FROM CAPE TOWN TO THE WORLD

How South Africa's storied theater scene now helps power international productions across the globe

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A scene from the South African premiere of The Magic Box. Photo: Courtesy of Disney/Fever

The new Disney musical The Magic Box may have just finished its recent runs in Cape Town and Johannesburg—but even now that the show is currently playing in Abu Dhabi, it hasn’t left South Africa behind.

That’s because its complete cast and crew—26 actors, plus a backstage staff of 29—is made up entirely of South Africans.

South Africa has long been known for its vibrant, homegrown, activist theater movement that, through the work of artists like Athol Fugard, drew the world’s attention to the injustices of apartheid in the 1970s and 80s. These days, however, theater producers also know South Africa as a nation whose strong theatrical talent pool has become an in-demand resource for many of the international touring productions now crisscrossing the globe.

That reputation was one of the major attractions for Magic Box, which mashes up the Disney songbook into a new story co-starring puppet versions of classic characters like Mickey and Minnie. After a Spanish-language, developmental run in Buenos Aires in early 2024, the show—produced by the original content division of the live event ticketer Fever, in partnership with Disney—went to South Africa to staff up an English-language version created to tour internationally.

“The caliber of the talent pool is really extraordinary there, both onstage and backstage,” says Magic Box creative producer and co-writer Felipe Gamba, a former Disney Theatrical exec who was already familiar with the region from his work with The Lion King.

That latter show has carried literally hundreds of South African performers around the world (see: this New York Times article timed to the show’s 20th anniversary in 2017). “The talent has always existed in South Africa, and for us, The Lion King was this entry point to access it,” says Anne Quart, Disney Theatrical Group’s Executive Producer.

But Lion King is only the best-known example of the international productions to hire performers and crew members from South Africa.

For a project with broad global ambitions like Magic Box, South Africa offered the right mix of cultural diversity and English fluency. “It was perfect for casting a show that will feel, look, and read familiar to audiences everywhere on the path that we’re about to embark on,” Gamba says.

“It was the logical place to start an English-speaking tour,” adds Fever CEO Ignacio Bachiller.

Meanwhile, South Africa’s local theater industry counts a diversifying audience, a rich history, and admirable training programs among its strengths, while the area’s veteran commercial producers work out production models that can succeed despite a weak rand.

In this SPOTLIGHT STORY, I’ll highlight

• the South African start of Disney’s latest, The Magic Box,

• the local talent that travels the world,

• how the post-apartheid market has evolved,

• the country’s two biggest commercial theater producers, and

• how international connections help them navigate the limitations of a unfavorable exchange rate.

Here’s how one nation’s talent pool has played a starring role in so many of the shows travelling the world.

OPENING THE MAGIC BOX

For the Cape Town and Johannesburg runs of The Magic Box, Disney and Fever partnered with Showtime Management, one of the two major commercial theater producers in South Africa. Disney and Fever benefitted from Showtime’s local experience and expertise, while Showtime got the chance to present a title that seems a perfect fit for the market’s needs.

“Disney brands have always been massive here in South Africa,” says Hazel Feldman, the founder and head of Showtime. But between the modest size of the market and the low value of the South African rand, the costs of bringing over a licensed, Broadway-replica Disney musical just isn’t feasible, she explains.

“I kept asking myself: When is Disney going to create a more cost-effective musical for markets like ours?” Feldman recalls.

The Magic Box aims to fit that bill. That was one of the driving ideas behind the show to begin with: to expand the reach of Disney’s stage IP with a streamlined musical for markets that can’t necessarily afford the high price of a Broadway replica of, say, Aladdin or Frozen.

For Fever, the international ticketing and discovery platform now in 35+ countries, Magic Box offered an opportunity to break into a market that it hadn’t yet cracked. “We learned that South Africa is a very interesting market for us, and as a result of doing it, we’re now deploying resources to take more content there,” Bachiller tells me.

WHERE MUSICALS ARE AUDIENCE MAGNETS

Another reason South Africa might attract a show like Magic Box: By all accounts, local interest in Broadway and West End-style musicals is booming.