Hillary lndi, director Elysium Magna Dance Theatre, has said their latest production Last of my Kind is a perfect gift for the end of year festivities.
Indi said the dance theatrical, which premiered at the Theatre in the Park in Harare on Friday last week, was full of humour and satire which lessen the tension that traditionally visits the havenots during the Christmas and the New Year celebrations. Most recently Elysium Magna Dance Theatre was at it again as it staged an emotion arousing Shinga Ndozvinoita Imba, which urges couples to be resilient in marriages.
Last of my Kind teaches that harassment, cheating and home fights do not add anything to life other than a permanent destruction to the joy and romance that may have been.
Indi said the play carried several powerful themes which needed to be fully explored for people in marriage to live happily. The play provokes the mind to think about what should be viewed as true love.
"The play focuses heavily on the emotional manipulation and psychological torment the woman endures at the hands of her husband. His indifference and cruelty are central to the portrayal of emotional abuse, revealing how words and actions can destroy a person’s sense of self-worth over time." Open infidelity is a key theme, illustrating the husband's blatant disregard for his wife’s feelings. His cheating is not just physical but emotional, as he flaunts his affairs without shame, deepening her sense of betrayal and isolation."
The stage play is set within the walls of a home that has become a prison and it tells the harrowing story of a woman trapped in a toxic marriage. Her husband has become a source of relentless pain — cheating openly and subjecting her to emotional blackmail and abuse. Day after day, she suffers in silence, unable to confront the brutal truth of her crumbling reality.
"The play takes place over the course of one fateful day. From the start, tension hangs in the air as she once again faces her husband’s blatant infidelity, marked by lipstick stains and careless conversations with other women. But today is different. Today, something within her begins to shift. As the day wears on, her anguish builds, and years of emotional torture and trauma bubble to the surface.
"In a heated confrontation, she finally confronts her husband, unleashing the pain she’s carried for far too long. She speaks of her shattered dreams, her stolen self-worth and the weight of his betrayal. He meets her accusations with indifference, his emotional manipulation cutting deeper with every word. The exchange is raw, intense, and heartbreaking — a culmination of all the unspoken hurt that has festered between them," the synopsis read in part.
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Indi pointed out that the Elysium Magna Dance Theatre has been tracing and trying to correct women’s history of trauma, from being forced into a loveless marriage to the constant emotional torture and the long-lasting effects of unresolved pain.
"Despite everything, her (the woman in the play) decision not to drink poison at the end brings forth the theme of resilience — though shattered, she is still standing, leaving room for hope.The theme of isolation is woven throughout the play, both physically and emotionally. The woman’s silence, her internalisation of the pain and the lack of external support showcase how people in abusive relationships often suffer alone, without the resources or the strength to speak out.
“The husband’s dominance over his wife is portrayed as a power dynamic in which he controls her emotions through neglect and manipulation. This imbalance of power is a hallmark of abusive relationships, where one partner seeks to dominate the other’s life,” lndi said.
