The Backpack and Africa Travel Centre

Brief history of the Space Theatre

The original Space was founded in Bloem Street, May 1972 by theatre photographer Brian Astbury and his actress wife Yvonne Bryceland and relocated in 1976 to the YMCA building 44 Long St. The SPACE established itself as a defiantly non-racial venue in a racially-divided country. The first pioneering fringe theatre in the country (pre Market and Baxter Theatres), it mounted almost 300 productions starting with the premier of Athol Fugard’s Statements After an Arrest under the Immorality Act. It hosted the first productions of the Kani/Ntshona/Fugard collaborations The Island and Sizwe Bansi is Dead, and gave a voice to Donald Howarth’s Othello Slegs Blankes, Fatima Dike and Pieter Dirk Uys’ early plays, and many others.

It became the home of Yvonne Bryceland, Athol Fugard, Pieter Dirk Uys, David Kramer, Barney Simon, Winston Ntshona, John Kani, Bill Flynn, Richard E Grant, Paul Slabolepsy, Marius Weyers, Marthinus Basson, Fiona Ramsay, Percy Sieff, Fatima Dike, Ian Roberts, Henry Goodman, Trix Pienaar, Grethe Fox, Bill Curry, Neil Mc Carthy, Denise Newman, Christine Basson, Mavis Taylor, Maralin van Reenen, Thoko Ntshinga, Dawie Malan, Kieth Grenville, Jacqui Singer, Roger Dwyer and a host of many more young actors, directors and writers who would become stars and stalwarts of the South African stage.

Now 36 years later, with the encouragement of its founding members and in line with City Council’s Inner City Development programme, it has re opened its doors to theatre goers as a welcome addition to the Cape Town Theatre Scene and already buzzing night life that is rejuvenating the city centre especially the Long Street area.