Every movie that finds its way to the screen is in its own way a miracle, a fusion of creative and technical energies, logistics and planning, faith, hope, and lots and lots of money.
But even when the lights finally dim and the credits start rolling, the battle to win hearts and minds has only just begun, all the more so for a South African filmmaker who must battle against the might of Hollywood to find an audience. Just ask Akin Omotoso.
The celebrated actor, director, and producer has been turning his passion for motion pictures into miracles ever since his parents gave him a movie camera for his birthday.
But the real epiphany came when the family moved from Nigeria to South Africa, shortly before the dawn of democracy, and the young Akin realised how many stories there were to be told, about life, love, and the turmoil and possibilities of change in his adoptive motherland.
Schooled in drama and film at UCT, where he won an award for his prowess as an actor, Akin made his full-length directing debut with God is African, a wry look at student life on campus.
Since then, he has made his name as a versatile, impassioned filmmaker, through films as varied in style and tone as the romantic comedy, Tell Me Sweet Something, and the fast-paced action drama, Vaya.
Akin sat down with Ruda to chat about the drama of real life, the real life of drama, and his restless campaign to disprove the “self-perpetuating myth that South African films are not good”.
Transcript:
R: Hello, and a very warm welcome to another session of the Change Exchange. My guest today Akin Omotoso, actor, director, producer, you’re so welcome.
A: Thank you so much. Thanks for having me. Good to be here.
R: You came from Nigeria at the age of 17.
A: Yes.
R: It’s not your choice at that age but you have very firm opinions at 17.
A: Absolutely.
R: What was that like?
A: We, my brother and I went to a boarding school, military boarding school. We came home for holidays and my late mom, rest her soul, she said … I remember we got back from holiday and she says, “Your father has got a job at the University of the Western Cape in South Africa. We’re moving to South Africa.” This was in December 1991. I must remember that time, a lot of people, South Africa obviously …
R: It was flavor of the month.
A: Prior state, but it was a place where you didn’t know. Of course the late Nelson Mandela had been released and there was this idea that change was happening but from a revert, one never knew. Growing up, we were told a lot about South Africa. I remember as a child just handing out free South Africa and all, Nigeria was very prominent in making sure its citizens understood the type of oppression that was going on in South Africa. The idea that yes, we understood change was going to happen but the idea that this was a place you could go to live …
R: As a black person.
A: As a black person was really strange to say the least. No, we were …
R: Not impressed.
A: We weren’t impressed. Also a lot of our friends were going to live in the States and now you come and say, “You’re living in South Africa.” It took some getting used to. Obviously, in retrospect, it was the best thing to happen for a whole bunch of reasons. One, I became a filmmaker here. Two, shortly after 1992, Nigeria went through a very dark phase with the dictatorship of Sani Abacha. In a way man, when I think back I’m like, “I don’t know what third eye my father had,” and in a situation where lots of activists were killed. We’re recording this, on the 10th of November – Ken Saro-Wiwa was murdered on this day by the dictator in 1995. In fact, which was if you remember the Commonwealth, it was Mandela’s first Commonwealth appearance as president and the first thing he has to do is preside over suspending Nigeria from the Commonwealth. Where history and the personal intersect, it was quite an interesting brave choice.
R: Your life could have gone in a completely different direction?
A: Absolutely. Absolutely.
R: If you were there then, you would have been?
A: Who knows? I don’t even know. You know what I mean?
R: Yeah.
A: I don’t even … I can’t even …
R: One doesn’t know how that ends.
A: One doesn’t know how it ends, but it’s an interesting thing that in December 1991, based on South Africa obviously understanding it, it was going to open up. The University of the Western Cape had put out these applications for people to come and teach. My father had taught in Lesotho in 1989. For his generation, South Africa was obviously a place of curiosity.
R: What does he teach? Literature?
A: Literature, English. In terms of the Western Cape, it was about teaching … he was a professor of English at UWC. We arrived here two weeks before the last Whites-only referendum, when de Klerk said, “Yes or no. What are you going to choose?” We got here two weeks before that referendum. I remember saying to my dad, “Are you sure these people are going to? Are you sure these people are going to vote this thing correctly?” He said, “Don’t worry. They’re going to vote yes.” Obviously, yes was the vote. It was a very interesting time to arrive in this country.
