43
THE NATION ON SUNDAY AUGUST 12, 2012
Glamour
My wife encouraged me to go for Tinsel audition 窶天ictor Olaotan H
OW did your journey into the world of theatre start? I got into acting through a teacher who was a member of Ori Olokun Theatre troupe in the 70's. He gave me the opportunity to act for the first time in my life. I was 15 years old then. From that time, I had contact with other acting groups like Jimi Solanke, Akin Sofoluwe, Yomi Fawole, and the late Laide Adewale. The irony about my life is that my father wanted me to be a medical doctor. I was good in Chemistry, Biology, and Further Mathematics. So, automatically you would think I was going to medical school. My father later died and maybe that was why I was able to do whatever I like. I started playing football for Water Corporation in Ibadan and they were rivals to IICC Shooting Stars, now 3SC Shooting Stars. I played for five years and they later disbanded the team. I later met with Laolu Ogunniyi. I did another film with him before I went to America in 1978. While in America, I was involved in another professional acting. I met other top Hollywood actors. With Laolu Ogunniyi, I was able to do the first television drama in Nigeria which lasted for three hours. I became popular in Ibadan and other western states that anywhere I went in the western states, they would always call me by the name of the character, Dotun Oluronbi. When I joined the performing theatre troupe in the University of Ibadan, Wole Soyinka was there, Dr Dapo Adegbite was there, Wale Ogunyemi, Jimi Solanke and Tunji Oyelana were all there. Tunji Oyelana was actually an actor but he did his music underground before he later took to music professionally. With all these great people around me, I was able to blossom into a fantastic actor. I did so many productions like 'Lion and the Jewel' by Wole Soyinka. We were
Victor Olaotan, the lead actor in the popular M-Net productions, Tinsel, is a veteran in the thespian trade. In his late 50s, he spoke to Adetutu Audu on his passion, acting, sojourn abroad, which left him 'high and dry' and his encounter with the production which offers him a new lease of life.
going to all the universities in Nigeria. Then we used to have five universities; University of Ibadan, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ahmadu Bello University, University of Nigeria Nsukka and the University of Lagos. What is your view on acting then and now? In my years of experience, I have come across every notable man that you know in the performing arts. I learned so much. Unfortunately today, the platform does not have the enigma that it used to have in those days. Acting at that time was totally different from now. Now, it has become commercialized. Young actors who are coming today don't have the opportunity to experience the training that we had. All of them want to be stars. We had to learn the hard way. We used to rehearse from 6pm till 6am the following day. That was how Prof Wole Soyinka rehearsed. Everybody can relax from morning till evening but once it is evening, that is when he works best and I suspect that he writes most of his plays at that time too. Eventually in America, the trainings I had here was useful for me because I met one Hollywood actor who wanted to take me in but because of my citizenship factor, I couldn't get in. With a blooming acting career at home, what prompted you to travel abroad? Travelling abroad was the in-thing then. I wanted to register with the actors' guild when a friend of mine called me that he had a production, that as professionals we should travel around. We left US and went to Canada, Europe and started acting. I came back in 1980 when they were selecting eight good performing artistes in Nigeria and I happened to be one of them. Others were Tunji Oyelana, Yemi Remi, Joe Adigwe, Demola Onibon-Okuta, Tayo Taiwo, among others. We went to five states in the United States and the president of the US at that time gave us a brooch each. It is called presidential medal. If you are given that brooch, no matter what you do in America, you will be forgiven because it shows that you have been pardoned by the president. I don't know where I put mine till today. I lost it maybe out of youthful exuberance. I later went to three different universities in the United States to study acting. Were you successful as an actor abroad? When I was in the US, I worked for a company that produced perfumes, Channel, as an auditor and I was earning $35,000 annually. Later it became $55, 000. I worked there for five years and later moved to a car manufacturing company. There I was earning $120,000 annually while my wife was earning $170,000 where she was working as an executive. We were making good money. I had about seven cars and three houses in Atlanta, New Jersey and one other city. I had to leave all that because of my tax issue. I wasn't paying the right amount of tax I was supposed to pay and in that case if you are arrested, it is either you spend the rest of your life in jail or you pay triple of what you owe. When I calculated everything, it was over $4million. There was no way I could pay that money. The reason why I became a pauper was because I left all my properties in America. I had to run back to Africa. The IRS took over all the other properties. When I came back to Nigeria, I had only $100 and my suitcase with me. I couldn't hold big money. When did you finally return to Nigeria? I came back to Nigeria in 2002 and opened a computer engineering outfit and I ran it from 2002 to 2005. Then a friend of mine who had a filling station asked me to come and run it with him. He saw the way I was running the computer engineering office and I didn't have the money to upgrade it. I needed about N1million but I couldn't find it. So I became a petrol station dealer with my friend. Friends noticed that I was back from US, so they invited me to a festival organised by NANTAP. They wanted to do an old film by Wale Ogunyemi and they wanted old time characters who took part in the original film. Since I was one of the characters in the old one, they called me. I wanted to play the lead role but all the characters in that film are leading roles. It is about four main characters. So Akin Lewis played Sanmi Ajao while I played the house boy.