Adapted for the stage by Qondiswa James, Ziawa Jande’s The Bone Stomach is a haunting, lyrical story about inheritance, womanhood, and the unseen forces that bind family, memory, and land.
On the evening of Grammah K’s death, we follow three generations of women who are healers born without navels. We follow their use of an ancestral ritual to awaken their buried history, uncovering an old story of corruption, betrayal, murder, and justice. The boundaries between myth and reality are dissolved through song, dance, and the timelessness of the forest.
James uses African storytelling to explore how stories are carried in the body, how women inherit both trauma and strength, and how cycles of violence can be reclaimed and reimagined.
CAST:
Funeka Zamokuhle Zondi
KwaZulu-Natal–born multidisciplinary creative working across theatre, performance, media presenting and writing. Her practice is rooted in storytelling and meaningful human connection. She is currently completing a degree in Live Performance, where her training has strengthened her discipline, collaboration, and artistic intention. Funeka’s work both onstage and behind the scenes has shaped her into a versatile, adaptable artist committed to growth.
Sithembile OkaGwabini Zungu
is a multifaceted South African performer whose career began at the age of five. She has worked across theatre, television and media. A previous Fleur du Cap Theatre Awards nominee, Sithembile has also gained national recognition through competitive cooking platforms and magazine features. She is currently building a strong presence in the voice industry growing her professional footprint.
Lerato Sotshinga
is an emerging South African, multidisciplinary performance artist and trained dancer. She holds a BA in Live Performance from AFDA, specialising in acting for theatre with a minor in media. Her work is driven by research-led, ensemble-based practices and an interest in socially engaged storytelling. Lerato continues to develop her artistic voice through collaboration, curiosity, and performances that reflect lived experience and social impact.
Sinobabalo Dlokova
Multifaceted Cape Town–based theatre maker, director, writer, dancer, and entrepreneur from the Eastern Cape. A graduate of The Rainbow Academy, she has performed in numerous productions including Behind the Secret; Tomorrow is Darkness; Sixteen; Shadows and Damaged, earning accolades such as Best Director at the Ukukhanya Kwelanga Drama Festival and Best Ensemble for Ingqiqo Yobutyhakala at Zabalaza Theatre Festival. She has showcased her dance capabilities with Cape Town Carnival, Trained at Ikasi Creative, and holds an N6 in Business Management. As CEO of Lily Rose Creatives NPO, Dlokova champions storytelling, community empowerment, and diversity in the arts.
Cheyenne Pearce
A Cape Town–based stage and screen actress with a Bachelor of Arts in Live Performance. Her work includes theatre and student film productions such as Satiated; F* Slur, and The Fire. She is passionate about storytelling that raises awareness and gives voice to underrepresented experiences. Cheyenne continues to build her career across stage and screen, focusing on meaningful and socially conscious work.
Lesedi Mbewu
From Willowvale, Eastern Cape, Lesedi is a South African multidisciplinary artist working across performance, music and puppetry. Currently studying Live Performance and Business in the Arts. Her poetry gained national attention with I Am Not Next, created with Siphamandla Arts Group. In music, she released her debut EP Right Person Wrong Timing (2023). Her stage credits include Complicated - Azande Theatre, Ixesha, and the Cape Town Carnival.
