Just The Ticket! Part One: The Impossible Dream

Originally published in 1997, Just the Ticket! , Percy Tucker's remarkable autobiography was met with great excitement. In his own words, he recounts the dramatic and exciting history of entertainment in South Africa as he alone can tell it.

In his company, we revisit theatres old and new and meet a parade of colourful, sometimes outrageous personalities, share in the excitement of opening nights at home and abroad and meet the most significant performers and directors of the last fifty years. The author has not ignored the disappointment and failures or the struggle to overcome the stranglehold of apartheid on the arts and gives an insider’s view of the battle that raged between managements and government during the boycott years while the theatre itself became the voice of protest and a significant force for change.

Percy Tucker – who founded the Computicket ticket-selling system which became the most revolutionary and unique system of its kind in the world has had a rich life at the hub of show business and sport in South Africa. Stage-struck from childhood his passion and commitment to the live arts led him to found Show Services in 1954, an initially small-scale ticket agency in Johannesburg to the deep displeasure of his father who could not understand why his graduate son wanted to be mere ticket seller.

Just the Ticket! Is the first-hand view of Tucker’s journey from these modest beginnings to becoming the trusted advisor and confidant to theatrical managements, the guide and comforter of visiting international stars and something of an unofficial impresario himself and is told with humour, humility, nostalgia and a sense of history. To be star struck for a lifetime and to succeed in turning this passion into a rewarding career is the stuff of which dreams are made. For Percy Tucker, the dream became a reality. Welcome then to Just the Ticket! and its star-studded cast, a theatre-lover’s travelogue that will enthral and entertain during many hours of satisfying reading.

Cover photograph by Ruphin Coudyzer