Nollywood actor Zubby Michael has said that some industry gatekeepers and executives are reluctant to support Igbo talents. He recently had his say during an interview with Broadway TV, and fans have been reacting.
Stressing that executives are very wary of mentoring Igbos, Zubby stated that they avoid talents from the Eastern region because they fear their mentees could quickly become their competitors.
He added that the majority of the gatekeepers know that Igbo talents are often fast learners who can acquire skills in a short period of time.
His words, “Igbo people are fast learners and they are capable of making it big with just a little. You might decide to mentor an Igbo person and what took you 10 years to learn, he will learn it in one year and six months.
And if you don’t treat him well, he will leave you and start doing the same business you taught him and become your competition. So, people are scared of that.
Industry executives, including some Igbos, don’t like supporting Igbos because they feel like they will get betrayed by their mentee outshining them.”
Nollywood is a sobriquet that originally referred to the Nigerian film industry. The origin of the term dates back to the early 2000s, traced to an article in The New York Times. Due to the history of evolving meanings and contexts, there is no clear or agreed-upon definition for the term, which has made it a subject to several controversies.
The origin of the term “Nollywood” remains unclear; Jonathan Haynes traced the earliest usage of the word to a 2002 article by Matt Steinglass in the New York Times, where it was used to describe Nigerian cinema.
Charles Igwe noted that Norimitsu Onishi also used the name in a September 2002 article he wrote for the New York Times. The term continues to be used in the media to refer to the Nigerian film industry, with its definition later assumed to be a portmanteau of the words “Nigeria” and “Hollywood”, the American major film hub.
Film-making in Nigeria is divided largely along regional, and marginally ethnic and religious lines. Thus, there are distinct film industries – each seeking to portray the concern of the particular section and ethnicity it represents. However, there is the English-language film industry which is a melting pot for filmmaking and filmmakers from most of the regional industries.
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