CROWNED: THE COMEDY SHUTDOWN HITS THE MARKET THEATRE STAGE

CROWNED: THE COMEDY SHUTDOWN HITS THE MARKET THEATRE STAGE

The Market Theatre Foundation and EyeUnderM Productions, powered by the City of Joburg’s Arts Alive, present CROWNED: The Comedy Shutdown, a knockout battle.

On Friday, 7 August 2026 ahead of Women’s Day, the John Kani Theatre at the Market Theatre plays host to the event, bringing South Africa’s most established comedic voices head-to-head with its sharpest rising talent in a battle for R20,000 and the title of champion.

Produced by EyeUnderM Productions (Mzansi Comedy Nights) and Nomad Concepts, the evening is staged as part of the Market Theatre’s 50th Anniversary Programme, with the City of Johannesburg and the Market Theatre Foundation joining as presenting partners, lending the weight of one of South Africa’s most storied stages to a groundbreaking comedy format. Alongside the laughs sits a genuine tribute: the Doek Challenge, honouring the women in the room and the culture they carry expressed in their stylish doek drip.

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Built as a high-energy, knockout-style comedy battle, CROWNED: The Comedy Shutdown brings together sixteen of Mzansi’s finest comedians as they compete to secure a spot in the Top Four, selected by the judges.

The four finalists will then advance to the knockout round, going head-to-head for the R20,000 grand prize. At this stage, the audience will also participate through a live clapometer to help decide the ultimate comedy champion. The winner takes all.

The line-up of 16 comedians battling for the crown includes Farieda, Shanray, Mfazomhlophe, Tsitsi Chiumya, Jacques Pienaar, KingSbuda, Dr Matthews, Thabiso Mhlongo, Emilio Tobias, Oscar Omuhle, Keketso Hutamo, Nhlanhla Shabangu, Nqobile Mahlangu, Sandile the Giraffe, Masibonge Mndende and Snatcho.

“Comedy is one of the most powerful reflections of society. It challenges, unites and gives voice to lived experiences, supporting platforms like CROWNED: The Comedy Shutdown speaks directly to the City of Johannesburg’s commitment to the arts and to the comedians who give this city its voice and its laughter. Through Arts Alive, we back the talent that keeps our creative economy alive, because a city that invests in its comedians and storytellers invests in its own culture and its own people,” says Mr Vuyisile Mshudulu, Director: Arts, Culture and Heritage in the City of Joburg.

Guiding the night as the host is Siphelele “Pele Pele” Mchunu, a Soweto-born comedian, actor and Jozi FM breakfast host with over 15 years in the industry and the 2019 recipient of the Savanna Audience Choice Comedy Award. Pele Pele is known for transforming raw, relatable and sometimes uncomfortably honest life experiences into comedy gold.

The competition will be adjudicated by two heavyweights of South African comedy; David Kau, one of the country’s most established stand-up comedians and a foundational figure in building platforms that launched a generation of talent. Joined by Trevor Gumbi, a multi-talented performer known for his sharp, socially conscious humour, with credits spanning Blacks Only, Comedy Central Live, and Oppikoppi to name a few.

“As part of our 50th Anniversary Programme, the Market Theatre continues to open its doors to diverse forms of storytelling and comedy remains a vital part of that ecosystem. CROWNED: The Comedy Shutdown is not just entertainment; it is a celebration of voice, community and the next generation of talent stepping onto a historic stage,” adds Greg Homann, Artistic Director of the Market Theatre Foundation.

Audience members are invited to arrive wearing their stylish doek, celebrating the heritage, identity and stories carried by women. A live, in-venue activation will crown the best doek of the night, with prizes contributed by event partners.

Keeping the energy high throughout the evening will be the dynamic female duo, DJ &NDee and DJ KayDaph, setting the tone for a vibrant and engaging experience.

Tickets are now available on Webtickets. Grab yours for R250 only to secure your seat at the CROWNED: The Comedy Shutdown before the battle sells out. Come ready not just to laugh, but to witness a crown being claimed.                       