Creative Team:
DIRECTOR
Qondiswa James
Freelance cultural worker living in Johannesburg. She is an award-winning writer, performer and theater-maker, performance and installation artist, arts facilitator, scholar, and activist. Her work engages the socio-political imagination towards mobilizing transgression. She has staged public art interventions at Infecting the City Cape Town, Live Arts Festival, FNB Art Joburg, Centre for the Less Good Idea, Les Rencontres a L'échelle (France), Arcade (Makhanda), Live Art Network Africa, AiiA Festival (Switzerland), Suidoosterfees, A4 Arts Centre (China), UCT’s Work of Arts Committee, and Wits University’s Towards Critical Apartheid Studies. Her installation work has been exhibited at the Spier Light Art Festival and the Stellenbosch Triennale. Her onscreen appearances include High Fantasy (DIFF 2018 Best South African Film Award, Artistic Bravery Award) and Letters from the Continent (Holland Film Festival 2021). In 2024 she was a resident artist at the A4 Artist Residency in Chengdu, where she collaborated on a digital hybrid performance, Youth in History. She has directed theatre works including A Faint Patch of Light (winner of a 2019 Standard Bank Ovation Award); her original play A HOWL IN MAKHANDA (Fleur du Cap Award 2022 Best New Script, Best Original Composition); and an original solo work, Retch (Naledi Award 2024 Best Performer on the Fringe). In 2024 she staged a new play, Amaxelegu, at Market Theatre under their play development program. Earlier in 2025 she directed a new work in progress, Dump State, about homelessness and evictions in the tidy City of Cape Town.
CHOREOGRAPHER
Siphesihle Nkantini
is a choreographer and theatre performer from Langa, Cape Town, working across physical theatre, poetry, and music. A 2022 Magnet Theatre graduate, who later studied Theatre-Making at the University of Cape Town. Some of his notable works include EMERGING FOOTPRINTS directed by Nwabisa Plaarjie; INGQUMBO directed by Thando Doni at Magnet Theatre; RIPPED directed by Jennie Reznek and Jayne Batzofin; FLAMES OF MY BLOOD at Somerset Playhouse in the Parel Vallei Playhouse Drama Festival; NDIJONGIWE by Mthuthuzeli Blaze Zimba; ACTS OF KINDNESS; and THE TIDES IN (ME)DEA with Chuma Sopotela. Siphesihle also works as a stage manager, assistant director, and choreographer
MUSIC DIRECTOR & COMPOSER
Karabo Hope Banda
Fleur du Cap–nominated actor, singer, writer, dancer, and theatre maker from Northan, Limpopo. She holds a BA Honours in Theatre and Performance from the University of Cape Town. Prior to UCT, she trained and worked as a student and freelance artist at the South African State Theatre and was a member of the State Theatre Youth Choir. In 2024, she joined the Magnet Theatre Youth Company, performing in Manje Manje and Glimmer. Her directing credits include Agamemnon and Woza Albert at AFDA 2025.
STAGE MANAGER
Oratile Manamela
Cape Town–based theatre practitioner and storyteller who graduated with a BA in Live Performance. She juggles various roles as a theatre-maker, contributing to both the creative and organizational ecosystem. Her stage management credits include productions from the Zabalaza Theatre Festival, Theatre Arts, Baxter Theatre, and Magnet Theatre. As a performer, she appeared in A HOWL IN MAKHANDA at the Redhill Arts Festival 2025 and in multiple AFDA productions, including The House of Bernarda Alba and Antigone. She continues to build a multidisciplinary practice rooted in collaborative and meaningful storytelling.
WRITER
Ziawa Jande
Hawa Jande Golakai
Born in Germany, she spent her lively childhood in Liberia until the 1990 civil war. A refugee and cultural nomad, she has lived and worked in several African countries. Jande, a clinical immunologist by training, also works as an author, educator, and consultant. She writes crime and speculative fiction. She is a laureate of the Africa39 list of promising sub-Saharan writers and is listed in New African magazine’s 100 Most Influential Africans of 2016. She won the 2017 Brittle Paper Award for nonfiction and was longlisted for the 2019 NOMMO Award for speculative fiction. She has been shortlisted three times for her crime novels. Jande is a 2020-21 Miles Morland Scholarship winner for Spectral, her upcoming jujuism fantasy book. She is also working on a collection of Liberian mystical folktales. Her works have featured in Granta, BBC, Brittle Paper, Omenana, Isele Magazine, Gutter Press, and other publications. Currently, she lives in Monrovia with her son.