Cinema Africa 2023 - A conversation with Eugene Boateng
- Title
- Cinema Africa 2023 - A conversation with Eugene Boateng
- Date
- April 27, 2023
- Language
- English
- Transcript
- foreign welcome to this interview I have a very wonderful guest with me today in the name of Eugene Water yes an afro German uh filmmaker after dancer professional dancer and also choreographer who grew up in Dusseldorf but has Ghanaian Roots yes and we are having him here because he's the main actor of a very main actor and co-producer of a very interesting film that has won several Awards recently and we are really really honored to have him here in person to discuss with us not only the film but also the background and also his work as uh you know as a filmmaker as an actor as choreographer also a singer because he has a huge he has a wonderful you know trajectory and so welcome to the Africa multiple cluster of Excellence where our main objective is so we configure African studies and reconfiguration always has to do with images so images of Africa and how do we you know walk through and also maybe you know give a counter discourse to this images of Africa in Europe particularly but also even to the Africans because also like the the image of Africans to Africa is foreign problematic so thanks so much and so we are going to be talking about your film yes uh but also the circumstances that surround the film and just to say that you have a double role in this film you are the main actor and also the co-producer how do you reconcile these rules uh in a film because both have different you know uh considerations or different principles uh first of all thank you thank you thank you thank you and um you mentioned a lot so thank you for that and um to answer your question you know making a film is a group project so you don't do anything by yourself so um being an actor and a co-producer means you also have producers on on the team in the team who are working as well you know so um I can there are times where I can focus as an actor and there are times where I have to work as a producer and I can switch between those roles because of the team you know so um it was it was challenging but fun as well and I could grow out of this because I didn't I didn't really produce before I acted I used to I act before but I didn't produce and um now producing was um something that I fell in love with and I enjoyed because I got to bring so many so much that made the movie hopefully um as authentic as possible okay I've watched the movie it's quite relatable and so and that's also going to relate to my next question um as an actor as the main actor and you are acting the role of kojo the main actor in this film or was it I mean were there moments where you had to go overboard the script given that we're talking about a country and which certainly has so much to do with you and you are on roads yeah and uh unlike I would say uh many I mean you know Germans who are called aphrodewich you have a very clear connection which means as I read from your background you were able to you were visiting Ghana almost you know like very frequently uh because you grew up in a family with a father who was subconscious of his roots and wanted his kids to really grow up connected to the Homeland so when you were acting this role were you in the straight jacket of the producer or you you had moments where you said no this is where I bring my own Journeys and maybe change the whole ideology or philosophy of the producing team um you know the thing is I came in as an excuse me I came in as just as an actor and um excuse me because I read the script and I saw possibilities and I saw things that we had to do this is the reason I step by step became a producer of this movie you know so from the beginning when I read the script I called the director and told him we have to do this entry and um because first it was it was a conversation about maybe doing it in English or something you know and um because you know they want everyone to understand and I said no no this one needs to be authentic so we need to do this in tree right and so this is how somehow I started to bring everything I knew into this so we changed the whole we changed the the script into tree and I translated it with the help of others and also change we changed some dialogues and why we were shooting also because the director was so um open I had the um the possibility of improvising a bit and he also always pushed me a bit to improvise and bring something to it and so the whole process was a process of me bringing as much as I could into it you know really interesting I recently had an interview with the Nigerian author scriptwriter actor also and B bandeli whom I guess you know and he was in a process of translating and also adapting all the show Inca's death and the King's husband which was initially written in in English into Europa and he confessed to me that it was even more authentic in Europe because when soyinka was writing I mean he was basically translating Yoruba into English and that sometimes people complain that he's one of australianca's most difficult texts because he was trying to translate something that was quite really like you know quite deep in Europe and he complicated it the more in English so how was your experience like having it in three instead of in English language experience it was it was so um we had so much like a big discussion question about the language because the thing is we also had someone Zaki kozaki he was helping us with the whole translation and what happened is I've read the script the first script I read it in German then they translated this script into English and that English was a bit weird and then that they translated the weird English version into a weird Ghanaian version but it was not just tree it was panty it was equim it was three it was so it was different versions of akan language in one script so I had to you know take the Ghanaian script and the English script I had to take it all away and just take the German script because I knew it by heart and then take it and just translate it and while we were translating Zaki and me were having big discussions no this is the way we say it no no we should say this way because it means and you also have to translate it from not just from language um perspective but also from a script and film and movie perspective you know so um it's it was quite a challenge thank you so much and it's quite interesting as an answer yes uh when you're doing a film um at this juncture where there are several debates you know and especially the topical issue of immigration when you're doing a film in that atmosphere whether like far right debate I mean like perspectives on the issue where you have liberals it's perspective and so what is your