Thirst

11 minutes of pure movement kick off Season 5 of the Centre for the Less Good Idea’s 3rd programme.

Directed by David April and performed by Phumlani Mndebele, Thirst is an 11-minute epic explored through the reaches of physicality and the capability of the human form. Mndebele, dressed only in a pair of dancer’s trunks, allows his body to flow, curl, jolt and unfurl across the stage. At times he moves as if in a stop-motion animation sequence. Other times he is as fluid and unbound as the liquid element he is personifying through his performance.

Music is key to Thirst. A section of Zakir Hussain’s ‘The Elements: Space’ is the soundtrack to Mndebele’s performance and, comprising a series of sparse but deeply rhythmic percussive sections, it both informs and offsets Mndebele’s performance throughout.

If Season 5’s programmes of 11-minute performances are an exploration of epics in the short form, then consider Thirst to be a shining example of an epic that is picked apart and recreated almost exclusively through the human body.  

DIRECTED BY | David April
CHOREOGRAPHED BY: David April | Phumlani Mndebele
ADDITIONAL CHOREOGRAPHIC INPUT BY | Shanell Winlock-Pailman
PERFORMED BY | Phumlani Mndebele
MUSIC | The Elements: Space by Zakir Hussain

WRITER | Dave Mann
VIDEO ENGINEER & EDITOR | Noah Cohen
STILLS PHOTOGRAPHER | Nina Lieska