Curro Create

Our first round of Acting4Film has finally been adjudicated...and now it's time to meet the famous faces who have been reviewing your work!

First up in the YoungStars category, these three film and tv aficionados don't really need an introduction - but we're going to brag about them anyway!

Jane Mpholo-Mehlape garners hundreds of thousands of followers across her platforms where she keeps us in stitches with her original - and proudly South African - storytelling. She's also an award-winning actress, playwright, poet, director and producer...and a very insightful mentor. This business woman and artist is a formidable combination of creativity and industry mettle!

Sive is a dear friend to Curro Create and many of you will recognise her as Professor Brainfreeze from our 'A Playdate with Curious Kate' edutainment webseries made for early learners. She has won multiple awards for her acting over the years and is a lecturer and teacher at various institutions in Cape Town. Sive is also our senior mentor in the Raed It! category at CAS and has nurtured hundreds of Curro learners over the years.

Sue joined us for the first time last year as an actress on Acting4Film and we are delighted to welcome her back! Her career spans decades of uplifting others through her work and her theatre, The Drama Factory, has become a hub of learning and creative safety where artists and technicians can take risks and reach new audiences with less mainstream productions. Her film highlights include Oliver Hermanus' 'Skoonheid' (winner of the Q***r Palm at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival and selected for Best Foreign Film shortlist for the 84th Academy Awards).

Hold onto your hats, everyone. Acting4Film is turning out to be the project of the decade!

Today, as we commemorate Youth Day, we honour the courage and resilience of the young people who stood up against injustice on 16 June 1976.

Inspired by Steve Biko and the Black Consciousness Movement, the youth of Soweto rejected the limitations imposed by Bantu Education and demanded a future built on dignity, equality, and opportunity. Their bravery continues to remind us of the power of young voices to shape our society.

It is especially meaningful, then, to celebrate one of our own creative learners who has brought Biko's legacy to life on stage and is now taking his talent to the big screen.

Congratulations to Curro Create alumnus Mathabatha Daniel Shadung, affectionately known to us as Daniel, from Northern Academy. After earning his Theatre Wings for his powerful portrayal of Steve Biko in 'Return of the Ancestors' at last year's CCNYTF, Daniel has secured his first film role in acclaimed director Tebogo Malope's latest production: 'Studying under the Barrel of a Gun'.

Malope is known for compelling South African productions such as 'Queen Sono', 'Outlaws', 'For Love and Broken Bones', and 'Rise: The Siya Kolisi Story'.

We are incredibly proud to have been part of Daniel's journey and to witness his continued growth as a young artist. Thank you to Ms. Sussie Mjwara for pouring yourself into him as his director, mentor and drama teacher; and Ms. Kim Greyling for being his biggest cheerleader and supporter of the creative arts at Northern Academy. Good teachers truly can change the course of a young person's life!

What a fitting way to celebrate Youth Day: by recognising a learner who is using storytelling to honour our history and inspire the future.

Well done, Daniel — this is only the beginning of your story!

'Studying under the Barrel of a Gun' is currently showing at Ster-Kinekor cinemas across South Africa.

This weekend we were lucky enough to have Ira Blanckenberg, actress and mentor extraordinaire, join Penny Youngleson (Creative Head of Curro Create) as an adjudicator on our very first CCNYTF Primary Schools Finals Showcase. We visited Curro Durbanville and Curro Aurora to watch 'Boekwinkel' and 'My First Lockdown' - and they were spectacular! A special congratulations to Cecilia Wesson and Regan Napier for your director and care with your casts - the hours you put in were worth every minute when we saw the end result.

Out of all eligible schools, only three primary schools made it all the way through to the top 15 across South Africa and Namibia - and they became our inaugural finalists on this brand new platform to show off their work.

Thank you so much to our Executive Heads, Heads of Culture, teachers, support staff, learners and parents.
Our whole goal with giving the primary schools this opportunity was to inject our young performers with a genuine joy and excitement for their craft - while honing their technique and aptitude for direction - away from the pressure and stress of Theatre Week.

And even if we say it ourselves: it was a resounding success!

Thank you to Ira for her mentorship over the past month with our schools. Next stop: Windhoek Gymnasium on 4 July; and then we'll release the full results of everyone's certification. Well done everyone, what a way to end off the month of May! ❤️🙏🏼

Drum roll please....

Our 2026 Theatre Week Top 5 High Schools who will be joining us in Fourways are:
- Curro Heuwelkruin
- Curro Klerksdorp
- Grantleigh
- Northern Academy
- The King's School Linbro Park

Congratulations to you all!

We have absurdist satires pitting political rivals in a Dr Seuss-inspired South Africa, Shakespeare adaptations between warring taxi bosses, kitchen-sink dramas set in cosmic and allegorical space, precisely executed Poor Theatre storytelling with live music as an additional character on stage - and a retelling of Africa's history through the eyes of its women over seven generations of making and remaking its people.

There certainly is something for everyone!

If you are in Johannesburg on 11 July, we would love to see you at HeronBridge College for the finals showcase, starting at 3pm and ending with the awards ceremony in the evening. This will be one for the record books!