Liberty I mean in terms of uh an artist are you not constrained in a way that you are you are maybe you know bent or made to be politically correct in the way you want to portray the whole issue of immigration because you know that it's going to be subject to debate so that maybe thematically you are more concerned than artistically you are your artistic Liberty might actually be lost or some sort of mitigated yeah that's that's a that's a really good question and um I learned a lot over the last years to be honest and you know we Shot the movie in 2018 and um while we were shooting we were telling a story that for me was the story of my father and not only my father but so many of my fathers and uncles and aunties and mothers you know because most of them went somehow through this journey and I wanted to tell that story and um and yeah there was a director a writer and director a German guy a white guy who came to me with this story and I saw it and I was like okay all right then it's you and me working together on this one to make it as authentic as possible right and um then um we Shot the movie and did everything post-production and then 2020 black lives matter happens and everyone is scared to screen this movie because they say it's a white director can we do this no and I'm like no one thought about this we just we were just doing the movie and you know the thing is yes I knew okay it's a white director and he wrote this but it's not that he wrote it and I was okay let's do this he wrote it presented to me and I said okay these are the changes we're going to make so that's why I became the producer and said okay let's change this and let's do this okay we got to do this we gotta no no this is not how we do we do that you know so this all of this happened so we somehow came together and made a movie together so it's not this one guy came and said you're going to do this and someone came I came we brought our knowledge together and created something but we faced some challenges and some glass ceilings and people weren't really giving us the opportunity to show the movie which I somehow understand I really do understand because we've experienced a lot in let's say Germany we experience a lot of white people make movies about Africa that when you sit there you're like this is not how you should do this you know and me as an African I feel ashamed sitting here and then going to school and people talk to me and say I watched this movie about Africa are you guys like that over there I'm like no you know so that's why people are afraid and people are fed up about certain constellations and all that I understand but this time I was involved and I was making sure that we we tell a story that is real and that is authentic and what a bit would it like with tiny chances we got we could prove that this was authentic and when people come together on a certain you know on the and we respect each other we find ways to create something to move on to grow and to develop you know thank you so much for that elaborate an insightful answer and now the the title of the film Boga and when I was trying to research about what Boga means and then also the Ghanaian context uh Ghana is always you know linked to some sort of movement Ghana must go yeah [Laughter] yeah in Kofa and Sankofa actually appears in the yeah so why is it about I mean like when you as an afro German you act in such a film I mean you actually visit Ghana you know up out of the film you actually just visit Ghana and then experience life and um you know what are the reasons that's per people to live uh because it's not only Ghana but I wanted to know to narrow it down to Ghana because Ghana has a very specific image in pan-africanism and I think I don't know whether it's last year or the year before there was uh this Ghana was the president of Ghana declared it as a year of return return and the sun cover in your head really like captures it quite so meanwhile the afro-americans or the afro-europeans are returning now the Africans on the continent feel the the spirit to live what is happening the that is that is a wow that's a good question it's deep it's deep because you know um now after a year of return um let's let me start this way um people in the western world have made good marketing the way they were selling their countries and their place it's just amazing and Africans who came to the Western World were also doing good marketing for the Western World so that means Africans living living in Africa they were like my brother my cousin my sister my auntie they are all living abroad and I want to go there as well because this is like paradise there is money and if I get a little bit money and I come back to Africa and I changed it back to African money it multiplies right so everyone um or many people a lot of people have the dream to come to to the Western World to make money and come back you know and this is also um one of the motivations I had making the movie bugger I wanted to show a bit how it is in in the western world because it's not like we come from Africa to the Western World and then Germany is like whoa all right guys you know we got money for you we got work for you we got this no no no it's not like that you hustle you know I remember my father when he came to Germany for 10 years he wasn't allowed to work for 10 years he wasn't allowed to work while our family were hoping for him to send money back home you know so those issues and struggles are there and people are not aware of it so we somehow we are we wish to um tell the truth a bit so people will consider or just think about it one more time before leaving or maybe staying home and build up home from from scratch you know and then after the movie year of return happens now the US is coming UK is coming Germany is coming all the African diasporates are coming to Ghana and Ghana is flourishing you know so it's an event to come to Ghana during the Christmas season you know it's an event on the like on um at the same time what happens is there is a gap happening you know so when you when when you get a lot of Tourism and things that happen in all of this the local people living there they are somehow a bit cut off you know so now how are we going to fix this Gap how are we going to create um possibilities and ways that the money that is coming in the local people living there can also um benefit of it and flourish with businesses and whatsoever you know so I think this is this is now a topic and this is now a question what are we doing with this exchange can we really mingle and exchange so everyone can benefit of it or is it just Western people coming to Ghana and sucking you know thank you very much okay then let's move uh I want to draw in now my own you know experiences um we also have an equivalent word in