R: One forgets so quickly.
A: I know.
R: Now, if you look back at it now it looks inevitable.
A: Yeah, exactly.
R: But it wasn’t.
A: No, no, no. Don’t get it … As you say, I remember that even at the time, you couldn’t vote. Yes, the structures had been dismantled, dismantling from the ‘80s and so on, but you still had the president of the day still had to call a referendum to say, “Are you with me on this change or not?”
R: How did you experience coming into South Africa as a person who had lived in a black country and this was really definitely not a black country in that season, at that point.
A: Yes, yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.
R: How did you experience that? Being at UCT as a student then?
A: It’s interesting that the sort of, when you look back. I think the thing about growing up, there’s something about when you grow up in a place that recognizes your own potential. I.e. you for a long time hear the fight and the continual fight is to fight against this idea that you’re inferior, like on a daily. This very diseased and jaundice view that certain people have that because your skin color is different somehow, you know what I mean? That poison. Growing up in Nigerian and coming from where I fortunately come from, it just never answers the equation. Coming to this country, the idea that somebody else thinks …
R: Looks down on you just for that reason.
A: Yes. It’s just like, “What’s wrong with you? Are you well? Is everything all right?” I think that was an interesting transition because people don’t know or at the time, people didn’t know how to ask, some people find that strange. They’re accustomed to you just because of the corrupt nature of that apartheid system, they’re accustomed to you just falling in line.
R: Yes.
A: You’re like, “Come on. You got to be kidding me.” I found that quite, I don’t know, I felt like I had the armor to deal with it. Obviously I’m still speaking from a very privileged position. There are people who’ve laid down their lives to make sure that this country changed. What I’m saying is your experiences on a daily … I remember in class once at UCT we were doing political theater, I think protest theater. I remember one white lady in the class saying, “Why are we studying this stuff?” Everyone just roasted her like, “What do you mean? There’s not enough study of this stuff.”
It definitely wasn’t a time of chill. Yes, there was … in 1994, definitely the euphoria and everything that finally, so that, to experience that was amazing. Also, to be at university at the time was that we all felt like we’re part of something new, we’re not taking nonsense from the past and hopefully we’ll start to curve the kind of society that we want to see. It’s a long way to answer the question but it was a very interesting time. Then also trying to grow to understand the country, like what is this place like? Cape Town was an interesting place to be at that time. We forget the violence, the cost of, and all that stuff was really quite present because we were new and trying to work it out.
R: And looking at it for the first time while people who had lived here, the fish is the last to notice the water they say.
A: Exactly, exactly. Having grown up in a university campus in Nigeria, fully aware. My parents had, they had a picture of Nelson Mandela, the famous quote on their bedroom door. I even remember as a child, I was like, “Why do you have this? Who is this man that you have?” My father explained to us what was going on. I’m saying having had that at a remote and suddenly you’re here and seeing all of it, was fascinating.
One more thing about that. As a child, at the primary school I went to, there used to be a play called The Rescue of Fatima. It was the way in which they taught us about what was going on in South Africa. The play was about some, some white soldiers kidnap this black girl from a village and then the village bandies together and goes and rescues the girl. That was the story. It was a way of talking and showing children and letting people understand South Africa. We always knew at school, the one Lebanese guy was going to be the white general. Everyone knew who was cast. I say that to say it’s a way in which education and information about the continent was passed on.
R: Then that move to South Africa also affected the rest of your life because you didn’t have our matric exemption so you couldn’t?
A: Yes, yes.
R: You wanted to study law?
A: Yes.
R: You couldn’t do that?
A: I couldn’t do it.
R: Then the soft option was drama and the rest is history.
A: And here we are. Yeah. It was interesting because at the time again, I remember being, I went to high school post-matric at Bishops. I remember somebody saying, “Where are you from?” I said, “Nigeria.” They were like, “Where is that?” I mean listen, maybe that person in particular had no idea but the point is …
R: No, we didn’t see ourselves as part of the continent. We didn’t.
A: You understand?
