How to Harness Anger

Bradley Steyn and Janet Smith talk to award-winning movie director Mandla Dube about how to make your revolution happen by reworking the fury and limitations around you into a creative force.

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Chapters

• 0:00 Tackling politics and anger through filmmaking
• 12:34 Transformation of the anger into meaningful art
• 20:45 The need for Africa to contribute meaningfully to humanity's story.
• 35:41 Harnessing Anger Through Creativity

Transcript

[Bradley Steyn]

My name is Bradley Steyn. I was born in Pretoria, South Africa. Growing up, I witnessed firsthand the brutality of hate and apartheid.

And as a teenager in 1988, I survived a massacre that would change the course of my life forever. And that's why I decided to take a stand and join the intelligence unit of Nelson Mandela's spy network. In the course of our dedicated efforts during that time, we successfully unearthed a sinister plot to assassinate Nelson Mandela at his 1994 inauguration.

This was a pivotal moment in South African history. Would we go into civil war? Would there be peace?

But it also marked a significant stride towards advancing human rights for all South Africans. Little did I know, a hit was placed on us. And I just managed to escape South Africa and find refuge abroad.

I used my experiences and my expertise and teamed up with leading security professionals, where I was fortunate enough to work with some of the most fascinating people in the world. Now I'm back in South Africa, ready to take on the rising tide of crime, murder, and corruption that has tainted South Africa's journey towards liberation and our democracy. Join me, Bradley Steyn, your co-host, along with journalist and author Janet Smith, and our special lineup of guests as we go undercover.

In this series, we will be declassifying our past, while we bring you the untold stories of our silent warriors, activists, and patriots. We'll also get a different perspective from our youth, where our democracy is today, 30 years later. Through these conversations together, we can shape the future we aspire to.

[Janet Smith]

Barend Strydom's racist massacre on a public square in Pretoria was one of the defining events of the last years of apartheid. It was November 1988. Global condemnation and international boycotts were finally grinding the world's supremacist outpost to a halt,

But even as expectations grew that there could be a peaceful transition to democracy, some, like Strydom, believed whites were being betrayed. The former policemen and army conscripts set out to make his statements in the most horrifying way possible. In total, eight black people were the victims of his rage.

The blood that covered the piazza outside the state theatre also came to mark the boundary between freedom and a form of captivity for Bradley Steyn, who was a teenager when he walked into the mass shooting. Bradley's life was spared by the killer because he was white. Yet that bloodied boundary was so destructive to his mental health that Bradley eventually put down those experiences and the astonishing true life events that followed into a non-fiction thriller, undercover with Mandela's spies.

This podcast takes you on a journey with Bradley and a number of extraordinary guests to examine the toll South Africa's battlefields have taken on our minds and how we can continue to work on our shared recovery. I am Janet Smith, and in this episode, we welcome award-winning film director and top South African creative Mandla Dube. Please join us for How to Harness Anger, which is created in honour of Strydom's 's sixth victim, 35-year-old Sekwato David Klometsana.

Sekwato was shot in the chest in the City Soul Jazz Bar record shop on Princess Street. Thank you for joining us. I'll hand over to Bradley now to welcome Mandela.

[Bradley Steyn]

Mandla, thank you so much for being here. I'm very excited about this one because Mandla and his work have truly inspired so many South Africans, with his body of work that truly gives honor to the legacy and the memory and the heritage of our liberation stories. Mandla is the director of Kalushi, the Solomon Mahlangu movie.

He's also the director of one of the hottest movies out on Netflix at the moment, Silverton Siege. And he's my buddy too, and he's also a farmer. And I just thought that'd be a great idea to bring Mandla in just to also give us a great perspective on how collectively we as South Africans can start doing so much better.

Mandla, thank you.

[Janet Smith]

Mandla, I wanted to begin looking at the title, How to Harness Anger, which is an unusual title, perhaps, under which to interview you. The reason for this is that politics and art can sometimes substitute for each other. Sometimes they are mortal enemies.

Sometimes it makes sense to bring them together. But as a director of cinema in South Africa and as an African, you are dealing with a terrain in which anger is a common theme. And you've tackled it in different ways.

You've tackled it through a documentary. You've tackled it through a feature film. You've tackled it through comedy.

