Peter Krummeck

Peter Alan Krummeck was an award-winning South African actor, set-designer, playwright, director, writer, and activist, who won renown beyond South Africa in his one-man play Bonhoeffer. Pioneering the use of drama as a tool for reconciliation, he founded the African Community Theatre Service with Archbishop Desmond Tutu as patron. Krummeck was born in East London on 4 March 1947 and died in Cape Town on 9 November 2013.

Early life and education

Krummeck grew up in East London where members of his family were involved in amateur dramatics. He achieved the National Diploma in Graphic Design with distinction in 1967 and was appointed studio manager at the Daily Dispatch newspaper in East London, under the editorship of Donald Woods. He moved to Cape Town in 1969.

A career in theatre and film

Krummeck’s theatre career in Cape Town, spanning more than four decades, included a lectureship at the Drama Department at the University of Cape Town in 1974-6, when he devised modules in stagecraft and design.

In 1973 he had appeared in the lead role in a translation of P.G. du Plessis’ Plaston: DNS-kind, and he went on some years later to translate du Plessis’ Siener in die Suburbs (as Seer in the Suburbs). Pre-eminently for CAPAB, at the Nico Malan Theatre, but also in other contexts such as Maynardville, and later at the Baxter Theatre, Krummeck achieved acclaim as a set designer in major productions, in addition to regular roles on stage.

Krummeck was much involved at the Baxter Theatre from its earliest days, indeed being responsible for the architect’s model prior to its construction; and he produced there his own play, The evening of our time, directed by Helen Robinson in 1978.

He founded the company Compass Productions and, subsequently, the African Community Theatre Service (ACTS), with Archbishop Desmond Tutu as patron, in order to undertake work in reconciliation. Under Tutu's mentorship he worked as a lay-minister in the Anglican Church from the mid-1980s, being associated with the parishes of St John's, Wynberg and St Paul's in Rondebosch - though latterly with the Rondebosch United Church. While at St John's he authored a guide to human gender relationships.

Krummeck was artist in residence at St Mark’s Church, Washington DC, and while there workshopped a programme for the first anniversary of 9/11, including his solo-play Bonhoeffer. Based on the life and witness of the German pastor, theologian and dissident anti-Nazi, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, it had toured in South Africa, as also in the United States and Canada, where it was televised. He also wrote and acted as Christ in a dramatisation of The Passion.

With the advent of television in South Africa Krummeck sought opportunities in this new medium and made regular appearances on television and in film.

Krummeck was concerned to explore issues of gender characterisation and discrimination and did so on stage, film and in published texts. With encouragement from Archbishop Desmond Tutu, he wrote a guide to gender relationships for the parish of St John’s Wynberg. His 1994 teleplay Dear and Awkward Courage, directed by Tamara Semevsky, was the first work openly to address the gay issue on South African television, while his award-winning HIV/Aids play iVirgin Boy elaborated themes on male rape and bisexuality. Related matters are taken up in Krummeck’s two novellas, Adam & Luke, published in 2012.

Final illness and death

Krummeck died at St. Luke's Hospice in Cape Town on Saturday, November 9, 2013 after a struggle with cancer. Just days before his death he had completed a radio dramatisation called The value of aloes, on the history of mission schools in South Africa, and their revival in a project headed by Archbishop Njongonkulu Ndungane. The funeral took place at the Rondebosch United Church in Cape Town.