‘I love you for eternity' — Connie Ferguson remembers Shona on his birthday

Nearly four years after actor, executive producer and co-founder of Ferguson Films, Shona Ferguson died, his wife Connie and family are celebrating his life.
Shona died on July 30 2021 after succumbing to Covid-19-related complications.
'My king would have been 51 today. Happy heavenly birthday my skat. Conversations about you always end up in laughter. You gave us such a good happy life. Thank you for the beautiful memories. They've really kept us going even in the most challenging circumstances. I love you for eternity.'

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IOL News

20 hours ago

• IOL News

'Trainwreck: The Astroworld Tragedy' - a deep dive into the tragedy that shocked the world

Astroworld is created by rapper Travis Scott and was marketed as a world of wonder, a playground of psychedelic visuals, thrilling rides and high-energy music. Image: X/@decider I've been waiting years for a proper documentary on the Astroworld tragedy, one that strips away the headlines, the hashtags and the hype to finally give a voice to the people caught in the chaos. It's been nearly five years since the deadly incident yet only now, through Netflix's "'Trainwreck: The Astroworld Tragedy" are we truly beginning to grasp the horror of the music festival. You can practically feel the breathlessness, the panic, the suffocation that engulfed the crowd that night. It's a grim reminder of what happens when chaos meets carelessness and no one takes responsibility. Astroworld was supposed to be a celebration. Born out of Travis Scott's childhood nostalgia for the defunct Six Flags Astroworld amusement park in Houston,Texas, the festival was marketed as a surreal wonderland of music, lights and striking visuals. Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Advertisement Next Stay Close ✕ The rapper positioned himself not just as a performer but as the creator of a musical universe. Fans came from across the country, some after months of isolation during the Covid-19 pandemic, all seeking release, connection and excitement. What they found instead was terror. Ten people, many of them barely out of their teens, lost their lives in a deadly crowd surge during Scott's headline set. Thousands more were left injured, traumatised or forever changed. The documentary slowly reveals the layers of mismanagement, negligence and sheer recklessness that turned a concert into a catastrophe. A concertgoer described the Astroworld experience as 'demonic,' questioning the eerie atmosphere and subluminal messages. Image: X/@geegucks The most powerful parts of the documentary come from those who were there, including a newly qualified nurse hoping to celebrate her achievement. There was also a paramedic who was proud to be working at such a major event, groups of friends excited to reunite after lockdowns and ordinary people, full of joy and anticipation. But they were all suddenly thrown into an environment where survival became the only goal. From the get-go, the event was disorganised. Jackson Bush, who was hired as security just hours before gates opened, admits he had no clue what to do or where to go. He wasn't alone. The security teams were overwhelmed before the music even started. Entry points were chaotic, with ticketless fans scaling fences and flooding the grounds. By nightfall, the energy had shifted and not in a good way. Astroworld is tied to Scott's identity as a high-octane performer who thrives off mayhem. He's known for encouraging mosh pits, wild dancing and 'raging' all part of the Scott experience. That reputation may fuel his popularity among younger fans but in an environment with minimal control and poor emergency planning, it's a recipe for disaster. As the crowd thickened and people began to lose control of their bodies, panic set in. What's truly heartbreaking is how many attendees said they knew something was wrong. They screamed. They cried. They waved at camera towers, climbed speakers, ran to security. But nothing stopped the music. Attendees described it as feeling like a waking nightmare, a sleep paralysis where your voice doesn't matter. Remember when Travis Scott performed at his Satanic , Demonic concert called ASTROWORLD in 2021 and 10 ppl died? Well. Seems selling your soul pays off. Not only was no one criminally charged. He went on to gross the MOST in concert HISTORY for his CIRCUIS MAXIMUS in 2024!... — OptimalRedPiller (@PillerRed) June 12, 2025 Even more chilling are the moments in the documentary where fans describe the eerie sounds and visuals during Scott's set. Some recall an unsettling ad-lib that echoed across the crowd as people were gasping for air. Others speak of a 'dark energy,' a spiritual heaviness that made it feel like they were leaving their bodies. These descriptions have fuelled conspiracy theories, with some online pointing to hidden symbols, demonic imagery and ritualistic undertones. While the film doesn't lean into those claims, it does acknowledge how many people left feeling deeply disturbed on more than just a physical level. The real villain here, however, isn't mysticism but rather it's corporate negligence. Paul Wertheimer, a crowd safety expert, outlines how Live Nation's internal protocol gave just two individuals the authority to stop the show. Davidson, another voice in the documentary, sums it up perfectly: 'The common denominator in what happened at Astroworld was a failure to speak truth to power.' Houston Police were reportedly aware of the escalating crisis by 9:30pm yet couldn't locate a Live Nation manager to intervene. And where was Scott in all of this? Still performing, seemingly disconnected from the mayhem unfolding in front of him. Yes, there's debate about what he could or couldn't see from the stage. 'Trainwreck: The Astroworld Tragedy' unpacks the horrific events of the 2021 festival. Image: X/@consequence But when fans are climbing onto equipment begging for help and the music keeps playing, it feels like more than just a miscommunication. The apology that followed? Wooden, rehearsed and hollow. No public accountability, no real reckoning. Just a carefully worded statement and then business as usual. As Scott prepares to perform in South Africa later this year, this documentary feels particularly relevant. It's not just a story about one night gone wrong. It's a reminder of how blindly we can place trust in fame. How easily we can excuse bad behaviour when it's wrapped in designer clothes, flashy production and catchy beats. It raises difficult questions about celebrity culture, crowd safety and who gets to decide when something has gone too far. If Astroworld was meant to be an escape, it turned out to be a warning. And we'd be foolish not to pay attention.