And if we can begin there and look at what anger has meant to you as a member of the creative community.

[Mandla Dube]
Thanks a lot. I really appreciate being here. And thanks for inviting me.

I'm literally in the middle of a production now. So I really thank the gods above that we're able to squeeze in and make time to be able to chat. It's very important that we have these conversations, that we're able to open up continuous dialogue and meet each other and learn from each other.

And then we will be able to be putting together, suppose, a conveyor belt, if you want to call it, for the ones that are coming. You know, there's an African saying that the beautiful ones are yet to be born. So for those that are yet to come, let us put, you know, beauty so that they can be able to have something to hang on.

And, yeah, stories that one has worked on and storytelling, I believe, comes from the heart. Right. So, you know, I think when we approach storytelling from the heart, you know, you are required to come with a certain sense of honesty or you are required to come with a certain sense of truth.

And my truth, your truth, Bradley's truth can be different. But at least we are coming from the heart. We are saying this is honestly who I am and know and this is my heritage and, you know, accept it for what it is and accept yours.

And, you know, we can and I've learned a lot from being a collaborator with filmmakers who have managed to harness all sorts of emotions into two hours, an hour and a half, you know, a 20-minute short film or stage play or whatever. Coincidentally, in your opening remarks, you're talking about the South African State Theatre. Kalushi, the story of Solomon Mahlangu, was first a stage play at the South African State Theatre where Bradley witnessed the massacre on Strijdom Square.

And, you know, we did the Rivonia trial as a stage play there, too. I should say I started lecturing at Wits University around 2005 and I saw the apathy amongst my students. They said they don't want to participate in South African voting and they don't really care.

And I was like, guys, you know, Wits University here, you know, you guys, this is your opportunity to be able to say something on who you are. You know, and I said, why should we? Why should nobody care?

And I said, well, you know, I'm a filmmaker. The content that I would love to make or produce or direct is really for you as my students. You know, so literally, to tell you the truth, I came up with this concept called the Legends of Freedom series.

And these Legends of Freedom were Kalushi, Solomon Mahlangu, the Rivonia trialists and Sylverton Siege. And the city of Pretoria was a character in as far as these stories are concerned. And in my interviews and in my research, the city of Pretoria being the capital was the citadel of what represented apartheid.

Angai, as you're talking about. So in doing the stage play Kalushi at the South African State Theatre, where you readily witnessed the massacre, was just was also cathartic. It was also healing.

Right. And coincidentally, we ended up shooting the film Kalushi at the Palace of Justice, inside the Palace of Justice, where Nelson Mandela and they were sentenced to go to prison for life. And we ended up shooting Silverton Siege at the Church Square next to the Palace of Justice as well, a stone's throw away from the South African State Theatre.

And inevitably, when we do the Rivonia trial, we're going to have to shoot at the South African State. Sorry, we're going to have to shoot at the Church Square anyway, because the Palace of Justice is at the Church Square, another stone's throw away from the South African State Theatre. So when you talk about anger and channeling anger, you know, cinema gives us an opportunity to be able to look at ourselves on the screen and laugh, cry, heal.

[Bradley Steyn]

A retrospective look.

[Mandla Dube]

Yeah. Yeah. It gives us an opportunity for us to do that.

And the heritage, what I always say to my students as well, you know, and it's the truth. When you go and watch a film, you bring your own background, and then we'll sit inside a dark room and we'll watch this magical experience in front of us. There are parts where I will laugh as an audience member.

There are parts where you will cry. And I will be like, OK, for me, tears are not going to come down. I'll laugh.

So we all bring our own. That's why it's so magical to be able to. And it's such a wonderful opportunity to be able to be a filmmaker, you know, to be awarded the opportunity to tell a story.

One of the films that I made as a cinematographer directed by Miki Dube was on Robert Sobukwe. Sobukwe, A Great Soul. So when you learn about people like Sobukwe and what they went through, I mean, actually Sobukwe was a lecturer at Wits University, if I'm not mistaken.

I think he was the first black lecturer at Wits University. I remember telling the students that, you know, you can't not want to participate in the politics of your country. Were you mad?

[Bradley Steyn]

Yeah.

