THEATRE
Theatre greats collaborate to produce a play that puts on trial one of colonial history’s greatest villains, writes
Leopold II goes on trial
Based partially on Mark Twain’s 1905 pamphlet “King Leopold’s Soliloquy”, CONGO: The Trial of King Leopold II is a play devised by veteran actors John Kani and Robert Whitehead and awardwinning director Lesedi Job. It is an imagined encounter between Leopold II of Belgium (Whitehead) and advocate Xola Mlambo (Kani). While packing up old case files, Mlambo finds a master’s thesis he wrote many years ago but never submitted, in which he builds a case against Leopold for his crimes in the Congo. Using actual records from the colonial archive, such as the writings of missionaries, the diaries of colonial administrators and writings by American and European visitors to Leopold’s Congo Free State, Mlambo builds a damning case.
Lungile Cindi’s brilliant set design plays with this idea of a vast colonial archive very well. The show takes place in Mlambo’s office, which is scattered with files, books, diaries, newspapers, and boxes. As a result, the actors have very limited space in which to move, sharing it with evidence and witness testimony documents.
In the play, Leopold tries to defend his crimes by downplaying the violence his men meted out on his behalf: “small trifles”, he calls them. These “trifles” are the focus of the book King Leopold’s Ghost by Adam Hochschild, and provide material for the play. In it, Leopold is likened to a greedy, cunning yet charming Shakespearean villain. These are the same qualities that Whitehead brings to his portrayal. Whitehead delivers Leopold’s delusion in ways that complicate this character. We are made to see that there are some cracks that are present in Leopold’s resolve, although one cannot help but feel that Whitehead did not push this far enough.
Leopold acquired the Congo as his own personal property in 1885, through claims of philanthropy and religion. He tells the audience (as he told the world back then) that he would bring the Africans “out of the dark night and into the light of Him from whom all good things come”.
Of course, in reality, Leopold was trying to make Belgium one of the great world powers by getting it a profitable colony. Mlambo shows how this profitability came through injustice, violence and death. Kani’s performance as Mlambo, and the witnesses, is impressive. Using only his voice as a signifier, he brings to life numerous other characters, without distracting or confusing the audience. However, although most of Kani’s character changes are convincing, a number lack nuance and sound the same.
As can be expected with a play that brings historical facts to life, this show is uncomfortable, symbolically violent and emotionally heavy. While Job, Kani and Whitehead attempt to make this experience easier for the audience by balancing the depictions of violence with humour, these attempts are futile. Rather than giving relief, most of the jokes fall flat, partly because they are offered ironically by Leopold. This overall heaviness is further exacerbated by Thapelo Mokgosi’s creative light design, which creates a sombre, dignified atmosphere whenever the audience hears direct testimony from witnesses.
Despite witness testimony, Leopold is not swayed. He insists that God, his only judge, knows of all the good he did in spreading the Gospel in the Congo. And even more charitably, he has given salvation to the dying by ordering his men to allow them to kiss the cross.
This rhetoric of a few good deeds is all too familiar. It is first brought up in the show by Mlambo’s supervisor when he is still a student. “Colonialism wasn’t all bad,” Mlambo is told, which may remind the audience of Helen Zille’s tweets . “If it was not for colonialism, you wouldn’t be sitting here in this university.”
While Leopold eventually relinquished control of the Congo, history shows us that this did not improve the situation for the Congolese people. And the exploitation continued even after Congo gained independence from Belgium in June 1960.
Echoing the end of “King Leopold’s Soliloquy”, Mlambo gives us his final reflections: Leopold is protected by people. He relies on the willingness of human beings to shrink, shudder and look away when they learn about what he has done.
For many years the Royal Museum of Central Africa in Brussels actively ignored Leopold’s atrocities in the Congo. It was only with the release and success of Hochschild’s book in 1998 that it finally confronted the legacy of one of its biggest benefactors.
CONGO: The Trial of King Leopold II challenges us to cease protecting Leopold with our silence. It challenges us not to quiver or turn a blind eye.
Leopold tries to defend his crimes by downplaying the violence his men meted out on his behalf: “small trifles”, he calls them.
On at the Barney Simon Theatre, Market Theatre complex, until November 11.