28 June 2006

After wowing audiences in Bern, Berlin, Brussels, Vienna and Melbourne, Third World Bunfight's Afro-kitsch nightclub spectacular House of the Holy Afro hits the 2006 National Arts Festival in Grahamstown before setting off on a nationwide tour.

Directed by Brett Bailey, House of the Holy Afro is sexy, provocative, flash and proudly South African, fusing shamanistic ritual with gospel music, slam poetry, slick choreography and driving club rhythms.

The show brings together two of South Africa's hottest acts: internationally acclaimed performance troupe Third World Bunfight and house music DJ Dino Moran (Ibiza, Ministry of Sound).

Performance poet Odidi Mfenyana stars alongside six of Third World Bunfight's multi-talented performers, choreographed by Free Flight Dance Company's Natalie Fisher.

House of the Holy Afro, first commissioned by the Sharp-Sharp Festival in Bern, Switzerland, has just returned from full houses at the Melbourne Commonwealth Games and has been invited back to tour Australia in 2007.

The show runs at Grahamstown's Rhodes Club from 29 June to 2 July at 10pm.

Post-modern African ritual theatre
Third World Bunfight, formed out of mainly untrained black performers from local townships and rural areas, has been making provocative, celebratory works since its birth in the Eastern Cape in 1996.

The company fuses traditional performance forms with a pop sensibility to create post-modern African ritual theatre pieces, forging a truly African theatre from South Africa's vast wealth of cultural heritage.

Productions such as Ipi Zombi?, iMumbo Jumbo, Big Dada and The Prophet have won numerous awards, including FNB Vita best costume design and best new script for Big Dada (2002), and FNB Vita best costume, set and new script for iMumbo Jumbo (1997).

The 2005 tour production of Big Dada was nominated for three 2006 Naledi Theatre Awards, including best musical.

The company is resident on the Spier Estate outside Cape Town, where it trains young adult performers, provides a programme of entertainment at Moyo, and continues in its artistic endeavours.

SouthAfrica.info reporter

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	A scene from Third World Bunfight's iMumbo Jumbo (2003). The company fuses traditional performance forms with a pop sensibility to create post-modern African ritual theatre (Photo by Patricia Driscoll, copyright Third World Bunfight)

	Third World Bunfight's Ipi Zombi?. The troupe was formed in 1996 out of mainly untrained black performers from local townships and rural areas in the Eastern Cape (Photo by Elsabe Van Tonder, copyright Third World Bunfight)

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