SAFTA Highlights: Puppet Nation ZA Makes Clean Sweep, Again

The South African Film and Television Awards took place this past weekend and, as seen last year, ZA News: Puppet Nation cleaned up yet again, bagging a whopping 7 awards.

The jewel in struggling pay-tv platform, Starsat's crown received top honours in the following categories:

• Best Achievement in Hair and Makeup (Franci Van Den Heever)
• Best Achievement in Art/Design Pruduction (Franci Van Den Heever, Matthew Sanna)
• Best Achievement in Costume Design (San-Mari Calaca)
• Best Achievement in Sound (Lyle Bennett)
• Best Achievement in Original Score (Lyle Bennett)
• Best Achievement in Directing (Thierry Cassuto, Alex Fynn)
• And, of course, the big one: Best Comedy

Its only competitor in the South African satirical news genre, Late Nite news With Loyiso Gola, did not bag any awards, though Loyiso hosted.


The sad part of it all is that the show can only be viewed by Starsat's approximately 100 000 subscribers, and viewers on Youtube, which are usually quite few. I'm surprised another  channel bigger than Star One  has not yet made a play for the show that has made a name for itself in being of award-winning quality.


Other notable SAFTA wins for they newsy/actuality categories include Safe Haven winning Best Actuality/Current Affairs Programme and Think Big winning Best Educational/Factual Programme.


The Vula Connection, which aired multiple times on eNCA bagged two awards. As you know, Sabido is closing its documentary division, so the wins mark a sort of end of an era.


Expresso's Katlego Maboe took home the viewer-voted Best Presenter category.