“ ‘MASTER HAROLD’ . . . AND...

“ ‘MASTER HAROLD’ . . . AND THE BOYS,” Friday, 8 p.m. (24); 9 p.m. (28) (15)--The terrible toll that racism extracts from its perpetrator as well as its victim is powerfully explored in this anti-apartheid drama by South African playwright Athol Fugard.

The 90-minute program, which already has played on the Showtime pay-TV channel, features an outstanding cast in Matthew Broderick, John Kani and Zakes Mokae, who won a Tony Award for his performance in the 1982 Broadway production. This is its first airing on the Public Broadcasting Service; it also will be seen Saturday at 8 p.m. on KOCE Channel 50.

Adapted for TV by Fugard from his semi-autobiographical play, “ ‘Master Harold’ . . . and the Boys” is a one-set character study involving Harold, a young South African white man, and Sam and Willie, older black men who have known him since he was a child and work at the Port Elizabeth tea room owned by Harold’s parents. It is there, on a rainy afternoon in 1950, that the drama unfolds, changing their relationship forever.

The news media bring us reports almost daily of the growing and increasingly violent opposition to the South African government’s policies of racial segregation. The only violence here, however, is verbal--an explosion of anger that stunningly illuminates the shameful, insidious, destructive nature of institutionalized hatred.

Indeed, Fugard’s principal metaphor is, of all things, ballroom dancing: the image of dancers gliding smoothly across the floor, managing ever so gracefully to avoid colliding with other couples.

“Aren’t we ever going to get it right (and) learn to dance life like true champions, instead of always like a bunch of beginners?” asks Sam.