Theatre in the Dark - DJELI

“Djeli” is a Mandinka term from the land of Mali that means “blood” and also means “storyteller”. When the French colonised West Africa, they popularised the word “griot” to refer to the storytellers who were custodians of the history of the peoples of this region. The use of the word griot means that the bond between the blood and the storyteller was erased. This play attempts to re-establish that bond.

The play Djeli is about an eternal bond between a pair of gifted djeli twins named Douma and Pule, who come from the 12th century AD. They are the descendants of a royal lineage of djelis (storytellers and custodians of truth, culture, sacred wisdom, royal history and secret memory). After their kingdom is attacked by a neighbouring tyrant-king, named Soumangoro, their family is slain to ensure complete annihilation of their kingdom's traditions. Their grandfather, Oba, who was taking care of the twins after their parents mysteriously went missing while on a royal assignment to the land of Sosso, is blamed for not warning the villagers. When he is assassinated by Sassouma, the illegitimate Empress, Douma, the boy, decides to steal the sacred golden stones in the eyes of the Golden Elephant guarding the tomb of Maghan Kon Fatta, the father of Emperor Sundiata Keita. With these stones he can travel in time to shift the course of history, but when things don't go as planned their lives are plunged into an endless loop where they have to keep watching their loved ones die. Finally, when the death becomes unbearable for Pule, she decides to follow Oba’s orders to travel to Timbuktu to the new scholars to record their history, their traditions and the truth about what had happened to the exiled Emperor. The twins no longer agree about which path to follow and a rift develops between them. One twin believes they should go back in time to change the course of history, while the other wants them to move forward so that the future does not forget about them.

Will Pule manage to convince Douma to leave the infinite loop of grief, or will she leave him alone in the desert, severing their bond forever? For, Djeli also means blood, and without their blood, there will be no more stories.

ARTIST BIOS

Mmatumisang Motsisi is theatre-maker, educator and performer based in Stellenbosch, South Africa. She facilitates meaning making through the body as the primary means of discovery, exploration and expression. Her work emerges from a curiosity around People, Place and Positionality. She is currently pursuing a PhD in Higher Education at Stellenbosch University and Coventry University. 

Katlego Chale is a South African theatre writer, dramaturge, actor, voice artist, lecturer and social entrepreneur. He is the Theatre Topics Lecturer in the English Department at the University of the Western Cape, and holds an MTech (Cum Laude), from the Drama Department at the Tshwane University of Technology (TUT). Katlego is in the latter stages of a PhD at the Drama Department at the University of Pretoria (UP), where he is writing about the linkages between public intellectualism and post-Apartheid South African theatre artists. Katlego has lectured scriptwriting at TUT, UP and WITS, and has experience teaching theatre subjects including physical theatre (theory and praxis), theatre history and arts administration. 

Most recently, Katlego has curated a Reading Room for Theatre Arts Observatory, where a team of actors staged readings selected from Monageng Motshabi’s publishing house, diartskonageng. In 2017, Katlego started The Writers’ Lab, an organization that provides spaces for writers to sharpen their craft within a larger supportive community and test, produce and publish their work. In 2021, The Writers’ Lab published its first anthology of plays, titled HAUNTINGS, which features four plays by Refiloe Lepere, Khutjo Green, Olivia Fischer and Jade Beeby. The Writers’ Lab has hosted multiple readings and festivals, and in 2023 they hosted the Hauntings Directors Festival, where Katlego was an organizer, and most recently, the Gathering of Stories Festival where Katlego’s new play, DJELI was performed in a staged reading for the first time.

Katlego is also part of the Creative Research Lab, and most recently performed alongside Lorin Sookool and Michael Bhatch at the AVA Gallery’s NEXXUS event in Cape Town. His other plays include Ubulution (2016), an adaptation and re-reading of Jane Taylor’s Ubu and the Truth Commission in collaboration with Professor Janine Lewis; STAINS (2018), a political theatre thriller based on the investigative journalism done by Marianne Thamm of the Daily Maverick; Motlotlegi (2019), an adaptation of Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar in collaboration with director, Dr Karina Lemmer; and lastly, NSO ANI (2021), a re-reading of Chinua Achebe’s Things Fall Apart that has yet to be performed, commissioned by the Theatre Duo – Billy Langa and Mahlatsi Mokgonyana.

Katlego is also a close collaborator with the TX Theatre, and has recently joined the theatre’s Board as a non-Executive member.  

Tiffani Kayler Dlamini is a Theatre Maker. Tiffani has a vast background in theatre technical management and training. She is currently the Adam Small theatre Complex’s Venue Manager and theatre Technician, as well as the US Drama Department’s Production Manager and Front of House Manager. She is also the part of the creative team for an environmental conservation and art project called Turning into Flowers. Tiffani is a Masters Candidate at the University of Stellenbosch, her research is focused on “The political is personal” and how ‘Coloured’ culture is developed through storytelling and the silences and gaps that exist. She is also interested in theatre for women by women and education through the arts. Tiffani was the Assistant Producer on the South African Film Zulu Wedding and she has worked with many arts festivals as the Festival Programming Officer for the Shakespeare schools festival South Africa, The Festival Coordinator of the RAPS Schools Festival Johannesburg. She is the current Festival Project Manager for the Spier Light Art Festival. She co-owns a company called She of the Fire; which is focused on theatre for women by women and it us also focused on growth of education and healing through the arts. Tiffani has worked as the Stage, Tour and Company Manager for the Well Worn theatre Company and many more. She lives by the motto Changing the world one girl at a time.