat, or Who is Sylvia? is on