Dr. Hyginus Ekwuazi, theatre scholar and poet, is the Head of Department, Theatre Arts, University of Ibadan. In this interview with Adewale Oshodi, he speaks about the changes he will like to see in the nation’s movie industry, Nollywood, how government is creating an enabling environment for filmmaking to thrive, as well as how the organisers of the NLNG Prize for Literature had restructured the award after last year’s embarrassment. Excerpts:

As a media and theatre scholar, would you say the arts industry is growing in the country, especially when you compare the theatre, movie and literary sector?
It appears the movie industry is caging other sectors, but we must realise one thing, it is in the nature of things. The theatre is older than the movie, and what is happening is that the movie is taking from the theatre, and this is a normal thing. The movie is exploring the strength and weaknesses of the theatre, so the content of the theatre becomes the structure of the movie. Also, the movie is taking its personnel from the theatre, and it is at the centre of what we call the mass media mix, now, every other thing fix into the movie and if we remove all these things, the movie will collapse. So, the theatre is central to the movie and it is like the movie is feeding on the theatre. The same thing is happening in the literary sector, it is just that it is not quiet pronounced because what happens in the well-developed film culture is that there is this symbiosis between the literary arm and the film. Any successful writer becomes a scriptwriter and any novel that is coming out, comes out with an eye into being turned into a film, like it happens in the United States where any successful novel will become a film immediately. So, every novel is like a film waiting to be made. That hasn’t quite started in Nigeria, but it is going to happen. We must realise that the best scripts that have been turned into movies had been written by people in the literary arm or theatre scholars, so, that symbiotic relationship is already existing.

Looking critically at the film sector, popularly known as Nollywood, you will realise most of the artistes don’t have the basic training in film production and performance. Would you say this lack of training is telling on the industry?
Most of the artistes don’t have the basic training but in spite of that, they are doing very well. We must not forget the origin of the movie; it is a mass culture or popular culture and one can perform very well without having any basic education in that area, so it is not a handicap. This is because when an artiste finds himself in front of the camera, he begins to learn what the camera wants and he begins to adapt, so the lack of education is really not a handicap, but if one is dealing with those behind the camera, like the directors, producers, technicians, cameramen, then the lack of training becomes a handicap.

Nollywood is the acclaimed second biggest film industry in the world, but this is due to the quantity of films produced, not the quality. As a movie scholar, what changes would you like to see in Nollywood?
We do hope that quantity would catch up with quality somewhere, or quality would catch up with quantity somewhere along the line. What is happening right now is that we have a lot of pot-boilers. A lot of movies are just being made and what we have now is not a spectator’s market, it is a producer’s market, and they produce anything they like to produce, not minding the quality of the movies.

However, a time is coming when the people will begin to demand quality movies and all the pot-boilers will go. So, it is a kind of transitional stage and it is inevitable, but quantity is bound to make way for quality sooner or later.

It has been said that government is not supporting the film industry adequately, especially in the area of subsidy and grants to filmmakers. What is your opinion on this?
When people say this, they should be a bit careful. The man who is selling spare parts, does government support him? Or the man who is selling automobile, does government support him? However, people say this because we are dealing with a cultural output, but the support of government is not in terms of money. Government’s support is in terms of creating an enabling environment and I know government is doing that already and that is why we have the film corporation, the National Film and Video Censors Board, etc, these are structures that the government has put in place in order to ensure the climate is ideal for filmmaking. So, to say government is not supporting the film industry is not fair enough, when it has actually put in place structures that make it easier for filmmakers to produce their films.

The literary sector can be described as one that has suffered the most in the country due to the fact that Nigerians no longer read. As an author yourself, is there anyway this trend can be changed?
It is not only in Nigeria that people no longer read. What is happening is that the visual culture has taken over, the television and film and if you want anybody to read anything, put it in film or put it on television. This is all over the world; people are losing that ability to sit down and read. Now, if you go to the advanced countries, they are beginning to produce reader-friendly books. Books that have pictures, or are written in form of movies, because they want to turn viewers into readers. It is beginning to happen, so the kind of novels that are beginning to come out are not the traditional novels, but novels for people who are used to films or television. People not reading again is not peculiar to Nigeria, it is happening all over the world. So, publishers are producing books that are more reader-friendly to get people to read them.

What do you think actually went wrong during last year’s NLNG Prize for Literature Award, because you were also in the running for the prize, but none of the nominees was awarded the prize?
You are asking somebody who is very angry, with the fact that I was a nominee and everything went wrong. However, what is happening this year is better. NLNG seems to have restructured this year. They learnt from what happened last year, so this year’s edition is better and next year’s will be better than this year’s. What happened last year was unfortunate and I know they are embarrassed, but the good thing is that they learnt from it and I do not think it would happen like that again. After the embarrassment of last year, I’m sure nobody would like a repeat of it, neither the writers, nor the adjudicators of the prize and this year’s edition shows that subsequent ones will be better.