Shoki Mokgapa (17 August 1984 – 26 September 2018) was a South African actress. She was best known for her role as Rachel in the film ''Sink''.

Early life

Mokgapa was born in

Johannesburg Johannesburg ( , , ; Zulu language, Zulu and Xhosa language, Xhosa: eGoli ) (colloquially known as Jozi, Joburg, Jo'burg or "The City of Gold") is the most populous city in South Africa. With 5,538,596 people in the City of Johannesburg alon ...

. She had a brother Tshepiso and a stepsister Ntsako Mokadikwa. She spent her early childhood in

Soweto Soweto () is a Township (South Africa), township of the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality in Gauteng, South Africa, bordering the city's mining belt in the south. Its name is an English syllabic abbreviation for ''South Western T ...

before her family moved to Johannesburg's northern

suburbs A suburb (more broadly suburban area) is an area within a metropolitan area. They are oftentimes where most of a metropolitan areas jobs are located with some being predominantly residential. They can either be denser or less densely populated ...

. Fluent in English and

SeSotho Sotho (), also known as ''Sesotho'' (), Southern Sotho, or ''Sesotho sa Borwa'' is a Southern Bantu languages, Southern Bantu language spoken in Lesotho as its national language and South Africa where it is an official language. Like all Ba ...

, Mokgapa attended

Michael Mount Waldorf School Michael Mount Waldorf School is one of 18 registered schools in Southern Africa that practice Waldorf education. Overview * Type of school: Michael Mount Waldorf School is a private, co-educational day school in Bryanston, Johannesburg, S ...

and took

A Levels The A-level (Advanced Level) is a subject-based qualification conferred as part of the General Certificate of Education, as well as a school leaving qualification offered by the educational bodies in the United Kingdom and the educational a ...

at the British International College. She pursued a

Bachelor of Communications A bachelor is a man who is not and never has been married.Bachelors are, in Pitt & al.'s phrasing, "men who live independently, outside of their parents' home and other institutional settings, who are neither married nor cohabitating". (). Etymo ...

before going on to train at the Johannesburg campus of

AFDA AFDA is a South African private Higher Education institution that offers higher certificates, undergraduate, and postgraduate degrees in film, television, performance, business innovation and technology, radio and podcasting, and creative wri ...

, graduating with a

Bachelor of Arts A Bachelor of Arts (abbreviated B.A., BA, A.B. or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is the holder of a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the liberal arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts deg ...

in Performing Arts.

Career

In 2008, Mokgapa made her television debut in the second season of the SABC3 drama series ''The Lab''. In the series, she played the role of Tumi, the Pearl Lusipho's personal assistant, for three seasons. Mokgapa was "instrumental" in helping to co-found the POPArt Theatre at the Maboneng Precinct, which opened its doors in 2011. On British television, Mokgapa appeared in the ITV series '' Wild at Heart'' in 2008 and then in the BBC drama ''Silent Witness'' in 2010. Meanwhile, she appeared in Hollywood films such as ''Retribution'' (2011) and ''Dredd'' (2012). In 2013, she appeared in the second season of the SABC1 drama ''Intersexions'' as Gadima. That same year, she made a minor role in the biographical film '' Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom''. In 2015, she gained prominence through her role as Disebo in the second season of the e.tv soap opera ''Ashes to Ashes''. In 2016, she appeared in the Sri Lankan feature film ''A Love Like This'' directed by

Chandran Rutnam Chandran Rutnam is a Sri Lankan filmmaker and entrepreneur. Rutnam has hosted numerous Hollywood films for their location shoots in Sri Lanka and Malaysia. He was the Line Producer/Production Supervisor on several international productions inc ...

which was shot in the Seychelles. In 2017, Mokgapa played Rachel Nyaga in the Afrikaans-language film ''Sink''. For her performance, she won Best Actress in a Feature Film category at the 11th Annual

South African Film and Television Awards The South African Film and Television Awards (sometimes referred to as the Golden Horns; often simply called the SAFTAs) is an annual South African awards ceremony hosted by the National Film and Video Foundation (NFVF), to honour creative exce ...

(SAFTAs). Then in 2018, she won the Best Actress Award at the kykNET Silwerskermfees Festival for the same role, becoming the first non-Afrikaans speaking actress to win the award. In mid 2018, she appeared in the

Amazon Prime Video Amazon Prime Video, known simply as Prime Video, is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming television service owned by Amazon. The service primarily distributes films and television series produced or co-produced by ...

miniseries ''

The Looming Tower ''The Looming Tower: Al-Qaeda and the Road to 9/11'' is a 2006 nonfiction book by Lawrence Wright, a journalist for ''The New Yorker''. Wright examines the origins of the militant organization Al-Qaeda, the background for various terrorist atta ...

''. She made her final film appearance in Jahmil X.T. Qubeka's '' Sew the Winter to My Skin'', South Africa's 2019 submission in the Oscars' foreign film category.

Death

Mokgapa suffered from clinical depression and anxiety for a long time. She committed suicide on 25 September 2018 in Johannesburg at the age of 34. A memorial event was held on 2 October 2018 at the Market Theatre.

Filmography

Film

Television

Awards and nominations

References

External links

*
Shoki Mokgapa
at TVSA {{DEFAULTSORT:Mokgapa, Shoki 1984 births 2018 deaths 21st-century South African actresses Actresses from Johannesburg Actors from Soweto South African film actresses South African television actresses South African Sotho people Suicides in South Africa