Total Sibikwa Play Competition in Benoni

Sibikwa Arts Centre, with the ongoing generous support of TOTAL, is presenting its annual community Play Festival Competition to be held in Benoni.

The Festival started in 1995 with the aim of providing Out of School! Out of Work! youth with job opportunities. Comprising of groups from communities around Gauteng the Total Sibikwa Play Competition is aimed at community development, vocational training and job creation.

The festival provides a platform for community drama groups to showcase their productions in front of industry professionals where they receive feedback on how they can improve their performance and how to utilize various dramatic elements to improve the quality of their production.

The groups that participate in the festival have to attend prefestival workshops that cover a range of topics from scriptwriting; stage management and directing. Total's sponsorship of Sibikwa is aimed at empowering youth from historically disadvantaged communities within the arts sector with quality tools to create their own job opportunities.

The winning groups embark on a short business and personal finance skills course which enables them to create means of sustaining themselves. The topics that are covered are bookkeeping; marketing and publicity; budgeting and creating a business plan.

Last year's winning group was the Siyakhana Cultural Group from Modderbee Correctional Centre. It is at the heart of Sibikwa's mission to reach out into the community and develop youth at risk.
The outreach into the various prisons in Gauteng is in keeping with this mission. It has provided the participating prisoners with self esteem and a sense of responsibility towards their communities to reduce crime and to contribute positively to society once they are released.

Sibikwa is calling all interested directors to enter their productions for this year's community play competition. The competition will be divided into two with the more experienced directors judged separately from novice directors. The deadline for the application and the scripts for the novice directors is Friday 29 May 2009. The length of the play must be between 25 and 30 minutes. Each group will be allocated 40 minutes to set up and strike. The play may incorporate songs, dance, speech and may be presented in any of the official languages. Plays must be written for a minimum of 3 characters and a maximum of 6 characters. Novice groups are allowed a maximum number of 8 characters in their plays.

Each group must present a full script of the play no later than 29 May 2009. The scripts must be submitted to Phillip Ndaba. The four groups who attain the highest mark in the competition will go forward to the job creation program. Participants in a group must be between the ages of 16 and 28 (above 28 years will conditionally accepted)

Obtain your copies of the application form and the rules of the competition from Sibikwa Art Centre.

Contact Person: Mr. Phillip Ndaba
Telephone: +27 (0)11 422-4359

Please Note: Dates for this event to be confirmed.