Print article   email story

‘All South African comics dip into the same pool of mediocrity.” This is what acclaimed director Heinrich Reisenhoffer (Cry The Beloved Country and Groundswell) told Stuart Taylor when (initially) refusing to direct Taylor’s critically acclaimed one-man stand-up show, Techni-Coloured.

Fortunately for Taylor – and the state of local comedy in general – he refused to take no for an answer, eventually managing to get Reisenhoffer to direct this show, which manages to steer well clear of the oh-so-predictable clichés which pollute most stand-up comedians’ routines (most notably, the feeding off of stereotypes around our different races).

Instead, Techni-Coloured chooses as its focal point Taylor himself – his life, hilarious insights, perceptions, as well as his life as a married man. Taylor recently had a son with his wife of four years, who, he says, “stays out of the public eye” and “has a real job”.

I met up with this 1999 University of Stellenbosch alumnus, also known as ‘that guy from Going Nowhere Slowly’, and found him to be (aside from almost an hour late) dapper, urbane, intelligent and affable. And much better looking than his press pics suggest.

Carl Collison: Where did Stuart Taylor come from, because, as if out of nowhere, there you were all over our small screens on Going Nowhere Slowly?

Stuart Taylor: Well, for a long time I had been living in Observatory [Cape Town] and performing on the comedy circuit. This sustained me for a while, but then we were wondering how we were going to go on to the next level. At that time I was slumming it, eating jam and bread, but performing was cool because the drinks were free. At that time I was also living around the corner from David Moore, who was pitching the idea for Going Nowhere Slowly to the SABC, and also always had soup and booze in his fridge. That was great. So, then Idols happened.

CC: Idols? What is the connection?

ST: Well, the SABC knew that M-Net was about to screen Idols between 17:00 and 19:00 on Sunday evenings. So they went looking for a low-budget local show, which they thought nobody would be interested in watching anyway, because everybody would be watching Idols , right? I mean that show sat on the shelf for a long while before it was eventually picked up.

CC: How has this run of Techni-Coloured been?

ST: So far it’s been cool. This is the end of the second week and the response has been cool. It’s been great. [Techni-Coloured was scheduled to end May 11. The show has been extended to June 1 due to popular demand.] The audiences here get it. Sundays are a bit dodgy because I have a 12:15 show and I am therefore fighting against the church. I think God is going to win this one.

CC: I don’t think I have ever seen so many brown folk at a theatre in Jozi.

ST: No, it’s very cool. They come out in support. I mean it’s strange because in Cape Town you’ll play to a 99% coloured audience and one percent white. And if I have two black people at a whole run, it’s a lot of black people.

CC: But coloured people don’t, as a rule, go to the theatre. It’s not in our culture, is it?

ST: Well, thankfully, with comedy they do come out and support. And the amazing thing about Joburg is the balance between black and coloured audiences. I mean, at the end of the day, we’re all black.

CC: Is the humour geographically specific?

ST: Not with this show, no. This show is more generic…

CC: Generic?

ST: Well, no, not generic. It’s more personal and it’s more … human. It’s about human nature. When I talk about my identity crisis, the black guy sitting in the front row has the same identity crisis because he hates the way he’s perceived. When I talk about the way the media portrays me, he is thinking, ‘f*ck I hate the way the media portrays me’.

CC: Speaking of the way media portrays you, what do you think of coloured representation in theatre?

ST: In terms of parts, there really aren’t that many. And I suppose theatre would be the same as television or movies in that it generally comes down to ‘we need a gangster, who’s gonna play the gangster?’ or ‘we need someone to sell flowers…’ It’s generally that k*k. And it’s not just theatre; it’s television and movies. But what is happening now is that you’ll find a lot of guys saying, ‘I am not being represented the way I want to be, so f*ck it, I’ll write my own sh#t’.

CC: Who do you rate locally?

ST: Marc [Lottering] is a phenomenon in that we all stood behind him while he macheted a path for us and we followed that path. Also, people like Riaad Moosa, who challenges your perceptions of Muslim people. There’s also Kurt Schoonraad; nobody can write a funnier punchline than him.

CC: Would you say your comedy is message driven?

ST: Techni-Coloured kind of is. It is driven by ‘this is who I am; I am not the sum of your perceptions. I am not denying my past or my history, but I am not the sum of that. And if you really want to get to know me, you’ve got to drop your bullsh*t ideas of who you think I am.’ We manage to say all of that without saying it outright. At the end of the day it’s a comedy and a damn great show.

Judging by the response he has been getting, there are throngs of people – theatre-loving or not – who feel exactly the same way. With his determination to shirk the conventional, Taylor could possibly be the creative injection our often staid comedy scene seems to be so desperately in need of.

Techni-Coloured ends its run at the Market Theatre on June 1 and then goes to the National Arts Festival in Grahamstown. For info contact the Market Theatre at 011 832 1641/2.

pulseditor@gmail.com

Subscribe to the print edition of City Press