Wall of Names

Wall of Names

For 50 years, The Market Theatre has been shaped by thousands of people, and we aim to honour them. We're inviting you to add names to this growing record of artists, directors, designers, technicians, administrators, educators, musicians, crew members, patrons, supporters and staff who have contributed to the life of The Market Theatre. At the conclusion of our anniversary year, the names submitted will be reviewed and validated before being permanently added to a wall installation at The Market Theatre. Scan this QR code to contribute a name to the record.

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The Annual Parade – Hey Hillbrow! Let’s Dlala! – Is Back with “Arise!”, the Cry that Alerts, Gathers, Protects and Transforms

The Annual Parade – Hey Hillbrow! Let’s Dlala! – Is Back with “Arise!”, the Cry that Alerts, Gathers, Protects and Transforms

Hey Hillbrow! Let’s Dlala! returns for its seventh iteration, presented by The Windybrow Arts Centre and Shade in collaboration with organisations and artists from Johannesburg and beyond. This year’s procession happens on 8 August 2026, on the eve of the commemoration of the 70th anniversary of the August 9, 1956 Women’s March.

The 2026 Hey Hillbrow! Let’s Dlala! iteration is themed ARISE, taking to the skies to make a declaration against the cage and in celebration of freedom. “Just as birds migrate across lands and share messages from afar, we are taking up the airspace,” states Shade’s Tamzyn Botha, curator of the parade. “This year’s theme, ARISE, looks to the seasonal journeys of birds as a provocation for freedom, communication and collective movement.”

Working with more than 350 children and young people from Hillbrow and beyond, Hey Hillbrow! Let’s Dlala! gathers handmade bird costumes, bird dances, birdsongs and street-scale imagination into a living flock. These birds are border-crossers, message-carriers, mischief-makers and freedom-dreamers. They migrate across walls, neighbours, languages, histories and streets.

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According to Gerard Bester, The Market Theatre Foundation’s Head of The Windybrow Arts Centre, the Grey Go-away-bird known as the Lourie, whose sharp call warns the bushveld when danger is near, will inspire the 2026 public procession—transforming alarm into art, warning into wonder and rebellion into play. “Hey Hillbrow! Let’s Dlala! honours the power of collective voice: the cry that alerts, gathers, protects and transforms. In Hillbrow, the call becomes a chorus. The street becomes a sky. The children become birds of warning, beauty, defiance and joy.”

As hundreds of participants from local youth organisations – Dlala Nje, Shade, Dlamini Foundation, Johannesburg Society for the Blind, Innovation of Excellence, Lefika La Phodiso, Fight with Insight, MES and The Windybrow Arts Centre – flock to the streets of inner-city Jo’burg in birdlike freedom, they’ll also be paying tribute to the unbeatable spirit of the women of 1956, who marched against pass laws as cages to reclaim their freedom of movement.

In celebrating the music of freedom, the parade will end with the mighty Kebra Ethiopian Sound System.

In the lead up to the parade, The Windybrow Arts Centre has turned into a creative makerspace for all the participants. This two week multi-disciplinary, artist residency/holiday programme ranges from Textile Design with Imbali Visual Literacy, Choral Works with Sbusiso Shozi and Muzi Radebe, Physical Theatre with Philani Tenso Mahlanga and Muzi Trust, Street Art with Rivaldo Nelson, Site Specific Theatre with Gcebile Dlamini and Parade Direction with Johannesburg Mask and Movement. The sonic library made in collaboration with the participants, will inform the soundscapes curated by Jarred Parenzee and Muhammed Dawjee.

The programme also invites youth and children to shadow these artists and production teams, to co-design the works and foster intergenerational collaboration. 

Come glide, fly and flutter as we celebrate in the streets and in the skies. Join the seventh iteration of Joburg’s most anticipated parade on 8 August 2026, starting from 10am at The Windybrow Arts Centre.

Hey Hillbrow! Let’s Dlala! launched in 2017 in celebration of the possibilities that public performance brings to public space; to share energy, laughter, surprise and play. This day was inspired by the life of Joburg public art super-heroine Lesley Perkes who died in 2015 and who had dreams for this place that others have continued to manifest.

The parade would not be possible without the generous support from Ekhaya CID, Badboys Security, Hillbrow Police, Assitej South Africa, Joburg Photowalkers, Craig Maarschalk, City of Johannesburg, Department of Sport, Arts and Culture, BirdLife South Africa and our media partner, Johannesburg in Your Pocket.