TimesLIVE

3 days ago

• TimesLIVE

'Between the Sea and the Land' by Sean Baumann

ABOUT THE BOOK: 'Is suffering inevitable? Are our lives really meaningless? Is God dead and, if so, how should we live?' This is just one of the chapter headings in Between the Sea and the Land. The book is an extended conversation about philosophy between Tomas and Sara, who are confined to an isolated coastal peninsula during the long days of the Covid pandemic. They discuss in an inquisitive and sometimes playful way the difficulties of understanding the nature of the crisis in which they find themselves, the fallibilities of language and science, what can be known and not known, and how to find a balance between individual needs and public safety. They consider the anxieties provoked by intolerance and political strife, and how to cope with the unpredictability and precariousness of life. The book encompasses a broad history of philosophical ideas from the pre-Socratics to the present day, and the search for answers in shifting contexts of fear and wonder, from the mysteries of the beginnings of consciousness to quantum physics and the accelerating developments in machine learning and artificial intelligence. In discursive and meandering conversations that reflect the coastal paths in the beautiful wilderness between the sea and the land, Tomas and Sara tackle fundamental philosophical problems that culminate in the overarching question: How does one live with uncertainty? EXTRACT All that we know of Socrates comes through the writing of others, Tomas started. Plato was the first of the philosophers that we know of who recorded his thoughts in writing, and as a student, and clearly an admirer of Socrates, much of his earlier writing was in tribute to Socrates. This was also an act of defiance, as Socrates' teachings had been officially condemned by the authorities. Plato is perhaps most remembered for his later writing, which is broader in its scope, in that he addressed issues other than the moral and political ideas that seemed to be of most interest to Socrates. So we are all prisoners, stuck in a cave. It does not feel much like that to me, today, walking along the sea shore, under a deep blue sky, Sara mused. Yes, we return to the cave, but this is a different sort of cave. It is an intriguing and much debated thought experiment. I don't think the details are important. It is quite an elaborate analogy. Essentially the prisoners are trapped in a cave with their backs to the entrance. A fire casts shadows onto a back wall, and because their backs are to the light, and because they know no other reality, the prisoners mistake these shadows for reality. Their reality is an illusion. In this respect Plato is arguing, as you indicate, that we are all prisoners. We were imagining that philosophy might be liberating, and anyway I am not sure about all this. It seems both poignant and oppressive. Why are we all prisoners? I don't think we have to be. We need to go back briefly to Socrates. When he was questioning what we meant by concepts such as freedom or justice, or other such abstractions, he was doing more than just seeking definitions. The implication was that there was something called justice, that was beyond its various instances, in some other realm. It was imagined as some sort of ideal. Plato took this further, and elaborated a theory of Forms or Ideals. We've lost the prisoners. Don't be impatient. I am trying to get there. Plato is arguing that there are two realms, one of transience and decay, the other permanent, stable and perfect. He was a fervent advocate of mathematics, and he believed that the cosmos in its entirety was ordered and expressible in mathematical equations. This principle applied to all things. There is a chaotic turbulent surface bound in time and space, and beyond that there is a realm that is ordered and forever. The world available to our senses is inherently unstable and unsatisfactory. He claimed that everything is becoming, nothing is. This world is a shadow of reality. What we experience as reality is an illusion. It is in our minds. We cannot escape from our minds and experience reality directly. So we are the prisoners. With regard to our concern about how we might live with uncertainties, there are certainties, but they are elsewhere. They had just started walking. The path turned away from the sea and towards the mountains, which in the early autumnal morning seemed to be floating in a haze of silvery blue mist. The notion that they were in reality trapped in a cave seemed bizarre, if not preposterous. Sara thought so. Why? Why can't we accept the evidence of this beautiful world that at this moment surrounds us? So what if it changes or ends? That is not evidence that it is not real. Our deaths represent a radical change, a clear measure of the passage of time, and the end of our days on earth. That is the reality: the transience of life does not make it less real. I am sorry about the entrapment of these wretched prisoners in the cave, but I think we should put