Brett Goldin

South African actor and comedian (1977 2006)

Brett Goldin (21 October 1977 – 16 April 2006) was a South African actor and part of the Crazy Monkey comedy troupe. Goldin was murdered in Cape Town in 2006 alongside friend Richard Bloom, a fashion designer who was a label manager for the Maze clothing company in Cape Town. He was a student of the University of Cape Town Drama Department from 1997 to 2000. He graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in English and Drama, and subsequently completed a Performer's Diploma in Speech and Drama.

Goldin began performing professionally at the age of eleven and had extensive experience in television, film and theatre.

Goldin, along with Trevor Clarence, Brendan Jack and Gavin Williams, performed stunts in the popular Crazy Monkey series of comedy inserts aired between music videos by MTV. He starred in commercials for Pepsi and CNA. Michael Krauss in the 2003 television film drama Citizen Verdict, and Dylan in Season 3 of the South African drama series Yizo Yizo.

Goldin's film roles include Carl in the 2002 horror film Slash, Lourens in the 2003 romantic drama Proteus, and B Dog in Crazy Monkey's 2005 comedy feature film Straight Outta Benoni.

In 2004 Goldin wrote and acted in his first stage play, a one man show titled Bad Apple, which examined what would happen if a Columbine style killing spree were to occur at a wealthy public school in Johannesburg. The production opened in August 2004 at the Intimate Theatre at the University of Cape Town, directed by Matthew Wild. The production received excellent reviews from the local press. At the time of his death, Goldin was playing the role of Guildenstern in Hamlet at the Baxter Theatre and was set to go to the United Kingdom as part of the South African production to be performed in Stratford upon Avon.

Goldin was murdered alongside a friend, Richard Bloom, in the early hours of Sunday 16 April 2006. They were killed with two shots each to the back of the head in Mowbray, Cape Town, after they had left a party in Camps Bay. They had been hijacked and shot execution style. Both men killed were gay, and members of the local gay community were traumatised by their violent deaths. Four other men had been sentenced for related charges the previous year in terms of plea bargain agreements requiring them to testify against Marlie and Davids.

In 2007 Antony Sher presented a Channel 4 crime documentary directed by Jon Blair about the murders, titled Murder Most Foul. In July 2012, the murders were covered in the first episode of the M Net Crimes Uncovered crime docu drama television series titled When Two Worlds Collide: The Brett Goldin and Richard Bloom Story.

Shortly after Goldin's murder, the Baxter Theatre Centre in Cape Town, the Royal Shakespeare Company and the Actors Centre in Johannesburg founded the Brett Goldin Bursary Fund in his memory.