Workshop Negative
Zimbabwe, 1984. Corruption is rife, black people are fighting black people, socialism is being replaced by rampant, vicious capitalism. Nobody is being brave.
Three men represent society in microcosm. Two workers, one black and one white, are employed in the tool-making workshop of an apparently socialist MP. Initially the men view each other as the enemy, since they fought on opposite sides in the liberation struggle. But we rapidly come to see that it is the hypocritical exploitative MP, mouthing socialism while practicing the most oppressive capitalism, who is Zimbabwe’s real enemy. Written as a blackly comic response to the backlash of Zimbabwean independence, WORKSHOP NEGATIVE airs the issues that everyone was talking about at the time, but were too afraid to raise.
Uplifting and funny, and as relevant and powerful as it was at the time of first showing, WORKSHOP NEGATIVE may pull no punches in its analysis of revolution and reconciliation, but its ultimate message is one of reparation and hope.
WORKSHOP NEGATIVE is a UK Premiere and a brand new production from Tangle who make theatre that excites, questions and entertains. Their work encourages people of all kinds to better appreciate the contribution that African - Caribbean people are making to UK society, and to adjust to how that society is changing. Tangle’s new township – style theatre production will tour nationally in 2016, enabling people across the UK to access a new piece of high quality theatre never before seen in the UK.
