Return to Transcripts main page
INSIDE AFRICA
Filmmaking in Africa; "Cion"
Aired September 8, 2007 - 12:30:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
FEMI OKE, CNN INTERNATIONAL HOST: Hello. I'm Femi Oke and this is INSIDE AFRICA, your weekly look at life and issues on the continent. In this special film and literature edition, Botswana goes Hollywood. Or is it the other way around?
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
JILL SCOTT, ACTRESS: Madame Ramotswe is a traditionally built woman and I am actually kind of slender in some places. So first I had to gain weight.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
OKE: Ooh, that sounds like a great diet. That was actress Jill Scott there, who together with Oscar winning director Anthony Minghella and a village full of extras bring a bestseller to the big screen.
Also ahead we go behind the scenes of Riverwood, Kenya's budding film industry. And South African author Zakes Mda talks about his new novel called "Cion". He also talks about America and what Africans can do for Africa.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
ZAKES MDA, AUTHOR: I know that we always look to the outside and say, and point at the Europeans and Americans and so on. Yes, they are fault, right from the beginning, from the time they colonized us and so on. But we were a party to that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
OKE: I have much more of my interview with Zakes Mda in a few minutes.
But we begin in Botswana on the set of "The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency." The movie is based on the bestselling novel by Alexander McCall Smith who is known for his rich, affectionate portraits of everyday life in Africa.
As Robyn Curnow reports, the filmmakers are trying to capture the same mood with some extra help from the community.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ROBYN CURNOW, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Amid the dust and the donkeys, a unique event in Botswana. It's the first time an international movie is being filmed in the country. And it's come to the village of Tuaning (ph).
The locals are getting a taste of Hollywood as extras in a funeral scene.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Background action!
CURNOW: It's a story about the exploits of a lady detective, seen here at her father's funeral, and a host of colorful Botswana characters.
Oscar-winning director Anthony Minghella says the local talent bring a rare quality to the production.
ANTHONY MINGHELLA, FILM DIRECTOR: We were shooting today and there were 20 women just being as we were shooting who paid absolutely no attention so what we're getting is sort of unmediated reality of Botswana which is so precious.
CURNOW: Leading the cast, Jill Scott plays the role of Precious Ramotswe, who owns Botswana's "No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency."
Not only is she funny and spirited but Precious Ramotswe breaks Hollywood stereotypes with her fuller figure.
SCOTT: Madame Ramotswe is a traditionally built woman and I am actually kind of slender in some places. So first I had to gain weight which was enjoyable, I must say. I really enjoyed that. And we added a little extra here and a little extra there to make sure that she fit the image of a traditionally built African woman.
CURNOW: Another American lead character, Anika Noni Rose says they're making a movie that will provide a very different picture of Africa.
ANIKA NONI ROSE, ACTRESS: Every single character is very round and very rich. They're not stereotypical. They're not two dimensional. It's not your usual story about Africa. It's a story about life and living and it is fun and it is funny without being farcical.
CURNOW: The movie is filled with real-life Botswana characters. There's the Bishop of Gaborone, Trevor Mwamba, who feels his new acting role is not much of a stretch from his day job.
TREVOR MWAMBA, BISHOP OF GABORONE: It's part of the job. I think bishops, lawyers to some degree, politicians, there has to be that aspect of the drama and the acting. You have to play out the role.
CURNOW: Also playing out a role as the woman mourner number one is Botswana's minister of health, Sheila Tlou who loves moonlighting as an actress.
SHEILA TLOU, BOTSWANA MINISTER OF HEALTH: To me it is not a contradiction. When you are a minister of health, you are in a very stressful job. Anything can happen at any time. And you literally hold the lives of people in your hands. So every once in a while you need something where you can forget about who you are and just be yourself. And just be a nice village woman who has no care in the world.
It is therapy to me.
CURNOW: Therapy to her and good news for Botswana.
There are about 1.7 million people here in Botswana and the economy is almost entirely dependent on diamond mining. So the arrival of Hollywood in a land mostly known for its diamonds and its dust, well, it's a very big deal. And the Botswana are so excited about this movie, the government has even co-financed it.
Once filming is over, the government and the filmmakers are hoping the sets, like this one in the capital of Gaborone will entice tourists who love the movie to spend some time in the land of the "No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency."
(END VIDEOTAPE)
OKE: Ooh. Looks like a really good film. It's currently in production but you should be able to see it sometime in 2008.
Now the author whose book inspired the movie is a Scot but his fondness for depicting African people and culture comes from personal experience. Alexander McCall Smith spent his childhood in Zimbabwe and has also lived in Botswana. Robyn Curnow had a chance to meet him in Edinburgh when the film was still in its planning stages.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
ALEXANDER MCCALL SMITH, AUTHOR: A miniaturized Botswana of cattle like ants and roads of .
CURNOW: Scottish author Alexander McCall Smith reads from his bestseller, a much loved series about Botswana's "No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency."