ENDS

The Windybrow Arts Centre is a division of The Market Theatre Foundation, an agency of the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture.

For enquiries, please contact Bongiwe Potelwa (Publicist at the Market Theatre Foundation) at bongiwep@marketheatre.co.za or (011) 832 1641.

Kaza Kamba Returns for 3rd Iteration at The Market Theatre

Kaza Kamba Returns for 3rd Iteration at The Market Theatre

The Kaza Kamba Pan African Theatre Festival returns to The Market from 20 – 23 August 2026. This partnership between mehlo-maya (eye-to-the-sun) and The Market Theatre is in its third year and is quickly growing into being “one of the most defining and deserving festivals of our time with a slant on Pan Africanism”, according to Daves Guzha, well-known Zimbabwean theatre producer.  

The theme for this third iteration is Memory Against Forgetting, and is based on the Milan Kundera quotation – “struggle of memory against forgetting” – from his novel, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting. This inspiration from the book balances the lightness of living without the weight of the past, with the weight and responsibility of remembering. In South Africa this rings very sharply as we navigate a particularly difficult time in our relationship to our continent.

The dynamic Kaza Kamba Pan African Theatre Festival programme brings a range of Theatre, Music, Film, Workshops and a Colloquium, as well as tables of goodies to buy.

The festival is committed to bringing together the arts with political discourse.

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iPhupho L’ka Biko mainlines the festival. This very dynamic group brings to life a brand new multidisciplinary piece which revisits the Marikana massacre both in memory and mirror. Marikana Still…fontein is a lament for the fallen, for the living, a reflection on fractured solidarities and a call to reclaim a Pan-African imagination rooted in dignity, memory and collective liberation.

Southing the Sound with Yonela Mnana (piano), Lesego Rampolokeng (poetry) and Gontse Makhene (Percussion). This is an expressive artistic ensemble that fuses harmony, spoken word and ambient percussion, spearheaded by the ever fearless and provocative poet and author, Lesego Rampolokeng. Sounding the South is not just a melting pot for piano, poetry and percussion; it is an estuary of communal thought and a confluence of critical yet therapeutic reflection urgently needed in this country and beyond.

Theatre Productions include the ever relevant play Skierlik based on a tragic South African event of 14 January 2008 that took place in the informal settlement, Skierlik. Thomas returns to the place where his wife and young daughter were killed in a racially motivated shooting. This  is a story of love, loss, and hope, and paints poetic pictures with words. The play is written and performed by the skilful storyteller, Phillip Dikotla.

The Dying Need No Shoes joins us from the Kenyan International Theatre Festival. This thought provoking play, written by  Fred Mbogo, directed by Alacoque, and performed by Emmanuel Shikuku and Ann Keveli, reminds us that memory starts at home. Purity Munanda finds herself in a room with her father after years of silence and fear. All the buried trauma comes to the surface. What begins as a tense confrontation soon unfolds into a gripping battle of truth, power and survival as dark family secrets are exposed. 

A Season of Hillbrow, a re-imagination of Arthur Rimbaud’s Season in Hell, is staged by The Windybrow Arts Centre. It asks what ‘hell’ might mean in the unfinished present of post-apartheid South Africa. A Season in Hillbrow brings the fire into post-apartheid Johannesburg, where young people from Hillbrow turn the city’s abandonment and reckless multilingual life into poetry, movement, voice and collective rebellion. The play is performed by the students of The Windybrow Arts Centre and directed by Sibahle Mangena and Gerard Bester.

Kaza Kamba Film Festival includes the classic revolutionary film,  The Battle of Algiers (1966) as memory;  and Sudan…Remember Us (2024) with a discussion by the Sudan Solidarity South Africa members following the screening. This film is an important reminder of Memory Against Forgetting. The words of our poets in Word Down the Line (2015) seek to ask South African poets about our identity and political poetic journeys through Black Consciousness and Pan Africanism, asking who we are today.

