Deon Opperman
Welcome to my personal site
Welcome to my personal site.
I am a South African screenwriter, playwright and producer, currently residing in Portugal. Having had my grade-school, under-graduate and post-graduate education in English institutions, while growing up in an Afrikaans home, I am fluent in both English and Afrikaans. As such I have written, and write, in either language.
For an example of my English screenwriting see here. For an example of my Afrikaans screenwriting see here.
My professional career began in 1984. Since then I have written the following broadcasted television and professionally staged theatre scripts:
Drama Series & Teleplays:
10 television drama series: 13 x 1 hour episodes
7 teleplays: 90 minutes
Stage Plays:
37 full-length stage plays (22 English, 15 Afrikaans)
8 original musicals (book and libretto)
1 oratorio (libretto)
In my capacity as producer for television and theatre I have produced all the television productions I have written, and produced and directed all my works for the theatre, as well as a number of plays and musicals by other playwrights. My television work has been predominantly broadcast by the South African Afrikaans Multichoice channel, kykNET, while my theatre pieces have all been presented in professional theatres and at various theatre festivals throughout South Africa since 1984.
In 1996 I was a founding director of AFDA: The South African School of Motion Picture Medium and Live Performance, a private tertiary institution for training in Motion Picture and Live Performance, where I served as executive director for eight years.
In 2016 I established the online archive, the Afrikaanse Kontemporêre Drama Argief (Afrikaans Contemporary Drama Archive), in order to preserve for posterity the many unpublished plays created over the last few decades by the vibrant Afrikaans theatre industry.
I am a Fulbright Scholar. My academic qualifications are:
Bachelor of Arts
Bachelor of Arts: Honours
Master of Arts: Film & Television
Master of Business Administration
(Rhodes University)
(University of Cape Town)
(Northwestern University, Chicago)
(University of the Witwatersrand)
For a more detailed overview of my work and professional awards received feel free to check out my profile in the Encyclopaedia of South African Theatre, Film, Media and Performance.