In his youth, Alexander McCall Smith lived in Botswana. Recalling those days, these books pay homage to the simple life in Africa.
MCCALL SMITH: There's nothing, I think, very serious or too unhappy that takes place in the books. The books are about the mundane, day to day affairs of people. So there's a great deal of drinking of tea and eating of cake. That's very important.
CURNOW: Slow-paced and charming, McCall Smith writes about Africa from his desk in his Edinburgh home. From here, so far away from his subject, he paints a loving portrait of Botswana.
MCCALL SMITH: People sometimes say to me that these books show a very rosy view of Africa. And in a sense, that's true. Because they do talk about the positive. But the problem is nobody really has been talking about the positive features of life in Africa.
CURNOW: Adoring readers relish his morality tales about the adventures of a warm and dignified lady detective called Precious Ramotswe, making him the darling of book clubs.
MCCALL SMITH: . happened to Mama Cutswi (ph) who is Ramotswe's assistant. Mama Cutswi is a great lady. She's a wonderful woman. She got 97 percent at the Botswana Secretarial College, a fact which I never tire of telling the readers.
CURNOW: The books have become a publishing phenomenon.
"The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency" was first published in 1998. Since then the feel-good stories of Precious Ramotswe have been translated into 40 different languages and have sold over 15 million copies.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And action.
CURNOW: A movie is being made and a TV series is in the pipeline. Speaking to CNN in 2004, McCall Smith had a very particular image of who should play his African heroine. And actress Jill Scott seems to fit McCall Smith's description.
MCCALL SMITH: Someone who is, like the character in the book, a traditionally built lady.
CURNOW: This unlikely Scotsman created one of Africa's iconic female characters. Thousands of miles away from dusty Botswana while he was working as a professor of medical law at Edinburgh University. Now, however, writing is his number one job.
Robyn Curnow, CNN, Johannesburg, South Africa.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
OKE: Still ahead on INSIDE AFRICA, South African author Zakes Mda has a new novel out, his first to explore America.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
MDA: I was trying to share with them, look, my people, what I have discovered here. An America that you do not know.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
OKE: Oh, he's such a good writer. My interview with Zakes Mda is next.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Making business news this week, U.S. food giant Heinz has pulled out of Zimbabwe. It sold its 49 percent stake in cooking oil maker Olavine (ph) to government controlled Cotco (ph) for $6.8 million. Zimbabwe's "Herald" newspaper reports the deal was part of the government's program to take over white controlled businesses. Industry executives dismiss the claim.
Cisco Systems has become the first U.S. high tech firm to shell shares to black investors under South Africa's black economic empowerment plan. The buyer is a local consortium led by political figures Valle Mussa (ph) and Popo Melefay (ph). The company is also providing shares to South African employees and a new education trust.
And the World Bank says it is spending more money than ever in Sub-Saharan Africa. It says it provided the region with a record $7.5 billion in loans, grants and investments in the last fiscal years. That's an increase of almost $2 billion over the previous year. Most of the money has gone towards infrastructure projects.
OKE: Good to see you again. Now, Zakes Mda is one of South Africa's most popular authors. He also paints, writes plays, directs, works in films, is a professor of creative writing at a higher university and runs community projects. Last week I rushed home every night to lead his latest novel which is called "Cion" and in the main character, Tomoke (ph) from South Africa heads to southern Ohio for a story that straddle's the state's past and present.
Zakes dropped by the studio during his book tour to talk about his work.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MDA: "Some women imbibed the lessons so well, but they went beyond just not loving their children, they developed a deep hatred for them. They hated them for being the children who could not be loved.
"If they had had the power, they would have strangled them in the womb."
This novel was actually suggested to me by my discovery of a very interesting community in southeast Ohio. The are called the WIN people by others. They don't call themselves that. WIN people, WIN, stands for white Indian negro.
They are a community that emerged and evolved from the intermarriages of the African slaves in the 1830s who were escaping from the Deep South. It's receiving rave reviews already and also it was picked by "Essence" magazine, "Essence" book club as their September read.
And it has become very popular with black women particularly in the United States here.
OKE: Let's talk about your paintings, your artwork. How is your approach different when you go to paint as to perhaps when you sit down to write a novel?
MDA: I think there is a symbiotic relationship between my painting and - because sometimes my painting features in my novels as well. You will find that if you look at a novel like "The Madonna of Excelsior" is told through paintings.
But also my novels are visual, very much visual precisely because I'm a painter but also because I am a playwright, I'm a scriptwriter, for film and television and so on. So I'm able to see the story more than anything else and so you'll find that my painting will inform some of my fiction. Some of my fiction will inform my painting.
I usually paint after writing. For instance, as a form of relaxing.
OKE: As somebody who's an African, how do you - how comfortable do you feel with other people taking on Africa as a cause.
