Photo Flash: Athol Fugard's THE TRAIN DRIVER At The Fountain Theater

Nearly a decade ago, Fugard saw a small item in the newspaper about a black South African mother who grabbed her three children and pulled them onto the railroad tracks in front of an oncoming train. The story haunted him, and he began making journal entries in his writer's notebook.

"I had an appointment with this story," he says. "The minute I read it I knew I was going to have to deal with it in one way or another. I wrestled with it for years, not realizing at first that the story I would write was not hers - that what I would deal with was the man in the train. His reality was the one I could enter into. This play is my truth and reconciliation. It deals with my own inherent blindness and guilt as a white South African."

"It's an awakening," explains director Stephen Sachs. "Until the moment of the accident, this white train driver was on a narrow track, looking only at the rails in front of him. His train's path goes through the pondoks (shacks) and he doesn't look at them or see the misery around him, until one day this woman steps in front of his train and his eyes are opened. The light I hope audiences see in this play is that awakening is possible; it happens, even in the darkest night."

More Articles by This Author...