Exploring bridges between Nollywood and theatre
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- Category: My thoughts exactly
- Written by Carmen McCain
- Hits: 1949
Last week I attended a SONTA (Society of Nigeria Theatre Artists) conference at Ahmadu Bello University Zaria, held from 14-16 November, themed “Nollywood and Theatre for Development: Exploring the Bridges of Interaction.” The goal of the conference was to examine connections between Nigeria’s popular film industry and theatre for development, which encourages audience participation in solving community problems. Unfortunately, I missed a presentation of a film and a music album made by ABU Theatre Arts students and keynote addresses by Nollywood scholar Onookome Okome and Theatre for Development expert Michael Etherton, one of the founders of the Theatre Arts Department at ABU.
However, I did make it to the venue in time for the awards ceremony, in which SONTA honoured artists and academics, including Chris Nwamuo, Alex Chinwuba Asigbo, Wale Adenuga, Chris Okuba Iyamoga, Barclays Foubiri Ayakoroma, Mahmood Ali-Balogun, Segun Oyekunle, Samuel Ayedime Kafewo, Saddik Balewa, Agbo Emmanuel Ogo-Ochi, and Mohammad Osera Egye. Following the awards ceremony, there was a round table of scholars and practitioners, including the keynote speakers and honorees, as well as other practitioners like film actor and academic Obi Okoli, National Film and Video Censors Board DG Emmanuel Mba, and others.Tuesday night, we were treated to an ABU student performance of Imprisonment of Obatala (1966) by Ulli Beier, the founder of the Osogbo school who passed away this year. Wednesday night, there was an even more stunning performance of the pidgin English play Katakata for Sofahead (1983) by Segun Oyekunle, in which a group of prisoners act out the stories of how they ended up in prison, painting a critical portrait of injustices suffered by the less privileged of Nigeria. Playwright Oyekunle was visibly moved and sat on the ground with the actors as the director Steve Yisa Daniel addressed them at the end of the performance. Oyekunle said that this was only the second time he had seen his play performed.
This is the eighth Nollywood-themed conference I have attended, and the focus on how Nigerian films could actively engage society is an important one. However, I was disappointed that much of the discussion (despite some new and important research published in the conference proceedings) continued to revolve around clichés that have grown up in the critical discourses surrounding “Nollywood.” The Nigerian film industry is often discussed as if it is a singular monolithic film industry, rather than made up of a great variety of language industries, practices, and styles.
Some of the unoriginality of discourse may be because what was originally planned as two days of academic presentations were squeezed into concurrent sessions on Wednesday 16 November, meaning that presenters only had 5-10 minutes to present their research and did not get to hear everyone else’s papers. Another reason may be that there were only a few full-time filmmakers, mostly from the southern axes of the industry, represented. Although Zaria is home to many Kannywood filmmakers and is only a short trip from Kannywood hubs, Kano and Kaduna, and although a few northern participants like filmmaker Saddik Balewa, Kannywood producer Dr. Ahmad Sarari and Cockcrow at Dawn television star Lantana Ahmed attended parts of the conference, only academics and southern-based filmmakers were featured on the opening roundtable intended as a discussion between practitioners and academics.
I was bemused by the frequently repeated mantra that “Nollywood” was only about making money, which must be brought in line with theatre for development’s agenda to improve society. First, of course, popular Nigerian filmmakers want to make money. It is a business. As filmmaker Mahmood Balogun pointed out at the round table, “You guys in academia can write your papers and books and whether they sell you will still get paid and promoted, but this is our bread and butter.” As actor and lecturer, Obi Okoli pointed out “If you make a film, you have to make your money back, or you are out of it.” The money made by films is put into other films. Actor and academic Ayo Akinwale pointed out that actors’ earnings in the Yoruba film industry are often modest.
While some of the largest English-language stars may claim to pull in payments in the millions, most people in the film industry in Nigeria earn a comfortable but unexceptional living wage. Second, just because filmmakers hope to make money from their business does not therefore mean that they are automatically unconcerned with social issues or with improving or changing society.
Outside the event on the ABU campus, I met two Kannywood filmmakers, Abdullahi Sokoto and Hamisu Jibril Goma of Bayajidda Production in Zaria, who had not realized the conference was going on. Having watched their film Bayajidda, based on the Hausa legend, I asked them “What are you working on now? Films about sarauta/royalty.” “No,” they told me, “we’re working on a film about zaman lafiya, peace.” “Are you doing it with an NGO?” I asked them. “No, we are doing it on our own,” they said.
