By Ndalo Mbombo
Almost 10 years of experience in multiple mediums allow Campbell Meas to show that art is the lens through which she sees the world. She is an actress, writer, director, and theatre maker. She also models but, she admits with amusement, “Only when I remember to shave my legs.”
Beyond the gifts of time and resources to write a script, the award has “reignited a curiosity that I’d lost”, she says. “I think that’s the biggest gift — being given the time and space to explore that curiosity.” The result is Vakavigwa (Buried/They Were Buried), the winning script currently in development.
Meas is a storyteller who refuses to be bound to one discipline. She challenges herself to create across mediums — which is what she plans to do with this play. In the form of Live Cinema, Vakavigwa is “not your typical theatre play”. She explains: “If a moment ends on stage, we are able to follow it into the wings and see what other parts of the story are being told in those moments that aren’t being staged live in front of the audience. Looking around the corner and just spying on what else is being told.” Live Cinema involves cameras, performers, crew, directors, and the shooting and screening of the performance, all in the same venue right before an audience, challenging viewers to exist in multiple worlds simultaneously.
Meas shared the vision accompanying this story within a story. “The story is dealing with choices, consequences and accountability. So I’m asking the crew and the production team to do the same thing, to be accountable to the creative choices, to deal with any consequences of the technology, to be responsible for what we are showing on stage alongside the actors.”
Vakavigwa follows a year after the death of a Zimbabwean student, Tinashe, who died on a contested piece of land. Its community claims the land is a historical burial ground but they face a construction company that wants to buy the land to build on it. Tinashe’s death becomes an unsolved mystery until Khanyi, a detective, starts to dig deeper into the case. Khanyi, who is well on her way to becoming a mother, was witness to an episode of domestic violence involving a colleague. Elizabeth, an architect consultant for the construction company, is the third character revealed later in the story who carries her own secrets. Her journey becomes about uncovering her truth and her sense of responsibility.
Meas’ interest in pushing boundaries and working across mediums promises an intricate performance that might compel you to stand and bark directions at the director or glue you to the edge of your seat in silence.
Born from a collaboration process that started in 2016 and then benched, this script has haunted Meas ever since. The competition — and her need to unpack why she felt unseen by herself — helped jumpstart the writer’s hand that had stopped in 2016.
Referring to preparation of the final script with assigned mentor Dr Refiloe Lepere, Meas says, “I really had to sit with the story, and I had to understand who are these characters, what was their journey, and what was the point of this journey.”
Thinking like a director or an actress became a challenge that presented an opportunity for growth. “I had to learn, by trial and error, being a writer, and to put aside all of my creative hats in order to write.” She recalls starting a solo pity party but recovering quickly to continue refining the play. “I’m looking forward to being a part of that rehearsal process in whichever manner that I am able to.”