R: Yeah.
A: That was quite an interesting thing. It’s like, “What do you mean you don’t know? What do you mean?” You know what I mean? We know at least from a distance a lot about you. The education system was very different. The course I wanted to do is law but I couldn’t get into it because I came in at a time when if I had started maybe a little bit earlier, but you know that 17 is a very … you’re in-between. In Nigeria I was finishing, here you got to … I sat out a year to be able to, so all of 1990, I didn’t go to school because you generally start again the next year. It was a pretty tricky time. I was very happy to get to university. The only course that didn’t require a matric exemption was drama. I felt like well, it’s not too far for me, i.e. my father being a writer, growing up in this very creative environment. My master plan was I would get in, once I’m in, I’m going to transfer to law. Yeah.
R: Then you were in a play and you won the award for the most promising student.
A: Yes.
R: You decided, “Okay, I can do this.”
A: Yeah. I don’t think I so much decided I could do it. I felt like okay, this could work.
R: Work in what way?
A: It was that enjoyed the process. Suddenly, I suddenly went … the play was directed by Mark Fleishman, Sunjata told the story of the King of Mali. The way in which Mark worked or works was so great. Firstly, it was an African story, there were seven of us if I remember correctly in the ensemble. It was our first play at drama school. Just the way it works, stripping down the ego, making sure there’s no, there’s no one is the lead, no one is the … Yes, I ended up playing the king but everyone plays their part. That communal, I just loved it. I felt like I want to do more of this. Winning the award was great as a sort of affirmation but it was more okay, if I work hard at this, I could… something could work here. Do you know what I mean?
R: Mm-hmm.
A: I think being at drama school, a lot of my classmates knew they wanted to be actors. They knew they wanted to be actors because they knew they wanted to be in the arts. I knew I liked writing but I didn’t know like for certain this is the thing that I want to do. The drama school opened that up in a way that was great.
R: You also got into filmmaking almost immediately.
A: Yes.
R: You started making short films.
A: Absolutely.
R: What drew you to film and telling it through that media?
A: Yeah. What happened was that, and I think you had asked also the drama department when a society is changing, there are new plays, there’s new voices, so the stuff, what you used to do before, there has to be room for more stuff. This exploration of new stories. What happened was that I was just looking around and seeing that a lot of the actors that I went to watch in plays were not necessarily always working so that wasn’t going to work. I felt like everybody, you will see this great actor like, “Man.” Then you would see them not working.
R: In other words not earning a living?
A: Not earning a living, that’s the word. I thought like that’s not going to work like I need to …
R: Our son said to his father when he was 12, he wanted to be the new James Bond, the next James Bond.
A: There you go.
R: His dad said, “You’ll die of hunger.”
A: Exactly. Then it really became quite early, it hit me very early, you’ve got to find something else to do. Then at that time the bug had bit so I was really not interested in anything else. I was like, “Well, what else is in this vein that I could do that if I wasn’t acting, I was doing that?” It came back to storytelling. Then I thought well, maybe not writing, maybe directing. I could, that seems like it encompasses everything.
Almost immediately yeah two things happened, my parents bought me a small camera for my 21st birthday so I was able to … so I had a small camera that I could use. The drama department used to film its productions, which was very straightforward, i.e. you just bring the VHS camera, put the tape in and record the stage. I struck a deal with the guy who had it. I said, “Can I keep the camera?” I don’t even know if this was allowed in university practices. I said, “Look, can I not film this because it’s at night?” I said, “You don’t look like you want to be here.” I told, “Can I do this stuff and can I keep the camera over the weekend or whatever?” This might have happened like three or four, just probably like four times, it wasn’t … he was quite generous in that way like “Yeah, you could do it.” I went and filmed. I don’t know how good a job I did at actually filming the stuff, I apologise.
What it was is I was walking around UCT with a camera and every now and again, I would just be filming stuff, so trying to understand how the camera works. Then the same thing with my own camera. I knew nothing. I knew nothing about the lights, I knew nothing about the sound, every, the first thing we shot, you just couldn’t see anything, like it was dark. I was like, “But why?” I was like, “Huh?” The next thing we got, we got a light, we got my friend’s lamp but now the sound was terrible. Then by the third one, there was a little, by my third year, there was like now we had mic, some lights, it was little, starting to come together. Then once I graduated, I made a professional film which I could then, which is 20 years ago, which I could then flag around. That was the idea. The idea was find something, if you’re not acting, you’ll be directing.
