Up Front

with the Publisher

At one of the regular series of “lunch time happenings” being held these days in one of the many halls of the spectacular Sydney Opera House, I found myself sit ting next to Dr Bill Coppell, a regular PIM contributor. Bill, who once taught at Fiji’s Nasinu Teachers’ Training College, was overflowing with enthusiasm at what we were seeing on stage Fijian Manoa Rasigatale and a small group from the Fiji Dance Theatre, which he directs, serving this packed Australian lunch-time audience some Fijian culture, yes culture.

No electric guitars on stage here. But traditional dancers and harmonising, in terspersed with short plays or sketches in the Fijian language. The sketches were Manoa’s, but there was no language barrier. The audience knew what they were about and loved them!

Only the previous week, Fijians had been making a different kind of impact on Sydney visiting footballers had been in volved in wild brawling during the final test and it left some nasty tastes in people’s mouths. But here was another side to Fi jian life.

Among the dramatic “happenings” on stage was a sketch based on a traditional top-spinning game, full of humour; and there was another showing how relatives playfully distract a newly-wedded couple by pretending to be toads and mosquitoes.

The effect was cleverly achieved without props.

Certainly more Australians saw the football drama than the drama in the Opera House, but if Manoa Rasigatale gets his way, he will fix that.

Although only 29, Manoa has long been an untiring advocate of the Fijian arts with already an imposing record. Born in the Rewa district, he left school in 1962 to become, in turn, a garden boy, quarry worker, messenger, band leader and pop singer and finally a journalist with the Fi jian weekly language newspaper, Nai Falakai. Journalism feeds him, but his in terest embraces Art with a capital A. He is

writer, singer, composer, painter,

playwright, actor, director and cannot really say which he loves doing best.

“Fiji is not a rich country. In the arts you have to be master of many things to make a living”, he says firmly.

Manoa spent 14 months in Australia in

1972/73, on PlM’s writing staff during the day and learning to act at the professional Ensemble Theatre at night and week-ends.

He became the first Fijian to act professionally in Australia.

Back in Fiji in 1973, he became part time director and producer of the Fiji Dance Theatre and in 1974 took the group on a UK tour lasting three months and 65 performances, including a Royal Com mand performance. The Theatre performs regularly in Fiji, using the money it raises by its own effort to keep itself going.

As I have seen for myself these last few years, on his trips to Australia, Manoa takes every opportunity to appear on radio, TV or stage, to remind Australians that Fiji is not just a duty-free shopping destination, but a country with its own traditions in song, dance and drama. He has proved himself to be the best single publicist that Fiji’s got.

Manoa’s aim is to develop the Fiji Dance Theatre as a true Fiji National Theatre, effective inside and outside of Fi ji. The present Theatre has no budget, no strong body to lean on and is only as effec tive as the enthusiasm and dedication of people like Manoa Rasigatale allows. It seems to me that here is a great national

opportunity going begging.

Stuart Inder