Time, Paper, Bone : World Premiere Listening Event
Flash back to a very wet and windy night in June at Sheffield DocFest 2024. Podcast fans from across the globe had gathered in the dark at The Crucible Theatre to attend a ‘listening’ event; the World Premiere of the first episode of a seven part investigative podcast Time, Paper, Bone, the brilliant winner of the inaugural Podcast Pitch Award 2023, supported by The Whickers and Sheffield DocFest.
Time, Paper, Bone investigates the closure of a cold case – one of the thousands of state-inflicted deaths by South Africa’s apartheid government. The story is told through the eyes of two women, Nombulelo Booi and Madeleine Fullard, one black, one white, who are brought together in a common quest – to find the remains of Nombulelo’s father. Nombulelo was 16 when she saw her father, anti apartheid activist James Booi, being dragged into an armoured police vehicle, half-naked, in the early hours of the morning. More than half a century later, Madeleine, the head of an investigative unit that locates the remains of apartheid’s disappeared, teams up with Nombulelo to finally bring her father home to the burial he deserves.
We were treated to half an hour of thoughtful, emotional and profound audio storytelling. Co-directors Bongani Kona and Catherine Boulle grapple with where to start telling a story which spans from the early 1960s of South Africa’s apartheid to a modern-day journey to give a much-missed father the burial he deserves. Time is a key character in their story, as they explore how to seek justice for wrongs committed nearly 50 years ago and ask how we can collectively move forward from such brutality.
The atmosphere in the theatre, where the audience listened in silence, many with their eyes closed, took on a deeply tranquil and slightly hypnotic feel; some citing that they had almost entered a meditative state. The soulful atmosphere of the piece was hugely enhanced by the voice of Thenjiwe Iris Kona, who voiced the powerful testimony of the victim’s daughter Nombulelo Booi. It turns out that Thenjiwe Iris is Bongani’s mum. As the episode finished, Jane Ray, Artistic Director of The Whickers, brought us back into the room by introducing us to Catherine and Bongani, hot off the flight from South Africa.
During a deeply engrossing Q&A (which carried on afterwards in the bar till the wrong side of midnight ), the co-directors shared some of the many influences which informed their project, shining a light on the time spent crafting this intricate story. Catherine shared how, former RAFA winner, Eleanor McDowall’s audio piece A Sense of Quietness inspired her to make the passing of time a central part of telling this story, Bongani said that Ethical Loneliness a book by Jill Stauffer made him reflect on what we owe to each other when listening to each other’s stories.
Questions from the audience, including some fellow directors from Cape Town, focused on how South Africa can continue to heal and asked what responsibilities they hold as story-tellers in order to help facilitate this change. Bongani’s answer aptly quoted from the tombstone of their central character, James Booi: “help us to be gentle”, emphasising the responsibility of care we have to the living.
Catherine and Bongani left with flowers, we left with memories that will last far longer.