Bioscope Beyond Borders is a new project that will be launched, set up as a small cinema in the Lindelani Buthelezi Gallery with 10 chairs and a range of South African films dedicated to migration and identity. People are invited to join films at any time and watch short films that are looped and run for 20 minutes. The Bioscope stands on its own, inviting the individual to watch and interpret the films as a singular experience. Bioscope Beyond Borders is a mobile festival and will be taken to any cultural events in the country, and will be presented at the Warrenton Festival in November, in the Northern Cape. 

Kaza Kamba Workshops are key to the festival, where young and old, starting out and experienced practitioners share ideas. Five workshops covering voice, music, drumming, chanting, movement, languages, are offered—including a workshop for youth and children from as young as three years.

Book Launches include Segopotso, a compilation of 17 plays from 1976 to 1986, most never published before, including Maishe Maponya, Zakes Mda, Fatime Dike and Matsemela Manaka. Edited by Vanessa Cooke, Lesego Rampolokeng, Samu Mfuphi and Bobby Rodwell.

Rising to Palestine: Africans in Solidarity for Decolonisation and Liberation, edited by Raouf Farrah and Suraya Dadoo with articles from African scholars connecting struggles from Gaza to Sudan, the DRC and Western Sahara.

Play Readings is our new development wing. Two new plays by Khutjo Green (Maki Next Door), and Jonathan Maseng (Sobukwe) will be presented to an audience for comments and debate.

The Kaza Kamba Pavement Café will be open from Thursday to Saturday night in The Market Theatre Precinct, with music and an open mic and lots of lovely food and drinks to purchase, as well as stalls with materials, clothing, earrings and all manner of goodies.

In short, there is a lot to see!

All documentary films and workshops are FREE. Tickets for plays and music shows are available on Webtickets.

Do not miss this vital festival, critical to our country today. It presents a weekend of live performances, film, workshops and debate on Pan Africanism. Everyone is most welcome!

ENDS

The Market Theatre is a division of The Market Theatre Foundation, an agency of the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture.

For enquiries, please contact Bongiwe Potelwa (Publicist at the Market Theatre Foundation) at bongiwep@marketheatre.co.za or (011) 832 1641.

For reduced price block bookings (of 10 or more) and school groups, contact Anthony Ezeoke at AnthonyE@markettheatre.co.za and 083 246 4950, or Khanyisa Titus at

khanyisat@markettheatre.co.za and 065 955 7182.

NATIONAL ARTS AND CULTURE AWARDS (NACA) 2026 – CALL FOR NOMINATIONS

NATIONAL ARTS AND CULTURE AWARDS (NACA) 2026 - CALL FOR NOMINATIONS New

ADAM’S ALE

ADAM’S ALE

ADAM’S ALE

Adam’s Ale is a powerful one-man theatrical work that explores the complexities of identity, masculinity and loss within contemporary South African society. At the heart of the story is a young man – Letswai – navigating the uncertain space between boyhood and manhood, grappling with what the rite of passage into manhood truly means and whether the expectations placed upon him align with his own understanding of himself.

The story unfolds through a series of memories, reflections and encounters that reveal the protagonist’s journey from innocence to experience. As he confronts the realities of social expectations, absent fatherhood and the pressures of manhood, he is forced to question the values and beliefs that have shaped his life. The work examines how inherited ideas of masculinity can both empower and imprison individuals, while also highlighting the resilience required to break cycles of trauma and silence.

Adam’s Ale is written by Mxolisi Masilela, directed by Banele Yengeni and performed by Kgwadi Tshwarelo Selolo.

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UNTITLED DEEDS

UNTITLED DEEDS

In a desolate land built from tin cans and plastic scraps, survival is a daily act of resistance. There is no water, electricity or any promise of service or care. Only the Law: a merciless system that forces citizens to move endlessly, evicted from one settlement to the next without reason or warning.

At the centre of this world is a family constantly on the run. Each time they build a fragile sense of home, the law arrives to tear it apart, declaring the land forbidden and the people illegal. Homes are dismantled overnight, memories left behind among rusted metal and melting plastic.

As eviction after eviction erodes their dignity and hope, the family begins to question whether the law is meant to control land or to erase the people who live on it. In a world designed to keep its citizens rootless and silent, their struggle becomes a quiet rebellion: the fight to belong, to stay and to exist.

Untitled Deeds is written and directed by Abednigo Moruti Dhlamini.

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