by Thinus Ferreira
Richard Nosworthy, a veteran South African producer of theatre, TV, film and music; screenwriter and director, and a director of photography has died. His cause of death is unknown.
Through an industry-career spanning more than 40 years, Richard Harry Nosworthy was notably the co-creator and series producer of The Wild local telenovela for M-Net (DStv 101), but did work across a multitude of TV shows over 4 decades, for South Africa TV channels ranging from SABC1 and SABC2, to M-Net, kykNET, SuperSport and e.tv.
Established in the early 80s, Richard Nosworthy was the CEO of Plum Productions.
Richard Nosworthy wrote, shot, directed and produced more than 2 000 hours of programming for both South African and international broadcast television, including numerous TV commercials, and also produced and directed multiple DVDs for South African singers.
According to his industry biography, Richard Nosworthy worked on TV shows across genres spanning from SABC3’s Top Billing, SABC1’s Selimathunzi , SABC2′ Fair Deal to M-Net’s Front Row, Carte Blanche and The Wild, as well as the Xhosa consumer programme Ufunda Ngomzikelo, Hare Bapaleng, Masidlale, The Second Mrs Styles, Zikathele, Jozi Streets, Bentley, FotoStories, Pikin and many more.
In theatre he worked on stage productions like Old Friends, Flight of Bird, The Music Teacher, Number One, Crazy Diamond – a tribute to Pink Floyd, and in music was involved with the production of hundreds of music videos.
Richard Nosworthy started his career at the Market Theatre in 1978 as an actor in Mario Schies’s production of Equus and exited the Market Theatre as stage manager in 1983 when he started his TV and film production company, Plum Productions.
Richard Nosworthy produced and directed Botswerere for BOP TV’, produced and directed the first-ever coverage of indoor-cricket for the SABC’s Top Sport, and the first-ever TV drama series shot entirely on the Betacam format in South Africa like The Edge and Zikalele.
During the 1990s Richard Nosworthy started working with international producers who were working in Africa, ranging from MTV Europe to Denmark’s TV2, September Films in London, Brighter Pictures in London, FIFA TV, the Middle East Broadcasting Centre & Children’s Television Workshop from New York and more.
In 2003 Richard Nosworthy joined with producers Clive Morris and Felix Meyburgh to produce the feature film A Case of Murder starring Steve Hofmeyr, Gideon Emery and Candice Hillebrand which was shown on M-Net in 2005. Richard served as executive producer, line producer and assistant director.
In 2004 Richard Nosworthy directed and was the line producer of 15 episodes of the drama series Jozi Streets for eMedia’s e.tv.
In March 2007 he qualified with a Certificate in Entertainment Law at the University of Johannesburg.
From producing, writing and directing the annual Muse Awards show for South Africa’s Writers’ Guild of South Africa (WGSA), to producing and directing numerous TV commercials, Richard Nosworthy also did a lot of corporate video work like creating a Heritage documentary for MultiChoice about the pay-TV operator’s history.
In 2017 he launched the Scribe Writers Room as a scriptwriting incubator to help scriptwriters from a variety of backgrounds to develop projects in a safe, uncensored and private environment.
He often did screenwriting classes, and helped with developing and writing spec scripts, and was constantly developing productions for stage, film and television, with a never-ending interest in helping to create new projects with interesting or unusual challenges.
In 2019 he became a member of the National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF) council and their audit committee In addition, he has been developing and writing a few spec scripts.
He did part-time lecturing at Rhodes University Journalism department with practical TV production workshops, for the South African Scriptwriters Association, AFDA Johannesburg, WGSA and the Moving Pictures Foundation.
Richard Nosworthy served as a judge on various industry panels, including for the NFVF’s South African Film and Television Awards (SAFTAs), the South African Society of Cinematographers and the Writers Guild of South Africa. In 2015 Richard was awarded the Special Service Award by the Writers Guild of South Africa.