Women In Theatre (WiT) Partners Plays on Sunday

Twenty young women from around Bulawayo attended the first Women In Theatre Lab session held at Amakhosi Cultural Centre yesterday marking the beginning of a mentorship program for female theatre voices in play writing, direction and producing.

The WIT Labs in play writing, directing and producing for theatre come as a result of a partnership negotiated between the Woman In Theatre Program and Amakhosi Arts Academy in the past weeks. This partnership came as a response by Nhimbe Trust to an SOS call sent out by the management of Amakhosi Cultural Centre seeking any  interventions from any one that can help address the challenge of missing women voices in the Zimbabwean theatre industry as reflected by the low participation on the ongoing Plays On Sunday at Amakhosi Cultural Centre. The Women In Theatre Program was founded by Nhimbe Trust and Africalia in 2011.

The partnership seeks to establish WIT Labs within the Amakhosi Arts Academy and capacitate those women who bring themselves forward to either write, direct or produce plays. The women would present their work on Plays On Sunday at Amakhosi Cultural Centre and take them to other venues across the country, regionally and internationally opportunities and resources permitting. It meets both the objectives of the Women In Theatre Program and Plays On Sunday.

Amakhosi Arts Academy has designed the capacity mentorship WIT Labs program to be theatre project based and flexible. Women are required to register with the WIT Labs the theatre project that they are working on and attend Lab forums for the mentorship. The 20 women present in the first Lab forum appointed Nonhlalo Dube the writer of the television screen play Yeyeni Bantu the Theatre Projects Coordinator. Among the women present at the first WIT Lab was Thembelihle Moyo and Miccain Sikhosana the only two women who have presented their productions on Plays On Sunday since its inception in November 2012.

WIT Lab session was held on the 9th of February at Amakhosi Cultural Centre from 10am till 4pm. We encourage all those women out there interested in the theatre industry and have stories they want to tell to attend and participate.