Theatre Performances : New Presentations, More Space Available

For some time now, the Goethe Institute, the French Cultural Centre as well as the Cameroon Cultural Centre, have been most solicited for theatre presentations in the country, particularly in Yaounde. Theatre performances, which for some time now was dwindling, seems to be on a revival phase, with the coming up of newer presentations and theatre homes.
In less than four years, the town of Yaounde registered over five public and privately owned theatre and related cultural spaces. Besides recently equipped Modern Spaces for theatre presentation at the Carrefour Shopping Mall, Cinema United, Canal Olympia Showroom, Cinema Halls at the Paul Biya Stadium, Modern Space at the Sita Bella Hall, there are several others such as the Salle De Convivialité (Conviviality Room) managed by the Ministry of Arts and Culture at the National Museum, Othni-Laboratoire located at the Titi Garage neighbourhood, Espace Karefour at the Terminus Mimboman, Afro Topo at the Mballa II neighbourhood as well as International Centre for Cultural and Artistic Heritage.
The promoter of one of such structures, Martin Ambara, founder of Othni-Laboratoire de théâtre of Yaounde says the space is open to all Cameroonian theatre and performing arts professionals. The space also supports artists in their research and development work by bringing in foreign professionals. Like the other cultural spaces, Othni-Laboratoire de théâtre also offers a platform of exchange and meeting between spectators and actors while impacting communities to revive people’s interest in the theatre domain. Espace Karefour is another theatre space for the practice and convergence of the arts, particularly the performing arts. The space is managed by Junior Esseba, an actor and theatre director, who is also the General Coordinator and President of the Cameroon Centre of the International Theatre Institute (I.T.I-UNESCO). According to Junior Esseba, Espace Karefour is an adventure that began four years ago in response to the desire to improve the technical and artistic ...