their predicament aside. They are not us. I am not a prisoner, or that is what I choose to think. I don't want to make you more cross, but he elaborated these ideas on a political level, Tomas said. I don't see how that is possible, if all this earthly stuff is unreal. There are three aspects to us, or maybe levels. These are the passions, the intellect and the will. The passions are perhaps the default position. It seems that the masses, whatever that might mean, constitute humanity at the level of the passions. The intellect should govern the passions through the exercise of will. I must please remind you, again and again, that I am not a philosopher and I might have misread this, but it does seem incredibly condescending, and ruthlessly hierarchical. According to this Platonic system a police class should keep the masses in control, under the guidance of the philosophically informed governing class. The masses lack virtue and knowledge, and anarchy would ensue if they were allowed to govern. This should be the responsibility of wise philosopher kings. How this elite was to be selected is, of course, problematic, but as I am sure you can imagine, these ideas have had a great influence on political thinking over the centuries, including the totalitarian systems on both the left and the right in our lifetimes. It seems strange, if not incredible, that the ideas of a philosopher in Ancient Greece should have such an influence in modern times, and to my mind, to be held to justify injustices. As an artist you are not going to like his ideas about the arts either, Tomas replied. Well, I don't know what a man who believes we are all stuck in a cave can say usefully about the arts. He believed that the arts were inherently representational, and as such appealed to the senses, distracting us from the important need to look beyond the surfaces of the world to the eternal and perfect realm beyond the senses. The arts are seductive, engaging us in a world that is illusory and deceptive, and should therefore be discouraged, if not suppressed. He proposes a very bleak world, Sara said. If we are not trapped in a cave, we are exhorted to contemplate the featureless order of forms. I don't care whether or not it can be expressed in mathematical terms. There is no poetry in mathematics. Not for me, but I am not a mathematician. Perfection, maybe, but not poetry. No music, no dance, no fine art, no celebration of the beauty of transience: it seems to me that there is little humanity in this. I am sorry to disappoint you and it is certainly possible that I have misrepresented his ideas, but I do think it is important that we recognise the many ways in which Platonic thinking has shaped our world. How? So far you have described influences that I personally regard, for the most part anyway, as negative. Yes, but influential nevertheless, and I think, in an indirect way, these ideas have shaped our religious ways of thinking, perhaps especially in the Judeo-Christian tradition. In what way? This cave metaphor is still with me and I struggle to imagine the divine in association with entrapment. The cave is our physical confinement in time and space, our being limited by our only being able to know the world through our senses, and of course by our mortality, Tomas argued. I know you are not a religious person, but surely this notion of another realm that is perfect and harmonious and everlasting conjures up an image of heaven? Yes, I understand heaven as a reward for good behaviour, but this other realm you have described seems more of a metaphysical concept, if I may use that word. We should try to understand the influence of Plato perhaps more in the work of Plotinus, who is described as a neo-Platonist, and was writing in the third century, at a time when Christian ideas were beginning to emerge in the ancient Graeco-Roman world. Plotinus was not a Christian but he had an important influence on Christian thought for the next thousand years. In a rather mystical way, he believed that reality ultimately consists of Platonic Forms. What exists is mental or of the soul, and so what is created has to be thought into being. There are three ascending levels of being, the lowest, I am afraid, being ourselves, or our souls, the next the intellect, making possible the apprehension of Ideal Forms, and the next and highest level is the good, which I suppose is God. The world is created in the mind of God and we seek to transcend ourselves into a state of oneness with God. I am still not sure about all this. I have a sense that Plato was saying that life, or reality, is elsewhere, and if so then what are we to make of our brief lives here on earth? Then maybe we need to turn to Aristotle, Tomas replied. He did not believe in an abstract reality. He did not believe we are prisoners. But before we leave Plato, and perhaps to make you feel a little more sympathetic towards him, and something for us to keep in mind when philosophy might seem rather abstract or dry, he memorably declared that philosophy begins with wonder.

