This Is London - 31 January 2020

John Kani and Antony Sher in Kunene and the King.
KUNENE AND THE KING WEST END
RUN AT AMBASSADORS THEATRE
John Kani’s ‘remarkable and moving’
(***** Guardian) two-hander Kunene
and the King is currently running at the
Ambassadors Theatre for a strictly
limited West End run until 28 March.
Co-produced by the Royal
Shakespeare Company in partnership
with Cape Town’s Fugard Theatre, this
timely new play marks 25 years since
South Africa’s first democratic elections.
The production first premiered in the
RSC’s Swan Theatre, Stratford-upon-
Avon in March last year and transferred
to the Fugard Theatre in April where it
played to sell-out audiences.
Photos: Ellie Kurttz
South African actor, activist and
playwright John Kani reprises his role as
Lunga Kunene alongside South African
actor and RSC Honorary Associate Artist,
Antony Sher in this important production
directed by Janice Honeyman. John Kani
last performed at the Ambassadors in
1974, where he appeared alongside actor
and co-author, the late Winston Ntshona,
in the Tony award-winning Sizwe Banzi Is
Dead, which went on to receive the
London Theatre Critics Award for the Best
Play of that year.
Gregory Doran, RSC Artistic Director,
said: ‘Our productions exist within a
global culture: we love to share our work
from Stratford-upon-Avon with
audiences across the UK and around the
world... I am delighted that London
audiences will have the opportunity to
experience this timely and important
piece of work in one of the very theatres
in which John Kani and Winston
Ntshona first performed their seminal
play, Sizwe Banzi Is Dead, in 1974.’
Kunene and the King follows the story
of Jack Morris (Antony Sher), a
terminally ill sixty-five-year-old white
actor living a relatively comfortable life
in the suburbs of Johannesburg, and
Lunga Kunene (John Kani), a sixty-nineyear-old
black retired male nurse.
Having suffered innumerable losses
during apartheid, Lunga must learn to
deal with the tension that more than fifty
years of apartheid has created whilst
Jack’s health rapidly deteriorates.
Tickets are available through the RSC
Box Office 01789 331 111 or book
online via ATG Tickets 0843 904 0061.
www.kuneneandtheking.com
CUNNINGHAM
Cunningham, a 3D cinematic
experience about legendary American
choreographer Merce Cunningham is
set to be released in cinemas across
the UK and Ireland from 13 March,
following the Merce Cunningham
centenary this year.
Directed by Alla Kovagan, the film
follows Merce’s artistic evolution over
three decades between 1944–1972, from
early years as a struggling dancer in
postwar New York to his emergence as
one of the most visionary and influential
choreographers in the world.
Misunderstood and rejected by the dance
world of his time, Merce persevered
against all odds and developed a new
dance technique and a new way of
thinking about making dance
performances in collaboration with
composer John Cage and visual artist
Robert Rauschenberg.
The film features excerpts from
Cunningham’s works, re-imagined for
3D cinema creating a moving and
visceral journey through Merce’s world.
17
T H I S I S L O N D O N M A G A Z I N E • T H I S I S L O N D O N O N L I N E