Three Talk with Noeleen on SABC3 on Friday with the cast and crew of Isidingo, SABC3's weekday soap which is turning 15 years old, was hugely revealing.
The arresting, extremely revealing and insightful Three Talk with Noeleen hour on SABC3 was thanks in a huge part to talk show host Noeleen Maholwana-Sangqu's very frank, very straight-forward, very engaging, intelligent, open-ended and very real questions.
Where Noeleen Maholwana-Sangqu sometimes comes across as over-rehearsed with too scripted questions or looking like she is parroting control room questions through her earpiece, the Isidingo episode on Friday came across as "true Noeleen".
Noeleen Maholwana-Sangqu asked real questions which real viewers wanted to know, and which opened the studio guests from Isidingo up to really give insightful and interesting answers in an amazing way.
Noeleen Maholwana-Sangqu lived herself in to such a degree with Friday's topic and guests that she even called Robert Whitehead "Barker" - his character's name - before apologising later.
It was a clear clue that Noeleen Maholwana Sangqu subconsciously - just like millions of viewers - has come to equate his image with the name Barker. It's something which only happens when you actually really watch a TV show in which the characters make a very strong impression.
It was clear that Noeleen Maholwana-Sangqu herself watches Isidingo.
Noeleen Maholwana-Sangqu asked several real and want-to-know but "difficult" questions which made the Isidingo cast and crew on the beige couches squirm and didn't yield definitive answers - from whether Isidingo is going to have a 15th birthday party, to where is Cherel (Michelle Botes)?
Noeleen Maholwana even asked about the difficult subject - still a deeply emotional issue for the Isidingo cast - about Ashley Callie, the actress who shockingly died in a car-crash in February 2008. ("I miss her dreadfully. It's never ever been quite the same for me," said Robert Whitehead.)
It allowed the Isidingo guests to share extremely heartfelt stories and moments and to give a real glimpse behind-the-scenes of not the show - but the tightly-knitted "family" the Isidingo cast and crew really is.
"How do you deal behind the scenes and creatively with an actor who's been on the show and says I don't want to be here anymore?" asked Noeleen Maholwana-Sangqu. It was an amazing question - and one of the many surprising, real and 'wow journalism' questions from the talk show host who was on a roll and didn't hold back.
"Oh gosh, we've had a couple of those," exclaimed Pumla Hopa, the executive producer of Isidingo. "You know we've written the story already, it's ready to shoot, and the person comes and says, 'look I have other plans.' "
"And you beg and beg and beg. But when they've made their decision they've made their decision. There's nothing else you can do. Now you have to go back and rewrite the story," said Pumla Hopa.
"It's very challenging. It can be fun," said Liam Stratton, Isidingo's head writer, "creating solutions for problems. It's fun and it's part of what makes the job cool and really worth doing. But when you've got three month's of story and you have to go back and unpick ... Because if you write the story correctly, it's all interconnected."
"So as soon as you start to pick at one bit, the whole things pulls apart. So you have to set it all up again," said Liam Stratton. "It can work really well - but it's just a pain."
Later Arno Marais who plays Benjamin le Roux said he's been with Isidingo for three and a half years and not been bored one day.
Thema Sebopedi who portrays Lerato Tsotetsi on Isidingo said she doesn't mind her fans thinking and expecting her to be Lerato when they run into her. "I don't blame them. It's who they meet in their living rooms every day. I have to meet them half way and tolerate it irrespective of how I'm feeling on any given day."
Isidingo director Stembiso Mathenjwa revealed how Isidingo is able to work in additional scenes (called "transmission scenes" to make an episode the exact duration required for playout) on a particular day to bring in current-to-the-day news events such as cricket scores and the exact petrol price hike into the show.
Isidingo delivers new scenes to the SABC for playout on the same day on those days where they knew beforehand news events will be taking place.
