Veteran actor and Delta State Commissioner for Culture and Tourism, Richard Mofe Damijo has said that playing Gunpowder in the soon-to-premiere movie, ‘Oloibiri’ was a piece of cake.
The film produced by Abuja-based Rightangle Productions will premiere later this month and screen at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival in France.
Produced by Rogers Ofime, the film centres on Oloibiri, the community in Delta State where oil was first discovered in Nigeria and the larger struggles of Niger Delta people.
Speaking on the challenges of playing Gunpowder in the movie, RMD said: “When I read the script, I felt a kindred spirit with the character. I knew immediately what I would do with it. As a Niger Delta boy myself, I am a very angry young man in terms of some of the things that I think are wrong with our system and that sort of fuels the angst in the character.
“So, it wasn’t much of a challenge trying to play the role because the role is me; it’s any young man in the Niger Delta that feels a need for a better life for where the nation’s wealth comes out from.
“I think what is even more important is that if you are transported to Oloibiri itself, all that arrested development; as if somebody took that town and froze it since 1956, then you will understand that you won’t have any challenges in playing the character”
On coping with a barrel of crude oil poured over him in the movie which also stars Olu Jacobs, Ifeanyi Williams, Taiwo Ajayi Lycett and Ivie Okujaye, RMD disclosed that:
“It took like four, five days for all of that oil to leave my body. I condemned all my clothes that I wore, I mean apart from the costumes. All the personal things I brought were corroded; the chain I was wearing on my hand, everything was gone but I kept those things for posterity. The effect that they wanted, I am glad that we achieved it. It was difficult to do but seeing the result made it easy.”