Masterful Lung's puts spotlight on 21st-century liberal dilemmas

Lungs was an exceptional staging. Afropocalypse at the Market is further proof of the world-classness of Joburg's theatre offering.

- By Richard Poplak

Sanda Shandu (left) and Jazzara Jaslyn play M and L in Bianca Amato's sterling version of Lungs, by Duncan Macmillan, at Montecasino's Pieter Toerien's Studio.

(Photos: Claude Bernado)

The staggeringly good production of Lungs, which played at Montecasino's Pieter Toerien's Studio last month, opened with broadcasts of a climate catastrophe. It closed, many years later, with broadcasts of a climate catastrophe. Plus ça change, as they say.

Between those parentheses, we track the struggles of a millennial-ish liberal couple who sort of maybe want to start a family? But, oy vey, the carbon footprint inflicted on the planet by a baby human! To breed or not to breed, that is the question.

In other words, Lungs is the most Jewish piece of theatre not written by a Jewish playwright. There's kvetching, kvelling, kibitzing and, most importantly, napping. Written by the English playwright Duncan Macmillan and first performed in 2011, it was seamlessly adapted for the South African context by director Bianca Amato.