R: Yes, more strength to your bow.
A: More strength to your bow. Also, I think that just story … and looking around as in what kinds of stories are being told? What kind of? Because as an actor you’re one part of the bigger picture. That’s why you’re called or you audition to give voice to different souls from these pages. As a director you’re far more involved in shaping an actor, so I feel like I want to see a story about X then I go …
R: You can make it happen.
A: I go out and make it happen. That was the kind of thing. While doing drama, while doing the course that my parents paid for, I was also doing the sideline course. I think now the drama department has changed. When we started to leave, when we were about to leave, they had acting for the camera because they could also see if you remember in those days a lot of theater companies, you join the theater company, television was starting to Egoli, like Generations itself. I remember watching the first episode of Generations as a student. All these things were new. The idea that you could be on television wasn’t something that …
R: And make a living out of it.
A: And make a living. It wasn’t something in our head. We were like, “If we can get into a theater group, we’re good.” Anybody who got cast on television is like, “Wow, you’re on TV.” You know what I mean? It was real, it’s weird to say so now.
R: Yes, it is. Then you were in Isidingo, in Generations, in a number of those big soapies.
A: Yes, yes.
R: Was a pay cheque at the end.
A: Yeah, absolutely.
R: You also played, you were in Blood Diamond and Lord of War.
A: Yes, yes.
R: Was there a decision that I’m not going to try and pursue that dream?
A: Yeah. I think because … the thing was that I really like acting, I do. I like the idea that you can become someone else for a couple of, it’s all or that you can somehow inhabit a character hopefully well.
R: Who is completely, might be completely different from yourself?
A: Might be completely different from yourself.
R: Yes.
A: I like that but I really love directing. I love it. That because it encompasses the communal feel. I think knowing that there are so many great actors out there and what they give and what it requires, it almost like I like acting a lot, I just love directing. I guess it was a moment, I was at a … it was a moment where I felt like not that you had to choose but one had to be given more than the other. It happened …
R: More energy and more attention.
A: More energy and more attention. It happened when I was at a festival, a film festival. I remember Generations had graced, they’d given me some time like four days or whatever to go to the festival, the Cannes Film Festival at the time had, they’ve got a sidebar, something called Cinemas of the World, so you’re not necessarily part of the festival but it’s …
R: The fringe?
A: On the fringe. Cinemas of the World. That particular year, South Africa was the one cinema. There were a bunch of short films and I’d made the short film called Rifle Road. It was part of that Cinemas of the World. It was cool, I got to go to the festival. It was at that festival flying back to go on set on Generations where I was like, “Well, you’ve got to make a choice between these two.” The straddling of the two at the time. One has to … Maybe some people don’t feel like they need to make that choice but I felt like I needed to make a choice.
R: From friends who are in soapies, it’s a full-time occupation.
A: Full-time.
R: You can’t really do other things, I mean little bits and pieces around it.
A: Yeah, absolutely.
R: But you can’t focus on anything else.
A: The thing about Generations, I mean even today those four years I spent there were some of the best four years of my life. I remember laughing a lot, I remember the … I would do it all again, those four years were amazing. What they gave was that even till today when I’m advertising a film, people say, “Yeah, but ask Kaya about?”
R: Yeah, gave you a platform, gave you visibility?
A: Exactly, absolutely. Forever grateful. I came back from that festival and I spoke to the producers and I said …
R: Write me out?
A: Yeah.
R: Was that scary?
A: No.
R: No?
A: Scary in the sense … it wasn’t scary that the choice had been made. Scary in that yes, you’re going into the great unknown. The pay cheque comfort is gone because now you’re entering a world of well, yeah. You’re entering a different space so making it takes a long time, it’s hard, it’s really difficult. It’s easy, in our staff, it was easy to work with someone.
R: Yeah, you just pitch up.