[Mandla Dube]

So that's what the response that I saw from my students was not wanting to participate. It was a catalyst for me to say, listen, I didn't go to film school. I didn't go through the whole experience of living in the United States and, you know, not to tell these stories.

So believe it or not, I and I were having a big challenge with the institution at Wits because they were not allowing, I felt, the students to go out there and touch cameras and tell these stories out in the field. And they were not preparing them strongly enough to be able to participate meaningfully in the film industry. So there was a whole, it just came at the time when I also felt like I should just step out there and teach on the field with my students.

And I think that was the best decision I made. So, yeah, so and I mean, one of my best friends is Teddy Mattera, whose father just passed away. Uncle Don, you know, may he rest in peace.

And I remember asking Teddy, could you direct Galushi? And he says, no man, I can't. It's a big responsibility.

You know, I wouldn't want to mess it up. And I went to Akin Omotoso, he was like, no, I wouldn't know where to start. You know, and I went to, I think I went to five directors or so.

And then I came back to Teddy and Teddy was like, you know why you can't find anybody to tell the story? It's because Solomon Mahlangu's spirit wants you to tell that story. So then I went to the family and I went to his mother, to his brother.

And she was crying. She was like, I just want people to know the truth that my son didn't, you know, pull the trigger to kill those people. And if you could be able to, you know, express the pain and the anger that I went through, you know, as a mother to a mother, a parent shouldn't have to bury their child.

And I'll be very happy. So they took me to Solomon Mahlangu's grave. And, you know, we did, you know, the prop up.

Actually, I remember going with you recently, right?

[Bradley Steyn]

We just went to his grave at the last performance.

[Mandla Dube]

This year, yeah. So, you know, so out of anger, a lot can come out from a standpoint of art, you know, but that's what I've done. I've managed to at least come from the heart in telling the stories and whether, you know, as an audience member, you can like it or not like it.

You can judge whatever, you know, you're allowed to. But I gave my all to be able to say this is how I can give a gift from my heart to Solomon Mahlangu's mom so that she could at least be able to, you know, go to the next life knowing that I did my best to honor her child and to help her heal because she was angry about the whole thing. So in that way, that's how I've dealt with anger in cinema.

[Bradley Steyn]

Remarkable.

[Janet Smith]

It is remarkable. And I think Mandla mentioning the United States is where I want to bring the two of you together in this discussion. We had a quick chat before this podcast started and Mandla described the importance of having distance from where you grew up, especially if there's trauma attached to it, to create different kinds of art, important art or to create meaning in your life.

And Bradley, your experience was very similar. Once you got to the United States, you were able to get some perspective on the trauma you had experienced. So perhaps let's return to Mandla first and talk about how that distance made you a better South African.

Is that correct? Or more educated Africans around trauma?

[Mandla Dube]

I think that experience made me a better human being. 

[Janet Smith]

Right. 

[Mandla Dube]

I think once we start moving out of the regional boundaries that we've created in our heads or that have been created for us, and as I said earlier on, I tell stories from the heart.

So as a human being, you know, I learned to be able to not to be attached to South Africa. And I was able to be open to being a better human being and experiencing life with other human beings in the United States who come from all walks of life. And I went to a university in Atlanta, the Clark Atlanta University in the AU Center.

And I remember one summer that, you know, I just now I've never told the story, actually. I remember one summer coming from summer school. It must have been 1989, or 1990, somewhere there.

As we were going from, you know, taking the bus through the city of Atlanta to where we're staying, this guy opened fire. This black guy opened fire and killed these three white guys.

[Janet Smith]

You witnessed that?

[Mandla Dube]

I witnessed this. Actually, I haven't told you this. 

[Bradley Steyn]

Wow.

[Mandla Dube]

How crazy is that?

[Bradley Steyn]

Yeah, you haven't told me that.

[Mandla Dube]

How crazy is that? You know, we've been talking about the issue of stars aligning.

[Janet Smith]

Yes.

[Mandla Dube]

This whole thing with our stars aligning this year, you know. 

[Bradley Steyn]

Because Mandla and I both turned 50 last year. 

[Mandla Dube]

Yes, we did. Yeah. 

[Bradley Steyn]

And we made this pact that, you know, we're not going to align ourselves with the stars.

