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Carl Joshua Ncube

Three Men on a Boat/Showbiz Reporter

ZIMBABWE stand-up comedian Carl Joshua Ncube is a man breaking new ground as he is billed to perform at a festival in Abidjan in the Ivory Coast, making him the second Zimbabwean to do so after superstar Oliver Mtukudzi.

The Market for African Performing Arts (MASA) festival runs from March 5 to 12.

An excited Ncube, who last year performed at the Comedy Central’s International Comedy Festival, said he was excited to be performing outside the country.

“This is such a big deal.  Having to put a bit of French into a comedy show and also having my own show outside of Zimbabwe, now that’s a first even for me.”

Adding to that, Ncube has scored new gig with Comedy Central as he has signed up to join the cast of a new Comedy Central animation show, a sort of South Park in terms of how controversial it can be. The series is called My Child: Teenage Mutant Azanians.

When Carl met up with the directors they were looking for Zimbabwean talent and a Zimbabwean angle to the story.

Meanwhile, Ncube has started serialising his life with a string of Facebook posts, labelled Did You Know?

In one of the posts, Ncube speaks about how talented he was as an artist while growing up.

“Did you know? My father (a Gifford High School teacher) made me sit for an O’ level art exam when I was 8 yrs old (made me do it from his office…all 3 papers)…he got my stuff graded by a GCSE marker and I got a (C)…should have seen how shocked the dude was when he found out it was an 8 year old’s work he marked!”

In another post, Ncube wrote about how he skipped a grade at Waddilove Primary School.

“DID YOU KNOW? On my first day at WADDILOVE PRIMARY SCHOOL in 1989, I was ready for grade 5…but confused on the first day I went into the WRONG CLASS and found out that I was in a GRADE 6 class…ashamed I kept it a secret and faked it the whole term. Mom made me continue in grade six because I was in the TOP TEN anyway! So I skipped a GRADE!”

Ncube then posts about how he started a t-shirt printing business with his friends when he was at Prince Edward High School.

“DID YOU KNOW? That when I was 15, my classmates Kuda Musasiwa (@begottensun) Shingai Mtezo and Wamuka Mwamuka figured out a way to register a company Hyrographix and started a t-shirt printing business with the hope of starting a magazine and television station while we were at Prince Edward School. We made quite a bit of money. We would change from our uniforms into formal shirts pants and ties to have strategy meetings at Mokador in Harare! We were even asked to present a paper to Parliament on behalf of the Foundation for Youth Enterprise (didn’t work out in the end tough).”