In celebration of Nollywood’s First Ladies

Title: Ladies Calling the Shots Author: Niran Adedokun Reviewer: Toni Kan Sometime in 2010, I was on a PR assignment in the Gambia. We arrived at the airport and were held up at immigration. Our party was made up of captains of industry and business men as well as professionals of various stripes.Then, the actor […]

Title: Ladies Calling the Shots
Author: Niran Adedokun
Reviewer: Toni Kan

Sometime in 2010, I was on a PR assignment in the Gambia.

We arrived at the airport and were held up at immigration. Our party was made up of captains of industry and business men as well as professionals of various stripes.Then, the actor Olu Jacobs, who was part of our party, appeared alongside his wife Joke Silva.

The moment he stepped into the room, cries of Igwe rent the air.

“They are with me,” Olu Jacobs announced in his stentorian voice, they stamped our passports and let us go.

I recount this story now to underline the power of cinema and of the industry we call Nollywood, the third biggest movie industry in the world.

What I did not say was that there was a movie director with us. None of the immigration officers recognized him even though he had produced over seven movies some of which starred Olu Jacobs.

In Nigeria the movie director is oftentimes male, a big man often times with a big ego whose job it is to dictate what happens on a set.

Think Zeb Ejiro. Think Teco Benson. Think Charles Novia. Think Tunji Bamishigbin. Think Mahmood Ali Balogun.

But the truth is that before these men, and coming after Hubert Ogunde and Ade Love Afolayan and Jimi Odumosu were women, creators and mother figures who presaged, in many ways, the industry we now call Nollywood.

Think Lola Fani-Kayode and Amaka Igwe, women at whose teats the nascent Nollywood was nurtured.

Fani Kayode was a pioneer and a visionary. She was, as many of her forebears have become, a triple threat and multi hyphenate; writer, producer, director. And after her came the imposing and inspiring AmakaIgwe. These were women who validated the Margaret Thatcher dictum which holds that the best man for the job is a woman.

This book, Ladies Calling the Shots is, therefore, at once a tribute and celebration of that visionary duo and those who have come after them.

Niran Adedokun, PR man, columnist, writer and lawyer has given us a gift that will keep giving. His book is a handbook, a primer and a moving history of a rapidly evolving industry. The book is history, documentary and motivational literature.

Inside this book you will encounter the stories of Amaka Igwe and 16 other female directors whose works have redefined our viewing experience be it on the small or large screen.

Within its 252 pages you will find stories of ambition, chronicles of resilience, tales of adversity overcome, memoirs of close brushes with failure and a paean to the restless spirit and creative imagination. This is an important and timely book that documents Nollywood like none before it.

This is the triumph of Niran Adedokun’s ground breaking book.

In an age where sustainability has become a business buzz word, Nollywood and its practitioners need to read this book to better understand the nexus between show and business. There is a reason why it is called showBUSINESS.

This book also helps us see that despite the cries of disrespect and adversity and marginalisation, Nollywood female directors have fared better than their counterparts in Bollywood and Hollywood.

Making the point, Niran Adedokun writes – “In a sense therefore, it is accurate to say that female filmmakers in Nigeria have held their own better than their counterparts in more advanced countries, although filmmaking in Nigeria is just about half the number of years that it has become a commercial venture in the United States.”

In Hollywood, out of 90 Best Director Oscars, only one woman has won it.

I am not aware of A list female directors in Bollywood like we have in Nollywood even though a few are emerging like ReemaKagti (Honeymoon Travels, Talaash); Rajshree Ojha (Aisha, Chaurahen); Kiran Rao (Dhobi Ghat); Farah Khan (Main Hoon Na, Om Shanti Om, Tees Maar Khan) and Zoya Akhtar (Luck By Chance, Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara.)

The amazing thing is that most of these Nigeria women achieved their successes not through formal training but a cocktail of tenacity, pupillage and tutelage. From EmaOdioso who apprenticed herself to Clarence Peters before saving enough and going to film school; Mildred Okwo who cut school to be on Lola FaniKayode’s sets, FunkeFayoyin who studied at the feet of the master, Tunde Kelani, Grace Edwin-Okon who was tutored by Zeb Ejiro, Blessing Egbe who went from modelling to acting and then directing as well as Tope Oshin who credits AmakaIgwe with opening her eyes to possibilities beyond her purview. These women dared to believe in themselves and in believing have and continue to change the trajectory of Nigerian cinema.

As we celebrate these women kudos must be given to a few men who have acted as mentors – Zeb Ejiro, Clarence Peters and IzuOjukwu. But the greatest applause must go to AmakaIgwe whose nurturing spirt has been chronicled for posterity by Tope Oshin in her award-winning documentary Amaka’s Kin.

We live in a country and a part of the world where knowledge is not codified, experience is not chronicled and journeys are not captured thus leaving a gaping lacuna of lost knowledge.

My son told me a joke recently. He said an American millionaire when asked how he became a Fortune 500 business leader will tell of how he got a 500 dollar loan, how he set up shop in his father’s garage, how he courted mom and pop shops before raising millions via and IPO. But ask a Nigerian billionaire and his short answer would be – God has been good!

This is why there is no book on production wizard Don Jazzy nor on Zeb Ejiro or AmakaIgwe or Linda Ikeji. We need to document their experiences, their successes and near misses in order to learn how they did what they did and in learning inspire the coming generation.

A simple Google search turned up 4 books on Justin Bieber, 5 on Jay-z, and 8 on Rihanna.

Any young woman who reads Niran Adedokun’s rendering of Blessing Egbe’s hard fought battle to box office relevance will learn a valuable business lesson no business school can teach. This is a book that the Lagos Business School should have on their curriculum. It is a handbook every aspiring filmmaker must have in his or her library. It is a navigational tool that will mark the difference between success and failure.