Welcome to Rocksburg
© Mpumelelo Paul Grootboom
Welcome to Rocksburg is the first installment of “The Rocksburg Trilogy”, a series of original South African “action plays” based on Township comic books that do not exist. This play is set in a fictional South African mining town called Rocksburg and its nearby black township, Matlapeng.
It revolves around a facially disfigured young man, derisively called “King Kong”, who has the body and the strength of Hercules. When he falls in love for the first time, with the girlfriend of a notorious township thug, this forces him into a life he had previously avoided quite successfully – the life of crime. He soon finds himself caught up in a cat and mouse game between the criminal underworld and a corrupt police force.
Intentionally using strong clichés in story and character, and stylistic mechanisms like slow motion and other devices found only in Township and Community theatre, the story is told in the much successful tradition of Hollywood action films, with a very powerful “Beauty and the Beast” type love story at its core. see here
