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Producer and
director, Jimi Odumosu, has something nice cooking. A docu-drama on
Nigeria’s commercial nerve centre titled ‘Lagos: The Golden Nugget’ is
what the veteran is waiting to serve Nigerians. The production,
spanning the 15th century to the present, is a series of 13 half-hour
programmes capped by a final 14th episode of one hour.

Though his father
is from Ogun State and his mother from the Centre of Excellence, the
retired permanent secretary, Lagos Television, who sees himself as a
Lagosian, had always wanted to do something on the state. After
completing ‘The Head of State’, a series about a military regime in an
imaginary West African country currently running on TV, he started work
on the script of a psychological thriller.

“In the midst of
that, someone called me and said that he would want us to do something
pretty profound about the history of Lagos. Since I had been thinking
of it, I got very excited,” recalls Odumosu with whom I have just seen
an episode of the production.

He had thought he
would spend about eight months on the project featuring tested artists
including Dejumo Lewis, Toyin Oshinaike, Tina Mba, Kayode Idris, and
Olu Okekanye, but ended up spending just under two years.

“We did not
envisage the scope of what we were going to engage in when we started
originally. So, as we went into the subject, we discovered many things
that we were not aware of before. We got more excited and as we got
more excited, the scope kept on getting wider. We were pleased with the
way that things were going because it meant more information.”

Faithful to history

Though there are
other documentaries on Lagos, Odumosu highlights what makes his unique.
“I have not really seen or known someone to have done something this
large, going into the history of Lagos from the 15th century up to the
present day. You could have seen people do something on Eletu Odibo,
Erelu Kuti or Madam Tinubu or depict one or two kings within the
particular period. We’ve done something that I think is good and
aspirational.”

How true an account is the production to the history of the state?

“I’ve not done a
straight documentary. I’m not a History professor, I’m a filmmaker but
I also like to be sincere to history. I took a bit of dramatic licence
in modifying some scenes which in itself is … we based our framework
on a particular book telling the history of Lagos. We remain pretty
loyal and sincere to that. If you put 10 historians in this room right
now and ask them to tell the history of Lagos, they are going to tell
10 different stories. We researched, spoke with people, and let logic
and plausibility prevail in what we were doing.”

Cinematic elements

Another uniqueness of the producer’s latest work is the generous use of illustrations.

“If you are talking
about the major events that we have to capture on camera from the 15th
century, you will realise that even if we had all the money in the
world we probably would not have been able to capture all,” he offers.

“I decided that I
was going to use almost all the major elements that are available to a
filmmaker when working on a period piece like this. Wherever I couldn’t
get enough money to do the set or the special effects that would be
needed for such a scene, I needed alternatives and these could come
either in the form of file shots, photographs, paintings, drawings,
sketches, actuality shots and interviews. I became a little greedy in
terms of being creative so I decided to use and bring all of them
together.

“Fortunately, I
found someone who is really very good at illustration. There were some
other areas where we had problems, we had written those areas for
actors and actresses but for some logistic and human reasons, we
couldn’t shoot the sequences. He was able to bridge this for us through
his illustration; all we needed to do was to write narrations for that
to move the story forward. If we had done this as a drama piece all
through, we probably would have ended up with 52 episodes. It was more
of economics really than any other thing.”

The perfectionist

“Anybody that has
worked with Odumosu knows that you have to be on your toes all the
time,” actress, Lilian Amah-Aluko, said of the producer of ‘Evil
Encounter’ and ‘Fiery Force’ in an interview not too long ago. Is he a
task master or perfectionist?

“In my younger
days, I thought I could achieve perfection but I doubt if anyone can
achieve it. Experience has shown me that, but you can get perfection in
man. Perfection in the sense that if you push a man, not to the limit,
but to bring out the best of their ability, the best of their
knowledge, you will be able to get something tangible from them. I push
myself a lot and I never in my life, as a broadcast manager, writer,
producer, director, pushed anyone more than I pushed myself.

“It may not be too
good for other people because we are made differently, but I just
assume that if I am this old, I should be able to push much younger men
to do things that they probably felt they couldn’t do. I found out that
people are generally happy with a low level of performance. As soon as
they achieve something very little, they relax but I found that the
more you push yourself, the better you get.”

Positive feedback

Talking about ‘The Head of State’, Odumosu confesses he is pleased with the feedback he has been receiving.

“A lot of people
phoned in and sent texts. Few months ago, I went to a furniture company
to buy some furniture and we got talking. Somehow, the owner of the
company got on to ‘The Head of State’, even things that I had
forgotten, that person was narrating to me. Telling me my story, what
could be more fulfilling than that? I’m happy because when I was
writing it, quite a lot of people didn’t want to partake in it because
they thought that it is about military regime and it might not go down
well with whatever government is in power.

“If we cannot take
the Army state and emote them on television so that we can learn from
the mistakes and be better for it tomorrow, if we cannot as a nation do
that, sit back and assess ourselves I don’t think we are ready for
development.”

Poor distribution

People desirous of acquiring works of by the director of ‘Doctor’s Quarters’ shouldn’t despair, they are properly documented.

“If we had a good
system of distribution in this country, as soon as we air a movie or a
television series, the next thing that a producer wants is to dump
everything onto the stable of a reputable distributor who will have a
network of distribution, but I’m still looking for that and that’s very
bad. Except for ‘Evil Encounter’ and ‘Fiery Force’ which are not in
their basic forms because something happened to them but after I clear
the works that I want to do this year, I want to travel abroad and get
these projects reworked, as it were, so they can be available for
people. But all my other works are available on hard drive in their
pristine form.”

On why he appears to produce TV series more than feature films,
Odumosu says, “Maybe I’ve been called to be a broadcast administrator
more than I had time to work on movie projects. I’ve been doing
administrative work for the most part of my life.”