The Show Must Go On!

Burning the candle at both ends: At a Pretoria Youth Theatre show during the day and acting in a TV show at night.

A few years back: It was his last night of shooting a scene, coincidentally at a hospital, and he signed off around 10pm. The Production Manager said “Drive safe, I have a bad feeling”. She was so incredibly right. Steven waved it off and said: "Not to worry, I’m driving straight home". On the N1 Highway, driving in the 2nd fast lane towards Pretoria when his back right wheel fell off at the bottom of the hill. He watched the wheel pass him by, sparks flying out the back, while the steering wheel locked. When he finally came to a stop, he called his dad and told him what had happened, who immediately got in his car. After the phone call Steven noticed a girl outside his window and a 4x4 behind him (all still on the same lane with cars whizzing past hooting, annoyed. One of the things Steven remembers and suffers slightly from, is the feeling of the cars passing him at record speed, making the car rock from side to side.

He got out the car to check on the girl and the car behind him. Turns out, the 4x4 stopped abruptly when the driver saw he wasn’t moving and she smacked into the back of him. This all happened while he was on a 2 minute phone call with his dad and he didn’t notice at all. He walked with the girl to her accident and she asked if she could still drive her car. The front was completely crushed. “It was a miracle that she got out without a scratch actually.” Then Steve's phone rang and it was his girlfriend checking if he was alright. As he answered and turned his back on the oncoming cars for a moment, a car slammed into the back of the girl’s car which in turn slammed into Steven and sent him flying midsentence. His poor girlfriend had to hear a crash, then scream, then an engaged phone. "It felt like everything slowed down when I was hit, I could see everything in such detail in the air and then…black", says Steven, humorously ending with, “So dramatic”. "I guess it really was a life or death moment. Had I been an inch to the left I would have been crushed between two cars". Any slight difference could have been the moment he simple became a memory. A statistic.

That car ended up writing off all three cars entirely and itself! Luckily no one was seriously injured.

He woke up confused, trying to wrap his head around what just happened and what is happening. He stumbled to the side of the highway without even looking. He just knew instinctively he had to get out of the way and ended up in the fastest lane, but luckily the accident forced cars out of that lane so it was safe to be in (not that he knew this at the time). Once he sat down and collected his thoughts, the pain kicked in. His right leg wouldn’t move anymore – "It was incredibly painful to move it" Steven says. Then blood started dripping from his face and that’s when he realised “shit just got real”. He called his dad and told him, he had just been hit (he was nearby but on the other side of the highway. By the time he had gotten there, the traffic had built up and the ambulances were there treating Steven). He was rushed off to hospital and the Doctor told him that they might have to shave his head if he needed stitches. Steven definitely wasn’t having any of it and told him not to worry, he will be fine. "I really didn’t want to lose any hair because it would put me out of work for a while", Steven tells me. But by the end of it all he was released from hospital the same night with a stiff leg and neck, small cut on his head that didn’t need stitching and three long scars on his back. He was lucky enough to be in the exact position, to escape with cuts and bruises in a situation that could have been a turn for the worst. The next day he arrived at the show ready to perform with a neck brace and a weird walk. "I watched the first 2 shows with an understudy playing my part and jumped in on the evening show because I couldn’t stand not being on that stage when I could still be".

"The lesson I gave and continue to give from all of this was that no matter how sick you are, if you can act, then act. No excuses."

"The lesson I learned was A. Get off the highway as soon as you can. And B. I must really love acting to be able to power through another 2 weeks of shows in that state."

#StevenJohnWard