Wild West, Bloody Mythology

Dark Noon offered a wonderful performance from South African troupe Fit + Foxy about violence, power, and myths of the Wild West at St Ann’s Warehouse on Brooklyn’s waterfront. The play was a hit at Spoleto and the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and features song, dance, and scathing history. The piece was written and directed by Tue Biering, with rambunctious choreography by Nhlanhla Mahlangu. Mahlangu has worked with William Kentridge and many actors are from the famed Market Theatre Laboratory in Johannesburg.

Ghastly humor and critical history probe myths embedded in our psyche. Using live sports commentary type feeds as narration, text and song unveil power conflicts as bloody “entertainment.” Direct testimony from the actors at the end of the piece documented how Wild West TV shows and movies infiltrate our brains as children. No one will miss the fascinating comparisons with the colonial history of South Africa which invented its own brand of settler mythology to render dispossession, cultural annihilation, murder and injustice as natural features of Boer history.

Train tracks cross a set which fills with ominous institutions obliterating indigenous culture from brothel to detention camp, church to prison. White face, blonde wigs, crazy hats and zany costumes, along with galloping entries from all sides keep heads swiveling. At times audience members were recruited to form a congregation in a church or witnesses to mayhem and murder. Tumbling, heel clicks, pratfalls and genocide stuffed the stage with crackling commentary. #darknoon #nhlanhlamalangu #stannswarehouse