'I am not a Christian filmmaker', Oreofe Williams

Since the days of yore, the evolvement and ascendancy of modernity cannot be quantified neither can it be over-emphasized. From culture, language, education to lifestyle and religion, we feel the exuberance, we feel the coziness, we see its impression and as it were, every successive generation (in all facets of life) usually exhibits a quantum of this influence. Film making started off on the threshold of stage plays that came into being as rituals to a Greek god before evolving to include action, organized settings, religious and social themes. Today, the liberty of modernity mixed with the reality of trending sociocultural affairs affords everyone including the older and younger generation a level playing field. 

You’ll agree with me that not until recently, the early days of EVOM Films and Mount Zion Films in (Christian-- as we love to call it) movie making witnessed crude (if you let me) methods and extreme churchy themes as portrayed in Agbaranla, Perilous Times, Egun Aimo and others without too much societal relevance. But all thanks to the Almighty who has raised a number of new hands like the new generation of the Bamiloyes, Oreofe Williams and The Chosen Vessels Dance Drama Ministry whose first flick, Oruko Nla, changed the game and upped it with subsequent comic flicks embroiling churchy themes like we see in Take Heed, Oro Odi, Pride, Little Jimmy, etc. 

That notwithstanding, for Oreofe Williams (an author, a film maker) and his theatre company, film production is completely an embodiment of responsibilities that extend far beyond churchy themes, can you beat that? In this no holds barred interview with Yamilenu Bamgboye, he explores the intricacies of being limited and tagged a Christian filmmaker, the challenges of growing up after loosing his mum at a very tender age and his rise to stardom. Do enjoy the rest of it.

You are a filmmaker and an author, how many books have you written so far?

For now, about six of them.

Motivational?

Some motivational, some, plays like A Casket for God, A Festival of Rain and there’s one that talks about theatre itself titled Actor as Pretender. It’s used to train actors.

Were you trained as an actor or you are just gifted?

Yeah, I was trained. It’s not enough to be gifted. I had my first degree from the department of English and Performing Arts, Ogun State University and we did a lot of plays by Wole Soyinka, Ola Rotimi, Femi Osofisan and the like. We had that training, that classical training onstage.

Awo Jesu was your first movie, right?

No, that’s a misconception. Awo Jesu was never my first movie. Adeoti was my first movie, produced in 2006. Awo Jesu gan was the third. 

But Awo Jesu was the one that exposed you to a lot of people.

Yeah, I think so. 

Why is that?

Awo Jesu was like that because it’s in four parts. When a movie is in parts and is interesting, it spreads more, people want to know more especially, why it is so. Secondly, the themes discussed in the movie were not popularly discussed as of the time the movie was released. Thirdly, the uniqueness of the movie also gave it an edge. You know, trying to run a faith-based film with those people you may likely call 'unbelievers’ must have done a lot of attraction because they didn’t expect that you know and would be like oh, so this is a Jesus film and we have people like these here. At first, when Awo Jesu was released, it wasn’t quite accepted. From the title, to the concept. I know of some people who felt we were anti-Christ agents. So, we had some kind of tough time when we started marketing that movie but with time, when people saw it, the whole thing changed. I did it in such a way that if you watched the first part, you’d want to see the second part. So what we did at the time was to give out about 10,000 copies of the first part we had intended to sell because people were not buying. By the time we went to where we had distributed them, people rushed our bus and were asking for the second part and that was the blow.

The combination of Awo and Jesu is controversial indeed. Would you say the mixture was a mere marketing strategy to reach out to a larger audience as well? 

Well, I must admit that that wasn’t the original title. The original title was Ijinle but I think as time went by, looking at the story, it was just better to name the film Awo Jesu because at some point in the movie, the corp members came out, trying to convince people that they were awo Jesu…. I think it just came from there.

A lot of people think that the third part of Awo Jesu has the resemblance of anticlimax, do you feel the same?

Well, if you want to grow, you must welcome constructive criticism. However, each part of Awo Jesu was done to be complementary: part 2 was done to complement part 1 and part 4 was done to complement part 3. If youwanttounderstand whatis in the third part, you have to watch the fourth part. So, it’s the fourth part that adds meaning to the third part. So, it’s possible for you to have t h o u g h t  d o i n g  p a rt 3 wa s unnecessary if you had watched parts 1, 2 and 3 only.

Unlike most Christian filmmakers, why do you feature secular actors in your movies?

Number one, I don’t want to be termed a Christian filmmaker because I’ve said it most times that a filmmaker is a filmmaker. There’s no point attaching the prefix ‘Christian’ to filmmaker. In this century, a filmmaker is a filmmaker. You may now decide to discuss faith-based themes, you understand? It’s even more academic to say someone is a faith-based filmmaker. When somebody says that he is a Christian filmmaker, gospel filmmaker, in one way or the other, it’s limiting. There are people who will hear that and will never watch your movie because they feel what you are doing is religious. So, if you say you are a filmmaker and people watch your movie and the story is interesting, you being a Christian won’t matter to them except the message even though they may  conclude along the line that you are one but not you labeling yourself from the onset.

