Almasi 2015 | A Year Of Rapid Growth And Expansion

In 2015, we conducted our first Playwright’s Festival in collaboration with the Ojai Playwrights Conference. Mr. Robert Egan, Ojai's Artistic Director, along with playwright/director/screenwriter Steven Belber, came to Zimbabwe and provided mentoring for playwrights, actors and directors alike. 2016 will see the launch of our playwright mentorship program, pairing our promising Almasi trained playwrights in Zimbabwe with accomplished American playwrights. This program will function in conjunction with Ojai Playwright’s Conference. We will also commence our director training programs and continue our staged reading programs, now with Almasi trained staged reading directors conducting their own readings.
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Almasi held a Vocal Work and Accent Variation workshop, led by accomplished television, film, theatre and voiceover artist Ross Marquand (The Walking Dead). Marquand taught Almasi artists various techniques in order to have better elocution and varied vocal and accented expression. The participants worked on monologues and were taken through a series of physical and vocal exercises and techniques in order to improve their vocal delivery.

We recently awarded two fellowships that will commence in the new year: Kudzai Sevenzo was awarded a fellowship to go the US to audition for professional acting programs, and Almasi Associate Artistic Director Zaza Muchemwa was awarded a fellowship to intern under Associate Artistic Director Mandy Hackett at New York’s renowned Public Theater. We are thrilled about this progress, the continual connections American and Zimbabwean artists are making, and the vital collaborations formed.  

Watching Gideon Wabvuta perform his one-man show ‘Mbare Dreaming’ in the southern Californian town of Ojai this August, as a result of an Almasi collaboration with Ojai Playwrights Conference, was a deeply moving experience. This is the very reason Almasi exists: to give the African voice opportunity and access to be heard on a global stage. Gideon’s work was riveting, I watched an American audience blown away by this young talented Zimbabwean’s talent, performance and skill. It invigorated me, it illuminated the very reason we continue to strive to bring these programs to pass.

We were deeply pleased to announce Tafadzwa Bob Mutumbi as our first recipient of the Almasi Walter Muparutsa Fellowship for Artists of Excellence. His abilities, dedication and excellence made this selection an obvious one. We truly believe in his future and that at heart he clearly exemplifies the committed, pioneering spirit of the late Mr Muparutsa. This fellowship allowed Tafadzwa to return to the US and enter a Masters Program at the Del’ Arte International School for Physical Theater, where he had already received a partial scholarship. He returned to Zimbabwe in the middle of the year and shared his learned skills with local artists in his astounding Almasi production: Chirorodziva, before returning to the US to commence his master's program.

We continued our popular Staged Reading Series, a free program that promotes dramatic literacy and exposure of great dramatic works to the Zimbabwean community while simultaneously training directors and actors alike. Lynn Nottage’s Fabulation or The Re-Education of Undine, directed by Patience G. Tawengwa, Suzan-Lori Parks' In the Blood, directed by Elizabeth Zaza Muchemwa, Pedro Calderón de la Barca’s Sueño, directed by Kudzai Sevenzo, Relentless by Thandiwe Nyamasvisva, Master’s Shoe, by Gideon Jeph Wabvuta, A Midnight Conundrum, by Elizabeth Zaza Muchemwa, No Good Friday, directed by Sandra Chidawanyika-Goliath, Athol Fugard's Nongogo, directed by Gideon Jeph Wabvuta, and Chirorodziva, an original production conceptualized and facilitated by Tafadzwa Bob Mutumbi.

The world is a poorer place if the African voice is not heard; if the African artist is unable to tell her story. In this newsletter, you have seen the work we've done to support this voice through the necessary training and collaboration, the creation of opportunity, and the constant pursuit of resources that enable these efforts and these budding artists’ projects. Please consider joining me in making a gift to Almasi this year-end. Consider how many more opportunities your gift will create for the artists we've highlighted - Gideon, Tafadzwa, Zaza, Kudzi - as well as the many other budding, talented African artists. It’s time for their voices to be heard. You can make it happen!

Your contribution will:

  • Allow us to continue making our programs free for the Zimbabwean community and for the artists we train.

  • Allow us to continue to provide grants to talented, Zimbabwean artists who have received opportunities in the US.

  • Allow us to continue to provide our Zimbabwean artists with stipends, free lunches and transport during our trainings.

  • Allow us to continue to bring accomplished American artists to Zimbabwe to train, mentor and collaborate.

We believe that the African artist has important stories to tell. We believe the world is ready to hear them. Help us make it so.

Tinotenda,

 

Executive Artistic Director

Sarah Sior Lemmons