[Mandla Dube]

Yeah.

[Bradley Steyn]

Because of the stars... 

[Mandla Dube]

Yeah, so the whole thing is that the stars have been aligned for the past 8 billion years, God knows how long, you know.

And in a creative industry, we have this tendency of saying if the stars align, you know. And I think to myself, what an arrogant, you know, it's such an arrogant thing to say if the stars align. We need to align ourselves to the stars.

So I think we are aligning and I'm now just remembering that your experience of what you saw in South Africa as a teenager is something that I experienced when I was about 19 years old.

[Bradley Steyn]

Yeah, in the late 80s.

[Mandla Dube]

In the late 80s in Atlanta. Where this guy was just going around in the city of Atlanta shooting at white people, you know. 

[Bradley Steyn]

Wow.

[Mandla Dube]

So anger and the politics of South Africa and the U.S. are very similar. Very similar, you know. So this guy just opened up fire and shot these three businessmen who had come into the city for whatever reason, you know.

And they obviously didn't get to see their loved ones. It was their last time. And so one had to move out of South Africa to really appreciate that sense of being rooted in the African identity because I learned so much about my identity while I was in the United States.

You know, I read so much about the contribution of African people to humanity and several, you know, millennia from the standpoint of civilizations going back. You know, there's so much that I picked up. You know, I actually learned about an area called Alkebulan.

And Alkebulan is actually an ancient name of what we are now calling Africa. And if you look at the Alkebulan map. 

[Bradley Steyn]

That's right.

[Mandla Dube]

The map of Africa is upside down. The map of the world is upside down where Africa, you know, where we are now in Cape Town is actually at the top and not at the bottom. And if you think about it, that's actually how we should be looking at life.

Our worldview should be Afrocentric in that way because humanity started here and went into the rest of the planet. Right. So we've been looking at the world from a colonial point of view, which has Europe at the top and then Africa at the bottom.

Right. So no wonder we are so messed up because we are thinking of ourselves in a very warped way as humanity. So there's a lot that I picked up at university while I was there and I was able to bring.

So I made a pact with myself to say I will make films that will conscientize humanity wherever I go as a filmmaker and use cinema as a platform and tool to deliver that. Whatever you want to call it, you know, message. So that's really.

So for me, cinema is a platform of being able to take a loud hailer and say, you know, this is who I am, this is where I come from.

[Bradley Steyn]

And this is our great history.

[Mandla Dube]

This is our great history. These are great stories. And this is how I choose to tell them.

And I think with the advent of the likes of the streamers coming into our region, it's just been beautiful because we  don't now have to run to Hollywood anymore. And I tell my students all the time, I said, don't go to Hollywood, let Hollywood come to you. And I got shut up.

You've been there. You know, that's you know, that's why you say. I said, no, but that's the reality of it now.

Hollywood is on. It's taking a nosedive going. And then the stories that are coming out of Hollywood are not really stories that, you know, they are recycling their content......

[Bradley Steyn]

Yeah, constantly.

[Mandla Dube]

Yeah, constant. So I think now it's a time where Africa, where humanity comes from, you know, started to say it's it's our turn to be able to tell these stories that are meaningful to help humanity heal. I think humanity is looking at us to say, guys, you know, where do we go next?

You know..... 

[Bradley Steyn]

It's our time to shine. 

[Mandla Dube]

It's our time to shine. But I think it's our time to contribute meaningfully to humanity, to say from a consciousness standpoint as human beings, this is what we contribute and feel humanity should go to.

You know, we didn't have a bloodbath in South Africa. Right. At the dispensation, we didn't have, you know, the whole concept of change that comes with the major civil wars and all of that, as we had witnessed, didn't take place here.

Yet there was a war that took place if you think about it.

[Bradley Steyn]

The Dirty War. 

[Mandla Dube]

A dirty war, no, well, people were massacred in front of your eyes.

That's part of war. People were killed in townships. People were maimed and people were, you name it, right?

Massacre and all of that. So, yes, you didn't have time. Yeah.

Yeah. And all that stuff. So it did take place.

People like Chris Hani, we're talking about Chris Hani earlier on, were assassinated. Stephen Biko was killed, you know, inside a police van. And similarly, there's so many people that are killed on farms.