A: Rock up, you know? Far more challenging to say you’re going to set up your own entity.
R: Yes.
A: Scary in that sense but scary that was necessary in the sense that I knew it was never going to be easy.
R: How did you get the machine going? Because I watched Vaya earlier this week, your latest film. One of the things that struck me was all the names in the beginning of … you must have contributed bits and pieces of funding.
A: Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
R: I thought that must have taken months of, with one-on-one and trying to convince this one and the … how does one get that machine going?
A: With great difficulty.
R: Yeah, I’m sure.
A: That’s the thing, right? With the film industry. It’s that and that’s what I love about directing or producing is the communal. You’re allowed to, you meet interesting people because obviously you’re bringing a project that you’re trying to convince someone. It’s different if we say we’re making milk, we all understand. Bread, I want to make brown bread. Everybody gets what you’re talking about, you know what I mean? There’s an idea of what it is.
When it comes to film, you’re really pitching something that’s quite esoteric. It’s going to be like this. Also, it’s a very expensive exercise. Lots of meetings, I always joke, if I open up a film school, the first year we’ll just be doing forms, how to fill out forms, nobody will see a camera for a while. I think that that’s what the industry is. I felt that I had to respect that that’s what it was about. A lot of time in the script writing phase, a lot of time trying to convince people to put funding into it, audiences to watch it.
The beauty of when you’ve been around a long time is that you see something like when we start, when I started you know, when I made my first film God Is African, the structures that exist today didn’t exist. The National Film and Video Foundation did not exist. The Department of Trade and Industry Rebate did not exist. The Gauteng Film Commission did not exist, the KZN Film Commission did not exist, all these entities that exist now that are allowing filmmakers to tap into these resources, they didn’t exist back then. I’m saying, I have a real appreciation of how far we’ve come and that we made God Is African in particular at a time when there was nothing. It was important to make it because the thing about the film industry is poof, everybody wants to be a filmmaker. You can be sitting around a table and everybody is talking about this great film they’re going to make.
R: Yes.
A: I never wanted to be like that. I wanted to be in the trenches if I can use that metaphor making it.
R: Actually doing it.
A: Actually doing it and continue to do it and not feel like it’s a once off thing, not feel like, I really wanted to make sure that I wanted to be telling films for a long time.
R: God Is African, when was that? 2003?
A: It came out in 2003 but we actually shot it in 2000. I shot it, I think it was 2001, there is the old age coming to play. We shot it, what I remember about shooting it was that we shot it around the same time I got on Generations. In fact, that’s why I knew I could choose it because I could pay for it, I could put my contribution. My first couple of cheques from Generations went into funding God Is African. What was …
R: Did it work commercially? Because one needs to find a market also.
A: Yeah, yeah. Look, what it did was … so the short answer is when you say, compared to what we spent, it was fine.
R: Okay.
A: The film cost us R60 000 to make. That R60 000 to make it and then what happened was that …
R: That’s apart from time and all of that. It’s just hard cost?
A: Everybody worked for free.
R: Yeah.
A: Everybody worked for free so I’m always very grateful to that team of people who really came. I mean what was I? 26? We were all very young and I remember an older filmmaker saying, “Yeah, you can only make this because you’re 26. I can’t go home and say I’m working for free.” In a space when no films were being made, we did this film. That was it. It was hard as well but we did it, you know what I mean? One went through the fire. All the things, you know, all the first time mistakes, all the trials and tribulations, we went through this furnace. That experience, I don’t regret it at all, because it shaped a lot of how I then proceeded. We had lots of compromises on the film on some level and that was like …
R: Because you couldn’t pay for what you wanted, yeah.
A: Things like that but also, on a much more, on another level, it’s more like people are working for free, you know?
R: Yeah, can’t shout at them too hard.
A: Not only that, they have to go work.
R: Yeah.