Mail & Guardian

4 days ago

• Mail & Guardian

Power, blood and spirits: Inside season 3 of Kings of Jo'Burg

Kingpin: Mo Masire, played by Zolisa Xaluva, in a scene from Kings of Jo'Burg season 3, which is on Netflix. Photo: Courtesy of Netflix There is no doubt that the team at Ferguson Films know how to create action in a gripping crime drama. Mzansi Magic's The Queen and Rockville are thrilling examples. In Netflix's Kings of Jo'Burg franchise they add an element of the supernatural. In the first season, which premiered in 2020, viewers were taken into the underworld of a Johannesburg criminal family, the Masires. Created by the late Shona Ferguson, who played kingpin Simon Masire in season 1, the series follows the Masires as they navigate power struggles, betrayals and supernatural forces. Led by Veronica Masire (Connie Ferguson) and Mo Masire (Zolisa Xaluva), in season 3, we see the family's continued rule over the criminal underworld, while dealing with a supernatural family curse and a new contender threatening to bring their empire to its knees. The rival gang, headed by Gavin Salat (Clint Brink), has declared war on the Masires in a bid to establish dominance in Johannesburg. To defend their turf, the Masires make a deal with their former enemy Aliko Bajo, played by Nigerian actor Enyinna Nwigwe. Executive producer Connie Ferguson and US co-executive producer Samad Davis continue their aim to create a show with a global reach. Thus, the casting for the franchise seems strategic with the inclusion of actors from South Africa, Nigeria and the US. Similar to previous seasons, which included American actors Terri J Vaughn and Michael Anthony, in this season we see new characters, such as Isador played by New York-born Malik Yoba. At first, I was sceptical about this all-star cast fulfilling my expectations, especially in the first season. But, rest assured, this is a serious series with a serious cast. With the exception of Lester's (Abdul Khoza) trivial jokes, there is no comic relief here. The overall tone from the characters, the soundtrack, and even the locations, is riveting, ominous and tense. There is no darker character than the menacing Gavin Salat who elevates the danger and supernatural factor. Complex and cold, with a robot-like wife on his side, Salat is Cape Town's saint by day and devil by night, leading a wide drug distribution network that includes prisons. Similar to Masire's Mermaid, Salat's supernatural entity is called Oom. Drawing from South African cultural heritage, Salat's gang members are tattooed with an eland — the spirit animal of the Khoisan. It is these spiritual symbols and mythical figures that set this franchise apart from what South African audiences have seen before. Unlike the Nigerian and Asian film industry, supernatural mythology is not broadly explored in South Africa. Growing up, my cousins and I were scared to death by drama series like Lesilo Rula (1987) and Ubizo (2007). Watching my grandparents' black-and-white TV, even the scenes with witches and dark spirits in Henry Cele's Shaka Zulu (1986) shook me as a boy. In recent times there have been a few films that drew inspiration from local folklore and beliefs. Norman Maake's recent award-winning Sebata: The Beast, 8: A South African Horror Story and Vuyani Bila's Deep Face, for instance, explore ghosts, spirits and other supernatural entities. A common denominator in the horror-supernatural genre is that the monsters are representative of unresolved traumas. When triggered by life events, we experience life as 'horror' as those past 'monsters' have been awakened. Kings of Jo'Burg challenges us to think about the monsters that lurk in our past and present, be it unresolved childhood traumas, envy, corrupt thoughts or fear. These negative emotions and energies, when undealt with, can turn people — alive or in the afterlife — into disruptive entities, hungry for blood and souls. The series made me wonder if family inheritances of spiritual gifts is a curse or blessing. Through The Mermaid and Oom, the series explores the idea of family legacies and spiritual warfare in protecting and enriching the family. In my village days as a child, we heard stories of shop owners burying human skulls and hands, with bony fingers creepily calling customers to purchase. Stories of people sleeping with snakes in their homes to gain success. Stories of businessmen and politicians bathing and drinking all sorts of concoctions in the shadows to amass more power and wealth. Kings of Jo'Burg prompts us to check our personal spiritual blind spots and our lineage. As hard as it might be to ask our elders about our family history, rituals and beliefs, the assignment to this generation is to ask those difficult questions, regardless. If we want to break generational curses, and embrace the beauty of family spiritual gifts, lifting the lids becomes of utmost importance. The supernatural aside, the action in series 3 is enthralling. In last year's Heart of the Hunter, a Netflix production also starring Ferguson, viewers saw how big-budget production can push the boundaries of action when it comes to fight scenes, car chases, weapons and explosions. The South African film and TV industry is indeed improving on that front. I was, however, not moved by the hyperbolic scoring in convincing audiences of the danger and thrill. Sure, it's a crime-action series, with plenty of bullets, blood, demons and drugs, but did the soundtrack have to be ominous in every scene? The overall sound design was off-putting, especially in the calmer and more emotive scenes. In one scene, when Veronica and Keneilwe (Thembi Seete) are talking about the glow of pregnancy, the music is imposingly eerie and mismatched. What am I as the viewer supposed to feel, exactly? The scene between Outjie (Maurice Paige) and Mo in the prison cafeteria also could have been made without music to allow the actors' prowess to naturally shine. The visual effects supplied by Pau Meyer from Luma Animation Studio, also the principal VFX supplier for M-Net's Shaka iLembe, immensely elevated the supernatural features in this season. The franchise has come a long way from the questionable camerawork, ambitious storyline and poor character development in the first season. Season 3 is bolder and more menacing — glowing eyes and all. Kings of Jo'Burg season 3 is streaming on Netflix.