At 50, Ben Voss asks ‘Am I still relevant?’ (hold)

Becoming Benno, Theatre
Venue: Victoria Theatre
Interview
By Rosa-Karoo Loewe
Daily Dispatch 

At 50, Durban-based performer and comedian Ben Voss doubted whether anyone would want to see him back on the National Arts Festival stage.

“I’ve been a bit trepidatious,” he said. “You hit 50 and you’re like, am I relevant at all any more?”

But his new one-man show, Becoming Benno, is so, so, funny.

“This is a show I’ve written from my heart,” he said. “I haven’t been back since 2019, and I wondered if people would still be interested.

“Art is valuable if you are doing it, but even more valuable if people see it.”

The award-winning performer, known to many for his work as the satirical Beauty Ramapelepele, or his Green and Black Mamba comedy shows, which came to the festival over the years, is now performing as a version of himself caught between his SA roots and a new life in Australia.

This premise has become a sort of local joke. Saffas longing to fly off into the Aussie sunset for the promise of a safer, better-governed utopia.

Was it Trevor Noah who did the “that’s it I’m moving to Australia” high-pitched woman’s voice skit that went viral?

Though Becoming Benno also looks at this split, he likes to think it’s not running away from a home you hate, but carrying that SA flavour with you to the newer pastures.

“The show is about this dual personality,” he explained. “One foot in SA, one foot in Australia, and caught in no-man’s-land between two cultures. Do you want to run away from home, or are you moving towards something else? Are you abandoning your life, or just creating new options?”

The show was developed as part of his application for a global talent visa to Australia, which he received with much gratitude in 2024. “It was after the riots in Durban. I started writing this show and thinking about the 400-plus people dead in the streets, which shocked me as someone with a 10-year-old daughter.”

Voss reached out to legendary satirist Pieter-Dirk Uys for a reference letter needed in the application process, and two lines in the email made him relook at the show’s concept. “He wrote the letter and in the email said: ‘You’ve just got to be clear about what you are doing.”

He’s not interested in people running away from SA; he’s interested in people who are running towards something else. “SA is not something to run away from,” he said. “It is a beautiful place, and it’s built an entire career for me. If you are lucky enough to have the chance, immigration can be about carrying the torch forward. That is what this has been for me.”

Voss has deep ties to the Eastern Cape. He credits the National Arts Festival with launching his career.

“There is an earthiness to Eastern Cape people that works. The festival really set me up. The unpretentious nature of the theatre, I do, which speaks to the Gqeberha and East London crowd. I think they get that.”

After beginning work on the show in early 2024, Voss shared a draft with a few trusted colleagues, including John van de Ruit, Steven Stead and Schalk Bezuidenhout. Their feedback helped him reshape the script into something more grounded and authentic.

“They thought it was too stand-up,” Voss said. “Schalk loved it. John thought I was rehashing old gags. He pushed me to make it more honest.”

Van de Ruit, author of the popular Spud book series and the second half of the Mamba comedies, came on as dramaturge through the process, and veteran of the arts, Michael Richard, came on board to guide rehearsals for its first runs in Johannesburg before the Adelaide festival.

“Michael is an old god of the theatre,” Voss said. “I worked with him for three weeks in December [2024] before heading to Adelaide in February.”

There, Becoming Benno was packed! Audiences loved it.

“The production was selected as one of five finalists for the Adelaide Fringe’s Best of the Fest award after winning a weekly category.”

Voss said many Saffas had been in the audience, cackling to see a satirised version of their own stories retold on stage. “It is funny, touching, heartfelt, moving, and relevant,” he said. “And a much better use of 55 minutes than sitting on your phone. Or even drinking a beer at a pub.”

“One guy came up after the show and said he moved there with a professional visa when he was 24, got stuck there during Covid, and basically couldn’t leave as he didn’t have a tourist visa, so the system had him trapped. He had to basically stay at home for seven years. I think he was only able to work at 30.”

“Lots of people have found it really hard. It’s quite a bun fight to get a visa. Australia is quite proud and very selective of what it does. There is this sense of gratitude if you are approved. It’s a very exclusive society, until you’re included.”

“I can work and tour there now. And I was surprised by how encouraging South Africans are, both here and abroad.”

Becoming Benno runs at the Victoria Theatre in Makhanda until July 5.

National tour dates include Durban’s Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre from July 9-21, with additional dates in Cape Town, Johannesburg and Pretoria.