A: We had situations where I was working on Generations. In fact, the thing about it was that I would go, all of us, Hakeem who was also a producer on my film an actually real cheerleader, Hakeem Kae-Kazim. I would shoot from about 6:00 to 6:00, 6:00 to 6:00 PM on Generations then leave Generations’ set and go on to God Is African and we would shoot from 7:00 to 4 o’clock in the morning just to get it done. People are working. We tried to find people who had jobs so that they won’t be relying on us. When you do it that way, what it means is that yeah, sometimes some people are not available. When you don’t have the experience to say, “Well, let’s not, maybe I shouldn’t shoot that scene that day. I should wait till the person is available.” That’s how I do it now or recast a person. When you don’t know, there’s also a bliss in that and there’s also like, “Okay, we’re just going to do it.” Then you realize like well, what that does is that it compromises certain things. The big lesson over there was just never compromise.
R: You said more than once that it’s the working together, it’s the assembly that actually gets you going.
A: Yes.
R: Partnerships can go seriously wrong. What makes a partnership work?
A: I think what, you’re absolutely right. Partnerships can go wrong. I think what makes it work is total honesty. In other words that when I go to sleep at night, I need to know that you and I are tossing and turning about the same thing. I can’t worry about what’s going on behind my back.
I think in terms of the people, the company, the thing that works is that everybody is on the same page. I know everybody can say that but what does it mean? What it means realistically is that we all understand that it’s not about us, it’s about the project. I know this is easier said than done but years and years of practicing it, because you got to practice it, makes it better because you understand that it’s not, you don’t become a victim in anything. “Ah, they didn’t like my idea.” Is did your idea work for what we’re trying to do?
Same thing when you’re on set. Everybody brings ideas which I love, I really love it. I mean that for me is always the thing, but we have to look at those ideas through a filter of is this working for the story? So I hear you. As a director, I would love maybe to have the camera angle there, but actually there is because I want to show off to my friends like, “Look what I can do with the camera,” as opposed to actually the story needs the camera to be there. It’s the same thing with the DP or the actors.
R: Sure.
A: I hear you. I hear you, you want to cry here but actually …
R: You need to cry five minutes later.
A: Do you know what I mean? Because of X, Y, Z.
R: Yeah.
A: It is hard but I think …
R: That means that presupposes such a level of adulthood, tone of being grown up.
A: You try. Look, yeah, it does.
R: You’re working with actors.
A: You do. You hope. You try to find and you hope that you yourself are bringing the necessary emotional intelligence. Every project that I’ve done I’ve always tried as much as possible to make sure I’m growing, to make sure I’m getting better at communication, make sure, excuse me, all those things. It’s not just me standing there going, “I need everybody,” I also have to be part and parcel or I am part and parcel of this conversation. It is difficult. The thing is to understand that when we get to the conflict point that we embrace it and we try and overcome it. What tends to happen is people don’t like conflicts so things build up. Now, somebody is not coming out to acting a scene because of something that happened three weeks ago, so now you got to say, “Well, what’s the problem?”
R: Yeah.
A: Then I think having the maturity to be able to have those. Then also to trust people. What tends to happen, and I know this as an actor, sometimes, they hire you but they really want to do it. Sometimes the director will come to you and say, “So, in this scene, whatever, your sisters died and da, da, da.” It’s like, “I know my scene because I’ve read it. I have read it.” You understand?
R: Yeah.
A: There’s this condescending view. If you hire somebody, if I hire you …
R: Trust them.
A: I have to trust you. You know what I mean? I think trust is a big factor that I allow you to cook. Like I brought Ruda in to do her thing, let’s do it, let’s see how we can do it, but I can’t suddenly now pretend like I need you to do something else. You know what I mean?
R: Mm-hmm.
A: I think trust is a big factor. Let people shine and do what you hope they do when we get together.
R: You obviously feel very intensely about the stories you want to tell.
A: Yes.
R: God Is African, Man on Ground, 12 years later, both about the difficulties between people from different areas and backgrounds and etcetera. Now Vaya with stories you’ve gathered from homeless people, and then in-between there, there was Tell Me Sweet Something.
A: Yes.
R: How did that happen?
A: Here’s the thing, I really love, love story, I love love songs. I’m the corniest guy you know. Think of a corny love song, it’s on my playlist. There was a film called Love Jones that I really loved back, released in the ‘90s. It was so affirming that film. Again, when we’re talking about stories, not so much now and it always feels ridiculous when you say it, this idea of love, an African love. Also, just that sometimes people in the city are dealing with other issues and the issues are issues of the heart. Tell Me Sweet Something …
R: You don’t want every black actor to be in the film because of something about blackness.
