It is not often that comedians get to share a stage with well-established acts in their territory, let alone headline the event at a top-notch venue. This past weekend marked an interesting time in the future of the local comedy industry as more and more of Botswana’s comedians are getting a break to display their talents on Southern Africa stages. In their quest to create a sustainable market and continual artist development, Major Moves Comedy secured a booking for Thapelo Malani who headlined the Lol’d Shedding Comedy Night at Alliance Francaise Lusaka which was organised by the Night of Laughter crew.
Thapelo Malani who is a visually impaired comedian made his debut in Lusaka to a rousing welcome from the Zambians. The event which had a capacity crowd was patronised by different nationals including those from Canada, France, United Kingdom, United States of America, Zimbabwe and of course Zambia.
The headliner Thapelo proved he is a force to reckon with, belting out witty and humorous punch lines about his disability and life in general. His impressive performance immediately earned him a booking at the biggest Zambian international comedy festival ZED Laughs and he will be traveling back to Lusaka in November. He conducted interviews on Zambia National Broadcasting Corporation (ZNBC) TV show Fryday and was also on Muvi TV breakfast show which has a viewership of more than 4.3 million people.
The event was hosted by Night of Laughter Director Hubert ‘Chingliz’ Mumba and included top Zambian comedians such as Danny Bwalya, Cheelo Mwanachingwala and Emmanuel Musaka. Talent manager at Major Moves Comedy, Gaolathe Kediemetse said, “Our main aim is not only to bring top class comedians to our stages, but we have to export our talent across Southern Africa and to other countries beyond where they can experience different crowds. Experience is the best teacher, and we want to develop our comedians by getting them to perform on the best platforms with the best comics and ultimately be able to perform internationally frequently making a living off comedy.” Major Moves Comedy has previously taken several Batswana comedians to perform in South Africa (Bloemfontein, Johannesburg, Mafikeng, Rustenburg, and Pretoria), Kenya, Lesotho, Swaziland, Namibia, Zimbabwe and now getting into Zambia.