MDA: I'm ambivalent about it. The reason being that Africa would not be a cause if we Africans had not messed up and damaged our own continent. Africa is a very rich continent but our own leaders soon after the liberation struggle, we deified them. We were so grateful to them that oh, you liberated us, and we made them into some demigods and let them run loose all over the place, looting our countries and we kept quiet when that was happening.
That is why today, then, we are in a situation whereby we have to survive on the pity of outsiders. Now they have to come and adopt our children and so on and - well, which doesn't help. Those Malawians or whatever children you adopt, that doesn't change anything in as far as the situation is concerned in Africa.
The only thing that will change the situation is us. The Africans themselves.
OKE: Other people admire you and honor you. Do you feel that you have a place? Do you have a sense of your legacy?
MDA: No. Not yet because I think the best is yet to come. I - I feel like I haven't done anything yet. I still have to do better. Yeah.
OKE: Then I hope you live to 120.
MDA: Thank you.
OKE: Must do better. Wow.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
OKE: My goodness. I am so not worthy. That was South African novelist, painter, thinker, renaissance man, Zakes Mda.
Move over Hollywood, Bollywood and Nollywood. Ahead on INSIDE AFRICA, some enterprising Kenyans try to make Riverwood a brand name in the movie business.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
OKE: Here is a look at some of the headlines on the continent this week.
Thousands of Darfur refugees greeted the UN secretary-general with cheers at a camp in Sudan. Ban-Ki Moon says he was humbled to see their living conditions. Voters in Sierra Leone headed back to the polls to choose a new president. In the first round of the election, the All People's Congress candidate, Ernest Koroma got 44 percent of the vote compared to 38 percent for Vice President Solomon Berewa of the Sierra Leone People's Party. A candidate must win 55 percent to avoid a runoff.
Tensions have boiled over within Burundi's last active rebel group. A rebel spokesman says as many as 26 people were killed when rival factions clashed in Bujumbura (ph). It was the worst fighting there in four years.
Straight to video is a fate no Hollywood filmmaker wants to ponder, but for now it's the goal in Riverwood, Kenya's fledgling film community. As Christian Purefoy reports, Riverwood's young filmmakers are finding an eager audience for their low budget productions.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRISTIAN PUREFOY, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: A fake beard. A few rotten teeth and an old pair of shoes. John Murag (ph) is aging 50 years for his role in his latest movie, with a little dirt rubbed in to add the finishing touches.
Kenya is pioneering a new genre of budget moviemaking.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: They're popular. Let's say all around the country we are popular. Very popular in the country. Even abroad, you find you're getting calls from different parts of the world.
PUREFOY: Shooting on a shoestring, each movie can take as little as a day to film and edit. They're then released on DVD and distributed from Nairobi's River Road, quickly becoming known as Riverwood.
What the directors and customers on a short, overcrowded street are proving to film industries across the world is that whether they can afford it or not, people are willing to spend the five dollar cost of a cinema ticket on cheap, low quality movies.
So why are they so popular? For a start they're in local languages. And Riverwood gives voice to local experiences.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Because those who participate them are my fellow Kenyans.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: We enjoy it because they're our own people. They know what we love.
PUREFOY: With budgets as low as $800 Riverwood films can turn a profit of up to $3000. But Riverwood has a long way to travel before it can rival Africa's better established movie industries in Nigeria and South Africa. But it is certainly a new concept in filmmaking. No moguls here. Riverwood's 300 young actors, directors and shooters have a different take.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: So one thing, we are not rivals at any one time. We work as a community.
PUREFOY: A community that's finding an audience and a few new onscreen heroes. Christian Purefoy, CNN, Nairobi, Kenya.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
OKE: Thanks very much, Christian, and of course to all you Riverwood directors, I am available for walk-on parts at a very reasonable rate.
Now, Ethiopia is counting down to a major milestone, the millennium. The country follows the Julian calendar, which means the year 2000 begins there at midnight on September 12. If you're going to attend the celebrations, please send us your photos or videos. Just go to cnn.com/insideafrica, click on the I-Report logo there and you'll receive instructions on how to upload your material.
So once again, that's cnn.com/insideafrica.
Here's a sampling of some of the I-Reports we received in the last week.
I-Reporter Samuel Davis sent us these images from Freetown, Sierra Leone. He attended a peace rally ahead of a presidential runoff election. The opposition All People's Congress Party pulled out of the rally, citing security concerns but Christian and Muslim leaders did attend. Candidates from the APC and ruling Sierra Leone People's Party had earlier signed a pact calling for a peaceful runoff.
Thanks for sharing your pictures with us, Samuel.
And that's all we have for your from INSIDE AFRICA this week. Join us next weekend when we'll be celebrating Ethiopia's millennium. It's going to be a good party. I'm Femi Oke. Take care.
END
TO ORDER VIDEOTAPES AND TRANSCRIPTS OF CNN INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMMING, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE THE SECURE ONLINE ORDER FROM LOCATED AT www.voxant.com