One professor scoffed when I mentioned that engagement with these independent filmmakers could nuance the discussion about motivations for making films, saying I was naïve to believe they were genuinely concerned about peace. But why should it be so unbelievable that these Hausa filmmakers should be interested in social issues? Are they not Nigerians who are as affected by current crises, as any other person resident in the country? I am troubled by the elitist attitude that only a professor at a university or someone “trained” in theatre for development or participatory video can recognize or address problems in powerful ways. In fact, in my opinion, NGO films, most often associated with theatre for development, are far more irrelevant to society than popular films. Donor-funded NGOs can churn out boring, didactic films without the stability of the organization being affected, and art films, funded through grants, can philosophize about politics using the inaccessible language of the elite. Popular filmmakers, however, have to appeal to an audience and often do so using techniques that have grown out of an oral tradition that teaches social mores through entertainment. Adeisa Peter Bello points out that music, dance, and theatre in the Ebira tradition often exposed immoral behavior as a way of reinforcing cultural moral norms. In the same vein, popular Nigerian films address social and political problems that popular audiences often recognize and discuss. Indeed, scholar Moradewun Adejunmobi has pointed out that it is precisely the popular commercial nature of the films which give them a “localized immediacy” most relevant to the needs of their audiences, as opposed to African festival films with grand social agendas which reach only an elite.
This “popular” vs. elite orientation was demonstrated in the two plays performed at the conference. Despite retelling familiar scenes from Yoruba mythology, Ulli Beier’s play Imprisonment of Obatala was filled with tedious poetic monologues. While the stylized performances were brilliant, the play seemed meant for an educated English-speaking elite. Segun Oyekunle’s popular pidgin play Katakata for Sofahead seemed much more likely to appeal to and affect a popular audience, in part perhaps because of the language used.
Ultimately, scholars engaging in this sort of serious and respectful research of Nigeria’s film industries are the ones who will have the most impact on the field. I am glad SONTA provided the platform for such research, and I would only ask that in future conferences of this sort, more full-time filmmakers representing multiple Nigerian film industries, should be brought together to demonstrate to scholars the nuances and complexities of the industries that make up “Nollywood.”
Articles
Exploring bridges between Nollywood and theatre
Category: My thoughts exactly Written by Carmen McCain Hits: 1949
Last week I attended a SONTA (Society of Nigeria Theatre Artists) conference at Ahmadu Bello University Zaria, held from 14-16 November, themed “Nollywood and Theatre for Development: Exploring the Bridges of Interaction.” The goal of the conference was to examine connections between Nigeria’s popular film industry and theatre for development, which encourages audience participation in solving community problems. Unfortunately, I missed a presentation of a film and a music album made by ABU Theatre Arts students and keynote addresses by Nollywood scholar Onookome Okome and Theatre for Development expert Michael Etherton, one of the founders of the Theatre Arts Department at ABU.
However, I did make it to the venue in time for the awards ceremony, in which SONTA honoured artists and academics, including Chris Nwamuo, Alex Chinwuba Asigbo, Wale Adenuga, Chris Okuba Iyamoga, Barclays Foubiri Ayakoroma, Mahmood Ali-Balogun, Segun Oyekunle, Samuel Ayedime Kafewo, Saddik Balewa, Agbo Emmanuel Ogo-Ochi, and Mohammad Osera Egye. Following the awards ceremony, there was a round table of scholars and practitioners, including the keynote speakers and honorees, as well as other practitioners like film actor and academic Obi Okoli, National Film and Video Censors Board DG Emmanuel Mba, and others.Tuesday night, we were treated to an ABU student performance of Imprisonment of Obatala (1966) by Ulli Beier, the founder of the Osogbo school who passed away this year. Wednesday night, there was an even more stunning performance of the pidgin English play Katakata for Sofahead (1983) by Segun Oyekunle, in which a group of prisoners act out the stories of how they ended up in prison, painting a critical portrait of injustices suffered by the less privileged of Nigeria. Playwright Oyekunle was visibly moved and sat on the ground with the actors as the director Steve Yisa Daniel addressed them at the end of the performance. Oyekunle said that this was only the second time he had seen his play performed.
This is the eighth Nollywood-themed conference I have attended, and the focus on how Nigerian films could actively engage society is an important one. However, I was disappointed that much of the discussion (despite some new and important research published in the conference proceedings) continued to revolve around clichés that have grown up in the critical discourses surrounding “Nollywood.” The Nigerian film industry is often discussed as if it is a singular monolithic film industry, rather than made up of a great variety of language industries, practices, and styles.
