Internationally-acclaimed actor and director John Kani has called on actresses to speak out against sexual exploitation within the industry.
Kani says women must do this even if it affects their chances of making money.
Kani is a juror for the 10th annual Cape Town Shnit Worldwide Short Film Festival. The festival is currently showing in eight other cities in the world including Cairo, Cannes, Hong Kong and Moscow.
He says he’s proud of a number of women directors who have submitted their work.
“In the 37 plays that I saw, judged with my panel, 19 were directed by women, I feel so proud because we used to, as the panel you could find a way and identify that the director was a woman
Kani has also encouraged young aspiring playwrights and film and theatre directors to learn from the experiences of the generations before them.
Kani has this message for emerging artists.
“Every generation has its own challenges, but each generation must know that it lives with the past generation, there is no generation that lives without the people before them; therefore reference is quite important to say how did my mother make it to where we are when she’s a single woman working as a domestic servant?”