A: No.
R: You want to just have a story and the people happen to be black?
A: Yeah. Even more than that is the idea that and what I like about storytelling is just the empathy of it’s about human beings and hopefully these characters are three-dimensional so that you feel you recognise them whether you’re black or white, you recognise yourself in them. Then for me, the empathy towards the character is really important. A much more rounded version of some of the representation. Sometimes the representation is problematic. Sometimes especially in this country, sometimes in this country, the representation gets problematic. Blackness gets identified with all kinds of things and you’re never given a full picture. A film like Tell Me Sweet Something and I guess subsequent romantic films is to say like don’t tell one story, tell a kaleidoscope of stories. The country is rich with story so tell a kaleidoscope.
For me, the same world that has, or the same city Johannesburg that has the characters from Vaya coming in is the same city that Nomzamo and Maps’s characters in Tell Me Sweet Something live in. It’s the same city that Hakeem’s character comes to look for his brother in Man on Ground, it’s Johannesburg and at different points of the day, these characters are intersecting even though they’re not meeting. For me, that’s the city as a place where people live and things are happening. I don’t separate all. I see them all as the same thing. I understand tone is different but I do love love songs.
R: You think that the South African film industry has matured in the last 20 years since you started?
A: Yeah, absolutely. I think you only need to look at the films and look at what’s happening and look at even the different platforms that have, since back when there were like maybe three stations or whatever it was in the early ‘90s. Also the structures, the government structures, the Department of Trade and Industry has been instrumental in a lot of the films you see. If that and then their partnerships with other government organizations have been really key in bringing films to the fore.
I don’t think it’s anything that you can say, “Well, just relax.” I think that we still need to get our audiences excited about the films, get everyone to be excited about South African films, to go to the cinema to watch, that there’s an excitement and an expectation of what’s coming next. I think that’s the journey and that’s the next frontier where you’re not struggling to come and watch because unfortunately, there’s a self-perpetuated myth that South African films are not good. Whoever started that myth was very good because what they’ve done is that they’ve really isolated a whole bunch of people who just don’t, you may as well be talking a different language. That’s not to say, and it has been proven in the last couple of years that there is an audience for the films. Most of the times people say, “Well, we didn’t hear about it, the marketing.” I think those and sometimes we need the exhibitors and distributors to almost go outside of the norm to understand that to build an audience is work and …
R: You can’t just do the same thing.
A: You can’t just do the same thing. At the same time, I’m very happy to keep on encouraging people, making the stories and you know, people get to the stories at some point. For me, it’s not a stop, it’s like a continuum.
R: Are you a five-year plan, 10-year plan person or do you, here’s a door, it’s open, I walk through?
A: No, I’m on the plans. I’m on the plans.
R: And? What does it look like?
A: So far so good. So far so good. I think planning in terms of what do you want to do? Where do you want to go? We spoke earlier about you know different paths and different choices that one could have made, what kinds of stories? So, just being very clear about the kinds of stories I want to be involved in, the kinds of stories I wouldn’t tell at all so that even when those conversations come up, we can quickly shut it down and say, “That doesn’t really interest me. I think you might need to take that to someone else. These things interest me.”
R: What would fall into that basket?
A: It’s very difficult to say because when I see it I go … but I’ll tell you I’m really interested in people and complex representation. That really interests me. Even in the rom-com, if you watch the rom-com, the many political things in that, if you watch Tell Me Sweet Something, very rarely do you see like parents talk about love. In that film, there’s a bit of a documentary where they’re talking about very rarely do we hear how our parents met, how they fell in love, do you know what I mean? There are some things in there that are provoking. Yes, it’s a love story but we’re also, love in itself is political. Those kinds of complex things interest me and I think on a level, that’s really it. Sometimes people bring projects and stuff, “But don’t you want?” Then I really go like, “Well, it’s going to take five years of my life. Am I ready to give five years of my life to this project as opposed to this other project which might be harder?”
