Malcolm Gooding’s name has been synonymous with radio since the ‘Seventies, and he has a most beautiful face for radio! At the Franschhoek Literary Festival, Gooding performed his autobiographical play ‘Going Gooding: A Play on Radio‘ last night, which was also the name of his show on the English programme of the SABC. In one hour the audience was transported back to an era of radio personalities and cigarette advertising. It is a shame that there were so few attendees.
Gooding opened a guest house outside Franschhoek recently, but appears to spend most of his time in Johannesburg, still doing voice-overs and documentaries. The play tells the story of Gooding’s career in radio, which started close to fifty years ago. A chance invitation by a friend to attend an audition as radio presenter opened the door which remains open for Gooding. He described himself as a ‘voice prostitute’, having been called the ‘Golden Voice‘ of radio. He demonstrated his diversity as a voice artist, doing at least 24 voices in his one-hour play. He started off with an advertorial skit, of which he does many now, for ‘Blomail’, a play on words for Glomail, which uses Gooding for such infomercials! He reminisced about his colleagues on radio, who have passed away, including Robin Alexander, Nigel Kane, Bill Flynn, Paddy O’Byrne, Bea Reed, and many more. He did a hilarious piece on Patricia Kerr doing ‘Forces
Favourites’, reading a letter in her very poor Afrikaans.
It was an era of radio dramas on Springbok Radio, the best known being ‘Squad Cars’, which exceeded 800 episodes. Gooding did an episode for us, in which he played every voice, including the narrator, an Indian and an Afrikaans policeman, a Dutch crime victim, and an Irish crime perpetrator. Gooding described the very popular program as ‘SA police propaganda’. Other popular radio dramas included ‘Taxi’, and ‘Consider your Verdict‘. Radio advertisements for Chevrolet (‘Sunny skies and Chevrolet‘), 
Rembrandt van Rijn (‘Each cigarette a masterpiece‘), Lexington (‘After action satisfaction’), Peter Styvesant (‘The international passport to smoking pleasure‘), and Alfred Dunhill (‘The finest cigarette in the world‘) were familiar to most of us. Gooding said that the ‘glamour days of radio advertising are gone‘!
Very funny was a scene of the SABC’s Head of Music Dr Anton Hartman, who also played the role of music censor at the SABC, in reprimanding Gooding on his music choice in his programme, finding double meanings in the song titles of the LP records of Satana (‘Satan’ without the ‘a’), Credence Clearwater Revival, Tom Jones, and many more, all of which were scratched by Hartman to make them unplayable. Funny too was the skit on Charles Fortune, South Africa’s best known cricket commentator, who often spoke about everything else other than cricket during his commentaries! He was taken off radio in his eighties!
Madiba appears in the show too, Gooding telling the story of how he met the late Nelson Mandela in 1995 at Ellis Park, in the final of the Rugby World Cup. In the last minute Gooding was instructed to meet Mr Mandela on the stage on the rugby field, and to introduce him to the rugby fans. When Madiba asked him who he was and what his role was, he asked Gooding if he really still needed an introduction! After the show he told us that he had to introduce Madiba at a Diana Ross show, at which the star and Madiba were meant to arrive on the stage together. Gooding once again was meant to do the introduction of Madiba to the audience, but had 
not received his security clearance, which meant that he could not go onto the stage and do his work! The last skit was at the expense of our President Jacob Zuma, told in rhyme in a Pip Friedman voice.
‘Going Gooding‘ is a wonderful nostalgic journey back to the past, documenting the history of radio at a time when it had quality English and announcers with character and attitude. Everyone in the audience had fond memories of the good old days of radio! Seeing that the play was performed at the Franschhoek Literary Festival, it would be ideal if Gooding expanded his play and wrote a book documenting the good old days of radio. The play can be seen at the Kalk Bay Theatre tonight and on Tuesday evening.
Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage
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