Witness Uganda

Finding Your Own Destiny

By Kate Driscoll

Why did the playwright have both Ugandan and English language mixed in? The language used in the play, Witness Uganda was a mix of Ugandan and English. Though there were two separate languages mixed in this production, it was easy to comprehend the message that actors were trying to communicate to the audience through their body language. The actors themselves were so believable that it was possible to laugh at one of the hilarious things that Griffin had said or one of his students had to being choked up over the intensity of it. The actors could switch between comical to seriousness in a heartbeat.

One of the cool things the actors did with the stage to make it believable is when the stage raised to become higher and slanted forward as if it was a hill, which was the setting that the production wanted to create the illusion of with this piece of set. The lighting for this was bright and yellow when the moments were happy and joyful, but later in Act 2 during the aftermath of the colossus twist in the story, it rains, and becomes dark and stormy. This highlights the character Griffin’s reaction to the mind-boggling twist. The costume’s consisted of clothes usually found in America, yet worn and ragged from the days spent in Uganda. The only exception to this was the traditional Ugandan garb worn by the ensemble and Joy. The music was energetic and spectacular as was the choreography of this piece with those strong voices and ecstatic movements. One of the props used in Witness Uganda was Griffin’s backpack that was key in him meeting Eden, Grace, Ibrahim, and Ronny.

The staging of the actors was very meticulous, but seemed chaotic with the ensemble mixing into the leads on stage to create a seemingly huge jumble of people. The story is well-told with Griffin doubling as a narrator of the play as well as being himself. It adds a special omniscient viewpoint as if Griffin knows the ending to the story, which the actor does because Griffin Mathews lives the play with a little more truth to it. The casting was well picked considering that all the actors had some incredible voices and outstanding acting skills.

What I got from the play is that “You have to find your tree.” This was said by Jacob in giving some advice to Griffin. This means that you need to find your own destiny or purpose that force yourself to follow a destiny (tree), which really isn’t yours to begin with.

            In the Question and Answer session after the show with the co-creators, Matt and Griffin, and the guitarist of the band, Matt really stressed assumptions of how people used to just infer facts about other people just from seeing them and their faces, “dig deeper and learn about the other person, and soon we as a people won’t be hating another anymore.”