Damon Galgut’s 2021 Booker Prize-winning novel, The Promise, chronicles the slow decline of a white family on a farm outside Pretoria, South Africa, and the ripple effects of a deathbed promise – made but not kept – to give the family’s Black housekeeper ownership of the small house in which she lives.

But how does a text so praised for its formal inventiveness – the narrative voice shifting from third to first person, and inhabiting multiple interior lives, sometimes within a single paragraph – get translated for the theatre and brought to life?

Writer Bongani Kona goes behind the curtain to watch the rehearsal process unfold. We trace Galgut’s journey from the play’s conception, and follow the director and cast as they workshop scenes, experiment with sound and action, and navigate the unusual set design – all in the build-up to opening night.

Presenter: Bongani Kona