Right. There are a lot of farm murders that are taking place, that have taken place. I mean, you were talking about me being a farmer, you know, just, I don't know, three, four weeks before the release of Silverton siege, I was with my son at home and on a farm.

[Bradley Steyn]

Outside Pretoria. 

[Mandla Dube]

Outside of Pretoria. And four gunmen came in and held us hostage from 10 p.m. until 4 a.m. And I remember laying on the ground, you know, tied up saying, today I'm not going to die. Today I'm not dying. I said to my son, today we're not dying. And he said, yes, Dad, we're not dying.

So it's exactly what I'm trying to say, that how do we contribute to humanity as storytellers, as South Africans, just to take this whole thing called life to another level? Because the world is looking to South Africa. What do we do next?

What do we do next? You know, because we've done it. We've always done it.

[Janet Smith]

Yes.

[Bradley Steyn]

You know, Mandla...

[Mandla Dube]

You've always managed to create in the midst of kak.

[Janet Smith]

And this is not the worst that South Africa has been through. At this moment in 2022, we might feel as if it is unmanageable. But I think you have said this yourself, Bradley, that, you know, other situations felt intractable, and yet people survived.

[Bradley Steyn]

Yeah. And, you know, I can relate to what you're saying, you know because I left South Africa and I was away for many years. And I came back and I keep saying this is I've seen how well South Africans generally get on and how far we've come.

And, you know, we quite advanced a lot more than American society, for instance, you know, within the race relations per se. You know, in 2020, I was at the Black Lives Matter march just after witnessing George Floyd get murdered. And, you know, to see the brutality, what I saw in the streets and the cruelty that I saw on the level of the cruelty and pain that they wanted to inflict on people.

It was a remnant of the height of apartheid. So, you know, I look at it, coming back to South Africa and looking to see where we are as collective communities, we're quite a few steps ahead of the rest of the world. We just, unfortunately, and this is my opinion, you know, we've got a failing government that just hasn't taken care of her people.

[Mandla Dube]

Yeah, I mean look we we've always in this part of the world had to sort it out on our own because we are living in a region where It's sort of been seen as being down there and and far away from everywhere. So we've managed to sort out..... 

[Bradley Steyn]

Deep darkest Africa.

[Mandla Dube]

 It's yeah You know, we've always managed to sort our shit out.

We've had to yeah so I think now the next level is in so in having those two. These are tools We've always had to find to figure it out. So that empowered we empower ourselves in Finding tools.

What are those tools? One of the most simple tools is a sport called rugby. We always find a way of being able to sit there and people cry, you know, let me game and all that stuff It's it's something that we've made sport has always managed to connect us, right?

And I think it's a thing of how do we now? Let those tools be taken to Areas that have not had resources in South Africa have not had resources to be able to have that growth take the place of healing, you know. Because we've always managed to do that even in the height of apartheid, I think it was somehow we were able to...... 

[Bradley Steyn]

We were just having an interesting conversation just the other day about food security. 

[Mandla Dube]

Yes. Yes. I was just telling you about that Yes. Yes.

I'm so glad you brought that up. 

[Bradley Steyn]

Yeah.

[Mandla Dube]

Oh, yeah, we just turned up. There's a conversation apparently that Fil Castro was having with some of the comrades in ANC and Mandela and so what's the plan guys, you know going forward?

What are you gonna do and all that? So well, you know, so and then he asked like, you know, do you know how many people live in a particular area? How are you gonna feed them?

It's like well, we don't know how the hell are you gonna go take care of people? To have food security when you don't even know how many people you have that stay, You know in a particular area.

[Bradley Steyn]

That needs to be fed. 

[Mandla Dube]

That needs to be fed. So Cuba doesn't have a food security problem because they know how many people live in Respective regions and then they know how many people need to be fed. They might have a problem with health because those things are key and number one on their list. 

[Bradley Steyn]

And their priority.

[Mandla Dube]

And their priority. So there's a there's been a big, you know, disconnect in as far as priorities are concerned here from the standpoint of it issues like health and food security, you know, we don't know how many...... 


[Bradley Steyn]

And education.

