Curro Create

Our 2026 CCNYTF Best Director Award is very close to our hearts: we know the countless sacrificed hours away from families and loved ones, the heartaches that are held for learners, the rehearsals that are shoehorned between our teachers’ full-time jobs…the swallowing of their own needs to make sure our learner’s creative cups stay full.

Our directors this year were all nominated in this category because they deserved the acknowledgment— and we thank them from the bottom of our hearts.

However, Ms. Collette Stander was, yet again, the winner of Best Director for her outstanding work on ‘My Own Planet’ for Curro Klerksdorp. The way she has poured herself into her community and learners is to be commended: we are so grateful to have this kind of love for the arts instilled into our schools.

Well done, Collette! You are a true staatmaker! And thank you to her mentor, Ira Blanckenberg 🥰👏❤️

Pleases scroll through the carousel to see some of her electric moments from ‘My Own Planet’!

📷: Jaco Bothma

The 2026 CCNYTF Best Ensemble Award was a clear winner this year: they even seemed to breathe together from the moment they stepped on stage. Everything about The King’s School Linbro Park was rehearsed to within the movement of a pinky finger — they operated as one, in-synch force of nature and ripped a hurricane path through our hearts with their timely piece that exposed the cruelties of global xenophobia, racism, classism and political intolerance through humour and professionally executed clowning in the classic French style.

To see teenagers deliver this kind of precision (and be willing to look “silly” in the name of their art) is incredibly rare. We couldn’t be more proud of this outstanding cast and their can-do attitude. Shout out to their teacher-director Deborah Da Cruz and their mentor Iman Isaacs…’Us & Them’ stood out as a work that truly was extraordinary!

Please scroll through the carousel to see more images of this seamless ensemble performance!

📷: Jaco Bothma