Theatre in the Park to stage Gurira’s play

her play “In the Continuum,” staged at Theatre in the Park in Harare from November 22 to 26.
The play will be staged as part of the World Aids Day commemorations that are held every year on December 1.
The staging of the play was made possible courtesy of a grant from United States Embassy in Zimbabwe who availed the funds through the US President’s Plan for Emergency Aids Relief.
The relief programme availed US$57 million towards the fight against HIV and Aids in Zimbabwe for the year 2011.
Gurira’s play – that will be staged after Raisedon Baya’s production “The Two Wives of John Mambo” that is currently running at Theatre in the Park until November 5 – was co-authored by Nikkole Salter.
It tells the story of a Zimbabwean journalist, Abigail Murambe, and a Los Angeles teenager named Nia James who has lived most of her early life living in foster homes after being disowned by her parents.
As fate would have it, they both discover that they are pregnant but the most compounding factor to their situation is their discovery that they are both HIV positive.
This leads to their ostracisation by their families and communities, a situation that leaves them in torment.
It shows how the situation is not just limited to one place but how it is affecting people on a global scale.
It challenges people to seriously look into the problems they face en masse and find a holistic way of solving them.
“In The Continuum” makes its return to Zimbabwe after it was performed in Zimbabwe in 2006 at the Harare International Festival of the Arts.
The play has won Gurira a number of awards on the international scale.
These include the Global Tolerance’ Award (Friends of the United Nations) which she won in 2004, Obie Award (2006), Outer Critics, John Gassner Award (2006) and receiving an honour from the Theatre Hall of Fame.
Guririra repeated the feat in 2007, after receiving the Helen Hayes Award for Best Lead Actress in “In the Continuum” at Woolly Mammoth Theatre in Washington, DC.
An elated Gurirra said she honoured to be lifting the Zimbabwean flag high abroad.
“It’s nice to see that other women have picked it up and other productions have been made based on it, to step out in front of the world as a professional actor,” she said.