Peter Tanyanyiwa
All is set for the Virtual second edition of Mitambo International Theatre Festival running from September 15 to October 3, 2020.
Mitambo International Theatre Festival is an annual theatre festival that seeks to create partnerships and links between Zimbabwean theatre practitioners and regional and international theatre practitioners that manifest effective and relevant exchange linkages whilst establishing a world-class sustainable event that contributes to the long-term development of theatre in Zimbabwe.
It is usually a five-day summer festival held in Harare with series of theatre performances, workshops, paper presentations, pop-ups and shows.
The first edition was last year under the theme “Emerge”, while this year’s edition is running under the theme, “Connect”.
Lloyd Nyikadzino is the festival Director, while Mercy Mangwana Mubayiwa is the Media and Publicity consultant. And Michelle Dhube is the festival’s Workshop Facilitator.
The organisers justified the theme saying they are creating partnerships and links between Zimbabwean theatre practitioners, regional and international theatre practitioners. Last year the festival emerged now its connecting.
The festival opening event will be held on September 14. This year’s festival is going online and will have Zoom workshops and discussions, live streaming of short and full length plays on their Facebook pages.
Mitambo International Theatre Festival director and Zimbabwe Theatre Academy director Mr Lloyd Nyikadzino said this year’s edition is coming in style, responding to the new normal, giving the audiences a chance to experience theatre on screen.
“In the comfort of their homes practitioners also get to share and learn from industry experts both local, regional and international, including Jasen Mpepho, Savanna trust, Daves Guzha, Prof Schneider, Patience Tawengwa, Dr Maedza, Plot Mhako and many others online.
“Look out for local acts from veteran directors and actors like Bob Mutumbi, Kessia and Eddington. We have various guests on our program, from South Africa, USA, Germany and some local acts,” he said.
He added that this year’s festival is a three week long event to allow for online engagement.
“The first week is mainly workshops, discussions and theatre discussions. Then short plays and later on full length plays. This is meant to build context and then build up momentum towards the live streaming of the plays, taking audiences from the online workshops and discussions,” he said.
The festival director went on to say that as much as the Covid-19 prevailing environment has affected many things they have chosen to look at the bright side as it has given them an oppotunity to go digital which is an advancement.
“We have chosen to look at the challenge of the Covid-19 pandemic as an opportunity. The pandemic gave us an opportunity to digitise and from here we are building on the model.
“But we cannot ignore the fact that we were looking forward to have a personal engagement and hosting people from different nationalities in our beautiful sunshine city as well as try to build the theatre going culture in the local audiences.
“With the impact we had last year we were expecting more from this year. But corona happened and we are worried that some of our audiences are not online. They are out there where the Mitambo pop ups would have reached them,” added Nyikadzino.