Cameroon for those who go abroad seeking for greener pastures we call them Bush followers oh wow somebody has fallen bush wow and the bush imagery is very you know it's very insightful because it can when you go to the bush you can either be killed by an animal or you or you kill an animal you kill an elephant or maybe a lion and bring home or tiger and then you are so the element of bush already brings out the risk also you need better opportunity you know because the bush is a virgin space that can you know you can unveil the unknown and the unknown can be the best or the worst but of course generally same as in Ghana there's the yearning to live because what is chasing is much even much more important than what is even inviting them Europe the the kind of economic political situation yeah but then uh not everyone that goes abroad is called bushfuller usually it's limited to a particular uh you know kind of adventurism I won't be ideally referred to as a Bushfire because I left the country for a particular purpose of studies so when you are doing a film on Burger how do you make sure that that single story doesn't become the template because you are talking about specific kind of specific experience of bug a ship if I can use the word now what about Ghanaian students who came I mean for different reasons um yeah they also have quite different experiences right of course yeah I mean you you would just become more guys through that money right so when you bring money back you are a bugger if you don't bring money you're not a vulgar right it's simple so they they scan you at the airport when you come when you just land and you you come with your luggage they see your clothing and everything and then they see are you a Boca or are you maybe just a student or whatever you know so um I think this is Boca is one movie and there are we have so many stories to tell you know we started with one movie and the idea was to tell a story you know um something in in the US they say something like the American dream right and um also this is somehow also a dream someone who starts from the bottom Rises to the top and maybe falls down again and Rises up again you know so this is the story we wanted to tell and I know that this is just one of hundreds of millions of stories you know and um we did this one and there are not like a lot of movies coming and we will tell other stories and we will so we would show different perspectives and different stories and all of this but I think um you started you start with one and then you bring the second one and then the third and then you hopefully um Inspire other people to also tell stories so we we start telling our stories you know so um what I what I'm really hoping and what I really wish is to inspire people and to give people hope and also to like to unleash a flame so people will believe that yo if he did it I can do it let's tell our stories you know because we shot Burger in 218 it's 20 23 now we need more of those movies and I don't want to be the only one doing those movies you know so we need a lot we need a lot of them so that's why I I try to encourage people whatever you do if you're interested in filmmaking just start and you know when you make the decision um you know things will align and then you get further and further and further and then we get to see more stories and hear more stories and see more movies and all of this so yeah we need to keep going great let me just a very last the very last question for this chat um you are really really uh you know uh the very best now as far as afro-german you know yeah I mean like you you because I've really had to research about you and and you really you know like the cream like creme de La Creme as we say in French and uh how do you see the the afro-german presence you know in the film industry in Germany and um when you act and go to these places are you taken to be a token are you respected in your own rights in your own value as you know um it's a journey it's a journey and um I know when I'm being used as a token and I know how to not allow to be used as a token and there is a saying for the greater good I walk amongst the evil [Laughter] so sometimes you're like okay you have to make some smart decisions like okay I gotta do you got to be strategic you know I gotta do this so this door will open and then I can do this because ultimately I want to do this but to get there I need to do this and this and that but I shouldn't do this so if I do this then I'll get there and then oh ah that was a mistake no no okay it's one step back now I gotta you know so I have to be strategic about um certain roles I pick and which movies I I I make you know and um I believe that you know what we have in Germany um we have some African some black actors and actresses here we have them but what we lack in is culture you know and um I always say I come with I'm not only here with my color I'm here with my culture you know so I stand I represent my whole culture and this is something that is lacking in the film industry in Germany when you see um some black African actors and actresses they they use them as a token most of the time you know and it's like okay we need a secretary and her name is Louisa let's make Louisa black and then we take Louisa and make it black you know and I'm like yeah but can she be a queer maybe and can she have can she can she have like background maybe a sister or a mother and maybe they talk a little bit in their mother tongue so you see their culture so representation is not just a color representation is the story behind it you know so the whole culture and everything what is it when I see those people what is it about them I don't I grew up with black people I grew up with so many black people I just have like um I have so many Ghanaian friends I also had other friends like you know from all over the uh um from all over the world but I was like surrounded by a Ghanaian community how come I see a movie in Germany and I see a black person and he's uh he's the only black person in the whole picture and I'm like he he must have been growing up with black parents of a black brother or a black sister or something you know and and when you have black parents then there is a relationship between this character and his or her parents and this relationship when they talk you experience culture culture you know and this I believe is what we need and this is what I what what is for me when when people talk about representation this is what I'm looking for thank you very much and we have come to the end of this uh chat this interview but um we're going to tease our viewers and in the next interview will tell me more about You featuring in Beyonce's thank you thank you very much foreign
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