Omoni Oboli, a popular actress and filmmaker, has spoken about how she exchanged scripts for movie roles early in her career.
She stated this in an interview with Radionow FM, while discussing what drove her to shift from actress to director.
After watching the films, Omoni saw that her vision was not being brought to reality, which fuelled her desire to become a director.
“I was trading scripts for movie roles; I’d say, ‘Don’t pay me, just give me a role in the film.'”
“So I started doing it. But then I’ll watch the film and recognise it’s not what I envisioned when I was writing because I write in pictures. I see what I write, so when I watch the movie, it’s really different.
“Not to say it wasn’t good, but no two directors will direct the same script in the same way. So I told myself that if my stories were going to have my DNA, I’d have to direct them myself,” she explained.
“And it was a scary thought, but then I told myself, ‘Warri don’t carry lass.'” What did they get that I did not? I was like, “I’ll do this thing.”
“So I began understudying directors, as if I were playing on set while intently monitoring the director. And I suggested I might need some formal instruction on this. “So I took a short course at the New York Film Academy,” she explained.