Two, using secular actors in such films has been criticized by many, by the stakeholders especially because most times the audience don’t mind but my own use of secular actors has been divine. You know many times, they say they are unbelievers you don’t use unbelievers for gospel films and all that and I always ask a question, who are the ones who know God perfectly? Do you know God inside out? Do you know who God can use to do anything at anytime? If we open the Bible, I’ll show you where God used a donkey to save a prophet, where God told a prophet, Hosea precisely, to marry a prostitute. If that happens today, people will say that pastor is marrying a prostitute, you understand? If you even study the ministry of Jesus himself, those He gathered where not people who were born again. He got them from their places of work; the likes of Peter, John, Andrew and the rest of them. They were not born again so to say and they followed him and at some point, He told them to go and preach and yet when they were preaching, they didn’t know the person they were preaching about because none of them knew who Jesus was until He left. Except Peter who said He was (still is) the son of God but practically, none of them knew Him until He died, resurrected and left. So, the trend God follows is different. If Jesus were to come to Nigeria today to make a film, He won’t call those who are Christians.

Having said that, we also discovered over time that a lot of people would never watch faith-based films. There are people who have never seen some as popular as gospel films are in Nigeria. They would also not watch because the faces they are seeing are not familiar. But one way or the other, we’ve been able to discover that people now watch because of the faces. There’s a movie we did called Orisa Mimo, it won two awards from an organization in London under RCCG and an international group of psychologists; they gave us a certificate of merit, recommending it as a therapy for people suffering from bipolar disorder. Someone said to me that she would never have watched it if it wasn’t for the classical faces she saw because she didn’t know they were still into movie production. She watched and enjoyed it. She was even crying that the same mistake she made with her mum was what the character was making with the mother. So, in one way or the other, everyone has a role to play. I know they use gospel faces in some films that are gospel but no one can come and say you can never do this, it is forbidden and I’ll ask you why you think it is forbidden. That you do yours that way does not mean I can’t do mine the other way.

You have also been delving into social themes too, why is that?

Ok, eeerrrhh… the reason you asked the question is because you have the mentality that I’m a Christian filmmaker and then any movie I do must have to be about Jesus, being born again and all that. And I always want to say that that is not true. As a filmmaker, you may have faith-based themes, it does not stop you from discussing social themes. We are in a society, and the word ‘social’ has something to do with the society. Where you are, there are things that happen right there. So, you have a responsibility as a writer, as a filmmaker to touch your society through your films. You may choose not to talk about the church but politics. Pastors on Strike for instance is a political film. How do I justify that? You’ll discover that even pastors that have churches organize seminars that have nothing to do with Christianity, take Sam Adeyemi for instance. I once said it that the Redeemed Christian Church of God is a church that has a university, Foursquare Gospel Church has a university, Winners’ Chapel has a university but you’ll agree with me that in those universities, there is nothing religious. When you enrol in any, you study Pharmacy the way it would be studied anywhere in the world. If it’s Theatre Arts, you’ll stage plays by people who are not too Christian or born again so to say: Femi Osofiasn, Wole Soyinka, Ahmed Yerima etc. the way it’s done anywhere in the world, that is the way to make impact. So, if a university that is faith-based can do all that and don’t run it like a Christian school or pray before lectures begin and they can be that influential in a social environment, what then is stopping a filmmaker who says I’m into gospel from making comments about what happens in the society: psychology, politics and the rest of them? If Pastor Adeboye wasn’t criticized for going to see Buhari when he was sick, why should I be as a filmmaker for going into social works? But that has to happen because the influence of people like that is enormous. So, you can’t say that his mission is Redeem church alone. I think the problem is that we have an older generation in the Christendom that have, for a long time, limited filmmaking to church, Jesus without any influence on other social aspects and it’s really limiting them too in the sense that most content providers on television don’t like to accept such films for airing. They feel it’s inferior and too sectionalized.

Just like the secular actors we were talking about, if you tell me that my featuring secular actors is wrong, how do you know they are secular actors, how do you know their names? It means you also watch secular films as a Christian and you admire them. So, if you watch secular films of which some of them don’t even make too much sense and I choose those people to come and preach Christ, why then are you criticizing me? 

 So far, would you say your productions have rewarded you commensurably?

Well, yes. And when I speak of rewards, I’m not talking about money alone. I’m talking about the impacts. People calling you, p e o p l e  m a i l i n g  y o u  a n d commending you is enough reward. The feeling is always great and fulfilling. It may not be about cash alone and sometimes, it’s also about money because you can’t be afraid of talking about money when you know money is needed. Money is not the root of all evil, it is the love of money that is the root of all evil. Someone was talking about Orisa Mimo and was saying she wanted her family to watch the movie but they couldn’t get it around them. They live in Georgia, U.S. She was appealing to me to put it on YouTube. I never wanted to until after two years and it’s just about one year. So, I decided to put it on YouTube because of her. We also have a channel LIvefire tv on YouTube.

So how do you manage fame or stardom?

Number one, I don’t know that I’m popular. Two, I always feel that I’m just starting but the little I’ve seen, without your fans, you can’t go anywhere and there’s no big deal in being famous. You have only chosen a path that has made you famous. If I have a friend now for instance who works at a good company and works hard to the top, the guy might not be famous but he has achieved. So, there’s no difference between me and that friend of mine. Why then will I allow that fame to chop my head when I know that there’s nothing in it. Everybody is doing something and everybody is growing big and great. I have been to some places, like you said, and people would come to me and take pictures with me. They are the reason you are called a celebrity, without them you are not one. They are my first asset. If fam egets into people’s heads, it can’t get into mine. I discover that when such things get into your head, it’s because you don’t have a bigger goal. If you do, where you are now won’t make sense to you and that’s how I feel all the time.