[Mandla Dube]

And education

[Bradley Steyn]

Well, the biggest problem is that you know, we haven't put our Children first, you know, we haven't put our poorest communities first and you know and that's been the biggest problem the biggest problem has as You know being People that we've elected into power Enriching themselves.

[Janet Smith]

So Bradley and as as you know, Mandla since Bradley is, you know, somebody you connect with and say you align with and Bradley tends to bring a lot of this back to politics.

[Mandla Dube]

Yeah, he cant help it. 


[Janet Smith]

He cant help it, and I think........

[Bradley Steyn]

This is the way I'm active right now. My activism now is I can't physically go and do it and do what I used to do. So I'm trying to do it through through art now.

[Janet Smith]

To return to that theme of anger you are angry with your movement you have an inability to come to terms with the disappointment and the frustration that you feel and you know Mandla, I'm thinking about a really great man here who you have said taught you a lot in Djibril Diop Mambéty. The great Senegalese film director

[Mandla Dube]

Oh really, where did you get that? That's like insane.

[Bradley Steyn]

Janet's an incredible researcher I'm telling you.

[Janet Smith]

But also I had the joy of interviewing him once.

[Mandla Dube]

Oh my god.

[Janet Smith]

It was one of the greatest moments in terms of journalism, but you said that he taught you Zen. What was that about?

[Mandla Dube]

So it was in I don't know mid 1990s, right I was still I was a rustle I had long dreads and at the time, and then there was this whole it was difficult for one to get into the film industry in the early 90s. I left South Africa when I was about 15 years old went to the US and then finished high school there. I went to Study in Atlanta and then got married and then came back here and I came here with a body of work because I As a cinematographer, I've done a lot of work behind the camera and you know, I've got known as this guy. Oh, don't talk to the African guy, you know in the US, he'll shoot, you know, you'll work well. So I did a lot of music videos and I came back with a body of work as a Cinematographer and I felt like you know.  That's something I could contribute locally as a filmmaker and it was difficult for me to do, to come in because it was in the early 90s at the early parts of transition in South Africa and there are a lot of cinematographers who are white guys that an older white man who didn't You know, you just didn't see fit.

How does a black cinematographer? Enter the space and where did you get you know, it just didn't it wasn't on their radar that could even take place so I became angry and then they came an opportunity for us to go to the Cannes Film Festival and I was one of the guys that went to the Kodak. Kodak at the time. We were shooting on Kodak film stock at the time, you know Kodak sponsored the whole thing so I was then in Cannes with my my ex-wife and one of the one of the one of the filmmakers that I like, you know, we are running to into La Crozette. The La Croisette is under the pavilion at the Cannes Film Festival. Literally walking there and then I'm angry.

I run into this guy. Boom Oh, you know and he stops me.

He held me. He's like, you know, he just looked at me. Get out of my way kind of thing, right. Because I was just very angry and then he took me to a place at the back of You know from away from the main road, but I think it was behind there's a hotel called the Majestic. That's behind the hotel there. And then we went into this Coffee shop.

He didn't say a word. Sat with me. Who are you then and you know, then I asked who's this guy and that's Jibril. I'm like who's Djibril? Djibril Diop Mambéty. And then he took out a pen and draw what he later said is who I am right.

He drew a flower and he said that's you know, he said that's you. So that's what I'm saying he taught me Zen this is a guy that I don't know.

[Janet Smith]

Thats phenomenal.

[Mandla Dube]

Yeah and obviously I watched his films after that. I was like wow this guy's a guru this guy's the guy and so I think it Was on the second day of being at the Cannes Film Festival We hung out with Djibril for the next I don't know how many days. And in all the time that I hang out with him in those four or five days of being there I mean we he said two or three words to me, but I just.......

[Bradley Steyn]

The energy around him.

[Mandla Dube]

The energy around him was like whoa. Now, I mean one of my other mentors is Haile Gerima. Now is Haile Gerima is a complete opposite. You know fist up, you know always pushing and and always fighting. You know always struggling to make sure for the cause of the filmmaker. So just being around Jibril was just a beauty, you know, and yeah I've never never and then I ended up working with the working with him now. Meeting up this guy.