Some of the unoriginality of discourse may be because what was originally planned as two days of academic presentations were squeezed into concurrent sessions on Wednesday 16 November, meaning that presenters only had 5-10 minutes to present their research and did not get to hear everyone else’s papers. Another reason may be that there were only a few full-time filmmakers, mostly from the southern axes of the industry, represented. Although Zaria is home to many Kannywood filmmakers and is only a short trip from Kannywood hubs, Kano and Kaduna, and although a few northern participants like filmmaker Saddik Balewa, Kannywood producer Dr. Ahmad Sarari and Cockcrow at Dawn television star Lantana Ahmed attended parts of the conference, only academics and southern-based filmmakers were featured on the opening roundtable intended as a discussion between practitioners and academics.
I was bemused by the frequently repeated mantra that “Nollywood” was only about making money, which must be brought in line with theatre for development’s agenda to improve society. First, of course, popular Nigerian filmmakers want to make money. It is a business. As filmmaker Mahmood Balogun pointed out at the round table, “You guys in academia can write your papers and books and whether they sell you will still get paid and promoted, but this is our bread and butter.” As actor and lecturer, Obi Okoli pointed out “If you make a film, you have to make your money back, or you are out of it.” The money made by films is put into other films. Actor and academic Ayo Akinwale pointed out that actors’ earnings in the Yoruba film industry are often modest.
While some of the largest English-language stars may claim to pull in payments in the millions, most people in the film industry in Nigeria earn a comfortable but unexceptional living wage. Second, just because filmmakers hope to make money from their business does not therefore mean that they are automatically unconcerned with social issues or with improving or changing society.
Outside the event on the ABU campus, I met two Kannywood filmmakers, Abdullahi Sokoto and Hamisu Jibril Goma of Bayajidda Production in Zaria, who had not realized the conference was going on. Having watched their film Bayajidda, based on the Hausa legend, I asked them “What are you working on now? Films about sarauta/royalty.” “No,” they told me, “we’re working on a film about zaman lafiya, peace.” “Are you doing it with an NGO?” I asked them. “No, we are doing it on our own,” they said.
One professor scoffed when I mentioned that engagement with these independent filmmakers could nuance the discussion about motivations for making films, saying I was naïve to believe they were genuinely concerned about peace. But why should it be so unbelievable that these Hausa filmmakers should be interested in social issues? Are they not Nigerians who are as affected by current crises, as any other person resident in the country? I am troubled by the elitist attitude that only a professor at a university or someone “trained” in theatre for development or participatory video can recognize or address problems in powerful ways. In fact, in my opinion, NGO films, most often associated with theatre for development, are far more irrelevant to society than popular films. Donor-funded NGOs can churn out boring, didactic films without the stability of the organization being affected, and art films, funded through grants, can philosophize about politics using the inaccessible language of the elite. Popular filmmakers, however, have to appeal to an audience and often do so using techniques that have grown out of an oral tradition that teaches social mores through entertainment. Adeisa Peter Bello points out that music, dance, and theatre in the Ebira tradition often exposed immoral behavior as a way of reinforcing cultural moral norms. In the same vein, popular Nigerian films address social and political problems that popular audiences often recognize and discuss. Indeed, scholar Moradewun Adejunmobi has pointed out that it is precisely the popular commercial nature of the films which give them a “localized immediacy” most relevant to the needs of their audiences, as opposed to African festival films with grand social agendas which reach only an elite.
This “popular” vs. elite orientation was demonstrated in the two plays performed at the conference. Despite retelling familiar scenes from Yoruba mythology, Ulli Beier’s play Imprisonment of Obatala was filled with tedious poetic monologues. While the stylized performances were brilliant, the play seemed meant for an educated English-speaking elite. Segun Oyekunle’s popular pidgin play Katakata for Sofahead seemed much more likely to appeal to and affect a popular audience, in part perhaps because of the language used.
Ultimately, scholars engaging in this sort of serious and respectful research of Nigeria’s film industries are the ones who will have the most impact on the field. I am glad SONTA provided the platform for such research, and I would only ask that in future conferences of this sort, more full-time filmmakers representing multiple Nigerian film industries, should be brought together to demonstrate to scholars the nuances and complexities of the industries that make up “Nollywood.”