"Do
they eat well from theatre? I don’t know. Do they make sacrifices that are
admirable? Yes!" - Dr. Fred Mbogo
Dr. FRED MBOGO is a Playwright, Critic, Actor, Director and Lecturer of Theatre and Drama at the Moi University's Department of Literature, Theatre and Film Studies. This interview, a first in a series of PEOPLEISM forums, was conducted with Oluoch-Madiang' on February 21st, 2016.
Theatre
in the academia: What has been the Moi University Theatre Department's contribution to the actualization of drama in the country?
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| Dr. Fred Mbogo, don & theatre professional |
Moi University has been producing
theatre graduates now for the last fourteen or so years.
If you follow closely
where these graduates eventually end up you would be impressed in parts and
somewhat excited in others. There are
those that have joined the media (broadcasting) in such capacities as editing,
writing, directing and all that. Others are copywriters, film makers, and one
or two have become regular actors in short advertisements for television. There
are others involved in teaching at high schools and Universities. The world of
Non-Governmental-Organizations has taken in most of them in capacities to do
with mobilization of communities. There are some who from time to time have
been producers of theatre works in Nairobi.
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| Dr. Mbogo's students in action, Moi University. |
But none has actually made the
practice a permanent business. Of course there is no one measure of knowing
whether as a University we are producing theatre practitioners worthy of
engaging in the Kenyan environment sufficiently. Perhaps what has betrayed the
majority of the graduates who may have loved what they do has been the nature
of theatre business in Kenya. It seems
difficult especially as it does not have sufficient or reliable funding. For
this reason, consistency in the practitioners can be an uphill task. From its
onset with Dr. J.B Okong’o and Prof. C.J. Odhiambo, Moi University has
succeeded in training theatre experts. Practical exploits by the department
have resulted in notable performances not only within the University but also
in other public spaces. This has been essential in the production of
storytellers who are not merely tethered to theatre, as live performance, but
have moved on to other areas where storytelling is essential such as in film
and television.
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| Dr. Mbogo on stage in 1999 with this interviewer |
The department has also grown with other instructors making
contributions such as Evans Mugarizi and the late Ezekiel Alembi, as a part
timer. There have been international collaborations for productions and
research with such institutions as Bayreuth University and the University of
Stellebosch. With time the department has grown to incorporate courses in film
and music, with Prof. Mellitus Wanyama heading a very essential part in
processes of producing graduates with a keen awareness of the place of music in
the creation of live performance. Recently, with energies of Cosmas Bii, the
theatre division has benefited from the engagement of film production so that
there has been training of actors and actresses towards the collaborative production
of films such as Cycle 28, and Let’s play pretend.
Of course there are
numerous challenges in the processes of training. Funding remains a big issue,
but also the idea that attitudes towards the performing arts haven’t changed
over time. There should be more energy employed in encouraging students to take
themselves seriously, but parents an society in general have failed to see the
potential of the performing arts despite the exploits of Lupita Nyong’o and the
living excitement that Nigeria’s film industry has brought to our television
stations. There is also a sense that diversity, in terms of areas of the
performing arts that one should engage in, has not been developed. But we must
have hope. Attitudes might change; and all could end well.
LEFT: MUKABIRA, written and directed by Fred Mbogo.
You have read and practiced and shaped theatre for eons! What do you find to be the most succulent thing about
theatre?
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| Mbogo's play 'Eulogy of a Neat Man' poster, Nakuru, 2013 |
Well, the idea that you are
exposed to the elements, from scratch. Unlike in film where there are so many
practitioners involved, theatre is living; you can write, direct, and act in
small or big projects. At the same time, you are close to the process of
production in that you struggle, as an actor, for example, to get your lines,
understand what they mean in context for your gestures and plot movements and
think about little things like hand props and the effect of light on your face.
You are so exposed, you must feel vulnerable but in the end there is the joy of
discovering victory when in that difficulty you have delivered your play to an
applauding audience. Isn’t that so human? What is more human than its
unpredictability, the idea that every time you perform you are uncovering
something new. There is something organic in that, it is like peeling into
life from above.