His name is Floyd Webb. He's a filmmaker from Chicago and we talked about Djibril and just oh my son's name is Djibril. I said, how does that happen? Oh, no, no Djibril is his godfather.

The real Djibril Diop Mambéty. So it is like......

[Janet Smith]

Oh, talk about alignment.

[Mandla Dube]

Alignment, Yeah.

[Janet Smith]

Off course Gerima, you know is an Ethiopian filmmaker.

[Mandla Dube]

Yeah.

[Janet Smith]

So you had this Content that was being sort of gifted to you in terms of human content.  From these great African filmmakers and so as we draw to the end of this of this podcast and what a pity because we can talk for many hours. Wanted to ask each of you. Art and anger. Politics all of these issues that that come together in creative people and then they make something else out of it. Djibril drew you this flower and he made something else out of you. So this is dealing with mental health right, because when you are able to harness anger and create something else out of it that reaches. You know into the hearts of other people. It's it's very meaningful. So I'll ask you first Bradley and then and then Mandla will wrap up for us, but art and harnessing anger have meant what to you as you've discovered this in these later years of your life

[Bradley Steyn]

Yeah, 

[Janet Smith]

The middle years.

[Bradley Steyn]

And it's been a a hell of a journey because you know, I left school when I was you know in standard eight and my grammar was terrible. Later on, I ended up marrying this amazing woman who was a schoolteacher.  Who taught me how to put sentences together and I started writing my book and people just kept encouraging me to put my book out and get it out and my book came out and I was surprised that it became a bestseller and I was very very grateful and very excited about that. And then later on I met Mandla and  I said to Mandla. How did you make Kalushi?

How did you write it? How did you do this? And he's like you must just write it.

You must just try your best and just just write it. Screenwriting is completely different and it's a completely different animal, but Mandla has been kind enough to encourage me to use my activism in a different way. Not to use it at the sharp end of the sword anymore but to do it through creative processes, so you know and it's so ironic because I probably would have ended up in theater or in the arts if I didn't witness the massacre. Because my mother was in the arts and I loved the arts and you know. So for me to find myself on this journey and How much it's actually helping me heal inside. Is actually remarkable. The whole process of Doing things creatively and being in this on this creative journey with you know with with this guy and these these people that I've surrounded myself with. Janet, you know, for instance, helped me write Helped Mark Fine and I finish our book and you know, it's just been an incredible journey. So I'm just just very blessed. 

[Janet Smith]

And without art Mandla?

[Mandla Dube]

 I'm gonna read something here.

[Janet Smith]

Yes.

[Mandla Dube]

It says to live a creative life. We must lose our fear of being wrong. Endquote by Joseph  Chilton Pierce right, so it's part of that you have to let go and let go to let go so that you can be Zen, I mean it's literally is that you just gotta be able to just let go and be attached to none of that stuff and just be open to whatever comes because it is so difficult. It is so difficult to find just that sweet spot of being a creative force or a vessel of saying hey. Yeah, we are literally an extension of the creator or the universe if you want. So our job here is to live little something, you know that this masterpiece that we call the universe has been put out in the called life, you know, so if you can be able to be fortunate enough to be creative. Hang on to it, hang on to it and you know. One of the amazing artists is Professor P.T. Ghandouli. And we're at this place. We're opening some event with politicians, you know and I think there was a painting of some kind in the wall there and he said only we can do this. And then he just started talking about this painting that's on the wall. Only we can freeze time. Only we can be able to put a light at a particular angle in an image and put those colors and be able to speak you know in those tones and those particular forms in those particular lines and then leave you crying. You know artists can do that and If we can be able to do all leave you laughing or whatever, you know, I mean move so moved Yeah, you know, so if we can be able to do that and do that more and teach. Even the politicians might not be a bad idea to teach some of these politicians how to be creative. Maybe that's what the ANC your movement, you know needs, you know, maybe that's what the EFF needs. Maybe that's what you know....... 

[Bradley Steyn]

Sorry, we don't talk about the EFF.

[Mandla Dube]

I'm just saying maybe that's what a lot of these political organizations need, you know, the DA and all these, you know in South Africa. I'm talking about maybe that's what maybe if we gave Donald Trump a little something to be creative with it might help him. You know, I mean just being creative little something, you know, it could also be gardening. So you could do gardening and farming. I go to the earth Yeah, I farm just to help me just you know.


