Jide, who has
played a bigger role in the industry as the President of the Association of
Nigerian Theatre Arts Practitioners (ANTP), insisted that history must be put
in the right perspectives, while tracing the birth of the modern film industry
in the country to Dr. Ola Balogun's film, 'Ajani Ogun,' produced in 1976.
Kosoko
acknowledged the support of President Goodluck Jonathan for the movie industry,
adding that he is working with others to make the issues about the industry
clearer.
Recently
the 20th anniversary of Nollywood was celebrated, how do you feel about this?
That is the story
being told by a section of the film industry in Nigeria, they are celebrating
the 20 years of their film; 'Living In Bondage,' as one of the films in the
industry, why not? But, if we are talking of the film industry in Nigeria, then
it is not correct. But I feel happy that the President of Nigeria, Goodluck
Jonathan is showing serious interest in the industry. I am happy also that the
Federal Government of Nigeria has realized the potentials of this industry. I
am so happy that he is determined to give the necessary support. The issue of
20 years is subject to controversy and I don't want to go into that now.
But
people believe that 'Living In Bondage' was the first commercially successful
movie in Nigeria?
When did you start
watching movies in Nigeria either on celluloid or otherwise, may be you want to
say in the 70s, will that be 20 years.
So,
how old is Nollywood?
It all depends on
where you want to take it from, there have been revolutions, there have been
films in the 60s, but were they really commercially viable? 'Kongi Harvest,' is
a film produced by Professor Wole Soyinka, there are other films like that from
various people, but because of the commercial status of the industry now, we
must refer to the first commercially successful film in Nigeria and it is on
celluloid and that is 'Ajani Ogun,' which was produced in 1976. It was a very
good experiment by Dr. Ola Balogun. He experimented on Yoruba Traveling
Theatre, using the Yoruba theatre, which was on ground already. He felt we have
been doing some films that were not box offices, but the theatre people had
been doing stage plays, he now decided to use them for films. That was the
beginning of commercial film making in Nigeria. 'Ajani Ogun,' made impact on
celluloid everywhere because the likes of Duro Ladipo, Adeyemi Afolayan, who
were already established names in the Yoruba Theatre industry, were part of it.
So, that was the first revolution of the film industry in Nigeria, the second
revolution started in 1985, you know with celluloid, we have to go abroad to
complete the work, when we were unable to go abroad to produce celluloid as a
result of the structural adjustment programme of the Federal Government then
and it was difficult for people to change our money into foreign currency, the
late Muyideen Aromire (Alade) sat down and experimented with home video and he
succeeded.
Initially, people
like Adebayo Salami (Bello), Hubert Ogunde and I were not really happy with
home video, we felt it could damage where we were coming from, but we had no
choice since the economy of the country was not improving, so we had to join
them since we could not beat them.
When I produced my
first film “Asiri Nla,' I used the best equipment available then, Eumatic High
Band to shoot it, after that Tunde Kelani and Tade Ogidan called me and said
that this is more like what they wanted. That is another one, we also did
'Asewo to Re Mecca,' at that period and all these were before 'Living In
Bondage,' which people are now using as a reference point for Nollywood. I
appreciate the good work done in 'Living In Bondage,' it came and made a very
good impact, but we cannot say that is the beginning of Nollywood, when there
had been productions before then. Even the Executive Producer of 'Living In
Bondage,' Kenneth Nnebue, has produced a lot of films in Yoruba language such
as “Aje Ni Iya Mi,' before 'Living In Bondage,' so how can that now be the
yardstick for the industry.
We have been
discussing this thing for a long time, and I thought we should allow sleeping
dog to lie, but since they are insisting it is 'Living In Bondage,' they have
to give us reasons for that. If they are not willing to change their opinion,
when we write our history, we have to acknowledge those that moved the industry
forward of which 'Living In Bondage,' is one of them. It came, they used better
technology than what we had then the same way Bello and I did 'Asewo To Re
Mecca,' at the same time that I did 'Asiri Nla,' we used the productions to
move the industry forward. It is a continuous thing, where we are now is still
not our position. Somebody will still come, some people are doing something
now, they are taking our films to cinemas, they produce films that cut across
all the tribes and they were shot with good equipment, professional cameras
such that we cannot afford for home videos. So, it is a continuous thing, we
are all contributing our quota to the development of the industry. So, why will
anybody now want to claim the glory, I am not ridiculing anybody, I have
nothing to gain in that, but I want to tell you, Hubert Ogunde, Ade Love and
some others, if we get there, they will ask us 'how come we were not celebrated
out there.' Ade Love even produced films before Hubert Ogunde, but can you compare
Ogunde's efforts in commercializing theatre with Ade Love's efforts? Baba
Ogunde commercialized theatre and everyone followed. He is the reason for our
continuous business, he started, it was a graduation from stage to television
and from television to film. So, you cannot actually divorce the beginning, can
you, must you? It's not fair, all I am saying is let us sit down on a round
table and write the history of Nollywood and start recognizing all those that
have contributed to its growth.
How
do you think we can get this corrected and put things in the correct
perspective?
Let us sit down,
come up with good record and let us recognize all the contributors. There are
some Ibo people that did films then too and the records are there, it is not
only Yoruba films that we are talking about; there are Ibo scholars who have
done things for the industry. We should write out our history, embrace it and
project it to the whole world. Now, what are we celebrating, we can say
Nollywood Celebrates 100 Years, the film industry in Nigeria is as old as the
country itself. This is the truth. There were films then, but they were not on
commercial basis. We should recognize people. We can say Nollywood Celebrates
90 or 100 years. We can write our books, our stories, we are working on that,
we will come up with a book; we will let others see it and stop messing
ourselves. Must we be fighting on the pages of newspapers over the years, is
that what we need. The President has been so nice to have given us grant to
allow some relief.
Have
you been able to access the money?
I am a member of
the committee, and then we jointly agreed at the town hall meeting that
policies must be put in place first for an enabling environment folr,
distribution network. If they give you N20 Million naira to produce film, where
will you sell it, there is no market, if our cinema culture comes back, I can
take it to the cinemas until I realize my money and make it into video form.
What the Minister of Finance, Okonjo Iweala is doing for us, I must tell you,
if we all give it support, it would work. There would be collaboration with
other countries, we are selling you, and you should sell us.
If we have not
intervened to advise that policy statement on piracy, distribution and all that
should come first, they would have started distributing the money.