Ultimate liberation is born of resilience

Pointless duties are designed to break the prisoners’ spirits. Random blows are meant to break their bodies. Yet they refuse to be beaten down.

Set on South Africa’s Robben Island, where Nelson Mandela was held for nearly 18 years, “The Island” presents a harrowing depiction of apartheid. Athol Fugard, John Kani and Winston Ntshona wrote the play in the early 1970s, but the qualities that suffuse their drama -- strength, dignity, defiance and, above all, hope -- remain vital in a staging by Camelot Artists and Black Belt Productions, which transfers to the Skylight Theatre in Los Feliz this weekend for an extended run.

The stage is empty and the guards are invisible, yet Robben Island feels all too real as the prisoners (played by David Paladino and Kenneth Rosier) groan and buckle under their harsh treatment.

Back in their cell, the men nurse angry red welts and begin to shrug off the day’s humiliations. As strength returns, so does brotherhood and solidarity. They josh each other and play a joke on the guards, but mostly they prepare for a prison performance of the Greek drama “Antigone,” through which they intend to send a bold message.

The story’s inspiration came from the real-life prison performance of an actor from the Serpent Players, a theater company that Fugard helped to found. “The Island’s” spirit of resilience, coupled with faith in the transforming power of art, would recur in many of Fugard’s subsequent stories.

Director John Parsonson clearly understands these themes, but he doesn’t announce them in capital letters. Instead he coaxes them out in little gestures: a hand that reaches out to give comfort or a torso held tall and proud. From beneath layers of grime, his extraordinary actors give their all. The result is absolutely liberating.

*

‘The Island’

Where: Skylight Theatre, 1816 1/2 N. Vermont Ave.,

Los Feliz

When: Fridays-Saturdays, 8 p.m.; Sundays, 7 p.m.

Ends: May 3

Price: $20

Contact: (310) 203-1334

Running time: 1 hour, 25 minutes