But also as an audience there is the idea that nothing can be
faked, you can see through to the actors and see them letting you down or
pushing you into areas of your emotional self that very few things in life can
let you grasp. It is that magic, that flesh and blood closeness that theatre is
best for. The theatre too can cheat you into being intellectual without
“feeling” it. It easily can lead you into debates that are so easily availed
through gesture and half sentences that are played in the minds of your fellow
audiences that applauding or silence become part of the performance- you cannot
find that through TV!
Lets talk about the state of theatre in Kenya: Challenges and opportunities?
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| Dr. Mbogo nurtures upcoming actors and actresses in Kenya |
It has potential. It can grow.
But it must move from Nairobi - in the journalistic sense, we need to see more
coverage of theatre experiences in places like Mombasa or Kisumu, Eldoret and
also other smaller towns where it takes place in forms that are not those that
we teach at University. I think it has to be given space to be nurtured. This
means starting to teach aspects of theatre in primary school. So that people
appreciate it from then. Through these efforts there can be a cohort of
graduates who appreciate theatre and who eventually become its consumer. It can
be an interesting site for the growth of intellectual citizenry if taken
seriously, which is why I suggest that it ought to be taught from Primary School
through to University. There should be more participants than are participating
at the School’s Drama Festival through, not mere extra-curricular ventures, but
as part of the curriculum. For why isn’t theatre essential as part of
communication studies, for example?
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| Dr. Mbogo performs in 'Thieves as Humans', 2009. |
Having said so, I must observe that there
are people who have been in the production of theatre in Kenya for a long time
through thick and thin. It is almost as though they have been welded to the
art. Do they eat well from theatre? I don’t know. Do they make sacrifices that
are admirable? Yes! I am talking of names I have heard since I started being
interested in theatre, people like John Sibi-Okumu, and David Mulwa. Others
like Sammy Mwangi and Abuto Eliud, Simon Oyatsi, Millicent Ogutu, George
Mungai, Keith Pearson, Oby Obyerodhyambo, Mike Kamunya, Oluoch-Madiang’, Silas
Temba, George Orido, Gilbert Lukalia, Lydia Gitachu, Mumbi Kaigwa, Obat Masira,
Caroline Odongo, among many others. These are the names one wants to respect;
they have been there through hard times- whether there has been funding or not.
So, yes, there has to be a frontline that keeps the fire burning; this is the
group that we should emulate. Somewhere along the way, theatre might gain its
prominence to an extent that we cannot do without it.
Kindly provide a brief literary appreciation/critique of John Sibi-Okumu’s efforts in scripting and putting up shows in Kenya.
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| John Sibi Okumu in his ELEMENTS. Most committed thespian? |
Surely, there has not been a more
committed individual in Kenyan theatre than Sibi-Okumu. People talk of Ngugi wa
Thiong’o’s Kamirithu and so on, but forget that there are people who have been
here longer acting, directing, writing, producing, teaching! I don’t think anyone has done more than Sibi
on this score. But what is interesting is that Sibi-Okumu’s work has become
even more committed in the last decade or so, in terms of written plays. These plays
have been political in nature, pricking into our consciousness. The best must
be in the fashion of the character of Mzee in the refreshing Role Play, who
takes us through the paces of how so
badly we have been betrayed- but also how we have been complicit in that
process. Should we be fearless and fight back to try and gain some dignity? It
seems so, Sibi-Okumu suggests in his Minister
Karibu where there is a sense in
which people have become selfish: we must be stirred to come alive again,
regain a semblance of something good for ourselves. Kaggia refused to go to bed with the powers that be, in
Sibi-Okumu’s play then we must take up a spirit like that; of refusing, of
being angry enough so we don’t side with the exploiter. But who is listening to
Sibi-Okumu? It is the intellectual, or some class, that can pay for the price
of a ticket at Phoenix Players or at Pawa 254, perhaps there is need for these
plays to be seen by more people. They haunt so effortlessly, but they must be
seen by the people on the ground who, in my view, must refuse to be kneed into
submission by corrupt exploiters. So, yes, Sibi-Okumu’s contribution is
admirable. I wish there was more of him and others that prick our conscience!
- END -
Fred Mbogo continues is based in Eldoret.
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