You take Vaya coming from the homeless, right? It’s a project brewed over eight years of, giving a place for people from the streets to validate that their stories are validated and Robbie my business partner and co-producer and co-writer of Vaya and also Harriet Perlman, co-producer co-writer on Vaya, they created the space where people could come and share their stories and the four gentlemen whom the story is based on, David, Zabu Xaba and Madoda, and also Craig Freimond, seven of them crafted this story over time. That’s what I like, that’s what I’m … when something is organic, when it doesn’t feel fake, when it’s authentic, I think that stuff excites me, the authenticity of something, I get excited about that.
R: Why choose to live in Johannesburg? You could live wherever. Your parents were Nigerian but also there was a London link, there was a West Indies link.
A: Why here? Right, it’s a good question. One thing was clear when I was starting out and again in Cape Town when I finished drama school. What was clear to me was that Johannesburg was the place I had to be because every week in the newspapers, I would see interesting plays happening, I would see people who look like me. When I looked around Cape Town, I didn’t see many, I didn’t see those opportunities. I think there is something about opportunity. It was stuck, it was really stuck like every week I was like, “Interesting play,” and you see all these interesting people and Cape Town, there weren’t those many opportunities. For me, it didn’t make any sense to stay there. That couldn’t work. I was fortunate … when I say that, that doesn’t mean like maybe I could have stayed and done something, because people, a lot of people stayed and have made excellent careers.
R: There are people who live in Cape Town.
A: There are people who live in Cape Town. For me, at the time in 1997, I just feel like again it was what I said, when I was in school seeing actors not working and I was making short films. In terms of acting which was the thing at the time because I hadn’t made this decision to focus on one, I was still going between acting and directing. When the audition, sorry.
R: You could be happy wherever if there was good work there?
A: Yeah. If there were interesting people there. Yeah, when the bug gets you, it’s about where are they doing good work? Where can I contribute to this concert as it were? What instrument can I play that helps out? Am I a hindrance or can I contribute? When the opportunity came to audition for Isidingo I was there, my agent auditioned and I got a part. Once I got the part, I just moved to Johannesburg. When I got here, like I said, I had the short film so on the days I wasn’t acting, I was going to different production companies.
R: There were opportunities? Yeah, those opportunities existed.
A: There were opportunities. I was here. I was here for a week and I had another job offer.
R: Yeah.
A: Then that fulfills you know what I mean? Then you go, “Well, then I’m in the place I want to be.” I really love Joburg, I love the city. I love the energy of the city. Yeah. It’s really simple, I love it. Obviously one travels and the idea of home is interesting because my late mom, rest her soul, is from Barbados so when I go back to Barbados, the house where we spent some time, that’s, it’s an interesting experience like, “Wow, you know I was four years old in this house.” My late grandparents used to live in London so we visited London a lot. That house that they lived in was also a bit of haven or where we grew up in Nigeria, where I’ve gone back to those houses every now and again and I still feel so comfortable just being in those places. The idea of home is an interesting concept. When you travel a lot and you see different places …
R: What’s it like coming back, landing at O.R. Tambo?
A: Always great. There’s something …
R: That’s the weird thing. It’s the same for me and I never really understand.
A: It’s like, “Hah.” I think it’s that you come back to a place where you understand well, my case firstly the phone goes off and it’s like, “You haven’t paid this. You haven’t paid this.” You know what I mean? There’s like a comeback to earthiness of coming back home. It’s like, “Oh, we had such a lovely time at that festival. Okay, now it’s, you know?”
R: Face life.
A: Now it’s time to face life so there’s something about that that’s quite gripping. Traveling to Nigeria or now even going back to Nigeria the last couple of years, the audience there really embraced the work really meeting a lot of great directors and wonderful, wonderful producers, doing some work out there as well. Also being wonderful. That’s what this industry allows you to do. It allows you to travel, it allows you to meet people. What I like, work with different people and work creatively with different people.
R: Akin, thanks so much for joining us.
A: Thank you for having me.
R: All of the very, very best.
A: Thank you. Thank you.
R: We will be looking out.
A: Thank you very much.
R: For your name.
A: Thank you. Thank you.
R: Until next time, go well.
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