[Bradley Steyn]

Has creating helped your mental health?

[Mandla Dube]

Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Yeah Yeah It has helped me to be able to just to be grounded and to be able to interact with other human beings, you know. You know who are also experiencing mental challenges Yeah, and by by being able to create with them, we heal each other. You know, one of the things I said once we've been asked sorry, you got me going. We're talking about Filmmaking funding and then they were you know, I was asking for funds from the Department of Arts and Culture You know to make Galushi and they were like, oh, you know, well, you know priorities, you know We don't have to do we've got to deal with issues of housing. I said what the hell has I got to do with arts and culture? That's the Department of Human Settlement, a Department of Housing. I'm talking about being creative and you are telling me about you. That's a cop-out and I said to the I think it was a minister of arts and culture at the time. I said, you know a minister a thousand years from now Nobody is gonna care about Nkandla. But they will care about stories that we've left behind. So fund the arts more than you can fund, you know compounds, you know, I mean so so it's very important that we impress upon politicians to tell to be creative, you know. A lot of these big corporations in the US are doing well because they allow people to be creative. You know, if you go to Apple everybody's just creative. They just Google their creative You know, I mean so, and enterprise it grows. 

[Bradley Steyn]

Gotcha. So people out there who might be listening to this are going through mental health issues and going through a hard time. What advice would you give to them?

[Janet Smith]

Well, well may I interject....... 

[Bradley Steyn]

Yes, of course. 

[Janet Smith]

As we close the podcast and throw an Interesting little question that I've been wanting to ask Mandla for a long time. What Film would you advise them to watch?

One last film to bring them Peace inside or to bring their meaning inside if there was one last film. 

[Mandla Dube]

Geez okay. We're talking about the issues of mental health when one flew over the cuckoo's nest.

[Janet Smith]

Thank you so much, gentlemen.

[Mandla Dube]

Thank you. Watch One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest.

I flew over the cuckoo's nest.

But that's another story for another day.

[Bradley Steyn]

I thought you were going to say something profound like Green Mile or something like that.

[Mandla Dube]

Watch One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest because it deals with that very heavily.

[Bradley Steyn]

Exactly and it shows the deep darkness of The place that mental health you find yourself in Yeah, but if any of you out there are suffering from mental health. Make sure you get out there and get some help speak to people and you're not alone.

[Mandla Dube]

Speak about your trauma, you know speak about your challenges speak more speak more and as I was saying earlier on, you know. We do this from the heart. So come tell tell tell your experiences coming from the heart and One of our great ancestors who was the founding president of the ANC. Dr. John Langalibalele Dube, he said, you know use your head, Use your heart and use your hands. Right to help Humanity Come out of darkness into light by using your head, your heart and your hands.

[Bradley Steyn]

I Just wish that Our current movement would use.......

[Janet Smith]

 See what I say.....

[Mandla Dube]

No, but I mean but nothing stops you from being able to go to. To take it to the movement and say that you know without being. You know. I mean without fear or favor. Because I experienced what you don't mind, you know, I'm talking to the one about to had to do some of my Mahlangu story Kalushi. It was just like beating against the wall.

Like why would you not want to support a story about one of your own, your own comrades? 

[Bradley Steyn]

Yeah, about our liberation.

[Mandla Dube]

Yeah, no, one of your own. So Mahlangu was executed. Going to the gallows saying my blood will nourish the tree of freedom, tell my people I love them and I look at the continuum. So he went there fine and say, you know for South Africans, and then the liberation movement that he came from was African National Congress and he was a member of Umkhonto weSizwe. So if I was a person who was in a position to be able to make that possible for the artist to I would have ran to say of course. It was that difficult eventually. Yes But it did, you know, it also speaks to that whole thing of mental health that. Never give up on a dream or for a vision you believe in. You know never give up. Never give up, never give up. A lot of us give up too soon. And then we don't understand why it's not realized. We gave up. Never give up.

[Janet Smith]

I think I would like to say thank you to you both for coming back, for coming back to South Africa, for turning that map on its head. But you know the map that's in our imaginations.

Thank you both and thank you for a wonderful conversation.