On June 16, Nigeria’s foremost playwright and theatre director, Prof Babafemi Adeyemi Osofisan, marks another year on earth. The occasion allows me to celebrate a man whose path I’ve crossed in my journey through life. Not only did Osofisan leave a lasting impression on me as a person, but he also significantly impacted the course of my writing, particularly the literary aspect. To this day, when I watch a drama piece, I say that I wish I had the time to engage in acting. I love acting. But I didn’t realise how much until I arrived at the University of Ibadan, where I did my master’s degree in political science. There, I began to show up at the UI Art Theatre and ultimately acted in several plays in Osofisan’s professional theatre troupe, Kakansela.
The renowned Nigerian academic was born in 1946 in Erunwon, Ogun State. He attended primary school at Ile-Ife and secondary school at Government College, Ibadan. He attended the University of Ibadan and other institutions abroad. He subsequently held faculty positions at the University of Ibadan, where he retired in 2011. He’s currently a distinguished professor of theatre arts at Kwara State University. His works have won national and international literary prizes. In 2016, he became the first African to be awarded the prestigious Thalia Prize by the International Association of Theatre Critics. Osofisan has written and produced more than 60 plays, including Who is Afraid of Solarin, Midnight Hotel, Once upon Four Robbers, and Tegonni: An African Antigone.
I took part in some of Osofisan’s plays at UI Art Theatre and at the Muson Centre, Lagos. Meanwhile, I took an interest in acting while I was staying with another remarkable personality who had also passed through the tutelage of Osofisan as a theatre arts student at UI. While I was an undergraduate student at the University of Lagos, I stayed with Prof. Segun Ojewuyi, who is the elder brother of my friend, Muyiwa Ojewuyi. Prof. Ojewuyi is a theatre director and, at the time, a lecturer at the University of Lagos. Sometimes, he took me along to watch his productions. It was in the process that I saw in person for the first time some of the actors who would later become household names in Nollywood, such as Richard Mofe-Damijo. I suppose seeing these actors inspired me, so when I arrived at UI, I took the opportunity to check if I could act.
I’ve always stated that I had the most memorable and fulfilling time while I was at UI. Acting was the main reason and Osofisan was a major contributor. After lectures, I was always at the well-resourced Art Theatre of the Theatre Art Department, participating in the rehearsals and presentations of different plays by students and lecturers. One of such was my role as “Father” when Alagba Kola Oyewo (a known name in Nollywood) presented his project, Luigi Pirandello’s “Six Characters In Search of A play”, at the time Oyewo was doing his Master’s degree in Theatre Art department.
By my estimation, Osofisan was easy to work with as a theatre director. He was patient and, more than this, he would allow you to first express yourself, exhibit your natural talent. He wouldn’t intervene unless he needed to. And when he did intervene, his corrections were those that I remember till today and even adopt while correcting younger actors. One of Osofisan’s corrections that I don’t forget is how to do “stage run”. He was so convincing that as he performed stage run I thought “this is masterclass”. A few years ago, while I was judging at a drama competition, I climbed the stage to show younger actors how to execute a stage run. Even as I did, Osofisan was as clear in my mind as the very day he climbed the stage, rolled up his trousers, and showed us how to do a stage run at the Art Theatre, UI.
And my experiences acting in his troupe helped in the many plays I wrote years later, which have either won or been shortlisted multiple times for national drama prizes. I never thought I would ever write a play, let alone plays that turned out successful. The very first full play I wrote, originally a short prose that I turned into play, went on to win the ANA Prize for Drama, 2014. Osofisan’s plays and his teachings years earlier are my foremost guide whenever I write. I recall that Osofisan was the first director to pay me a fee for acting, at a time when I was only enjoying myself acting without expecting any fees. He was also the director whose comments first gave me the impression that I could act. During rehearsals, one of his visitors might walk into the Art Theatre looking for him. One came this night and made a comment on how well I was doing with my lines. It was at that stage when many of my fellow actors were still trying to get their lines.
Osofisan responded to his visitor’s observation, saying he noticed in the period he had worked with me that I was always the first to get my lines. He said, while others got theirs as they peaked towards public presentation, I always peaked well ahead of them. I’m not sure an actor should peak ahead of presentation, but I read Osofisan’s comment to mean that at least I could act. Till today, I’ve not studied how to ensure an actor peaks at presentation time. Maybe one day I would have the privilege of meeting Osofian and ask him how best to do it, even though journalism has made me dump acting long ago. However, I wonder if I would ever be able to abide by the strict timetable for peaking steadily that I imagine the veteran theatre director would set. It’s because I don’t know how to slow down about anything. I put all my energy into whatever I do, a phenomenon I notice some who work close to me neither comprehend nor are able to cope with.
I partly picked up what I regard as dedication to a cause while I was into acting at UI. There, we would sometimes rehearse until past midnight, and sometimes some of us would have another rehearsal to report for as early as 5am. It added to the building of self-discipline, which I found useful in the years that followed. Significantly, under the tutelage of Osofisan, I notice that there’s a stricter discipline that Nigerians of his generation are imbued with.
I noticed this in him, and I noticed a similar trait later in life whenever I came across anyone from his generation. Each time a person of that generation made a comment or behaved in a similar manner, my mind would go to Osofisan. I think there was a way that generation was raised that the younger generations of Nigerians have lost. The discipline in Osofisan’s generation is sometimes visible even in the small things that some might dismiss as insignificant.
For instance, there was this night Kakansela Troupe was rehearsing, and Osofisan came in with a bottle of drink, and a small glass cup that he was using. Well, we managed to persuade him that we would need a drink to rehearse well that night. Colleagues were passing the small glass cup from one person to another. Yours truly grabbed a big plastic cup somewhere, went to the director, and asked that my share be poured into it. Osofisan said a plastic cup wasn’t appropriate for this kind of drink. Instead, he gave me the key to his office so that I would pick the right kind of cup. I returned with the small glass cup and got my share. But till today I don’t forget the words and the acts of Osofisan regarding the drink. He left a huge impression on me. I didn’t just see discipline, I saw self-control, character. If it’s not done, one shouldn’t do it. These days, however, I notice that when one advocates discipline even in small things, many flippantly rebuff and issue tags.
But as I always state, it’s in small things that one knows what a person will do with big things. If a person lacks discipline in small things, they can’t exercise discipline in big things. This individual problem is now manifesting as a collective problem Nigeria suffers from. What has helped Nigerians of Osofisan’s generation to achieve for themselves as individuals has also contributed significantly to putting Nigerians on the global map as a nation of talented writers. This isn’t rooted in doing things anyhow. It comes from being disciplined. Osofisan’s huge contribution in his field, as well as the impact he has had on many of us privileged to have crossed his path, cannot be separated from the discipline he and his contemporaries imbibed. If, as individuals and as a nation, we’ve benefited from their personal sacrifices, we should be able to point it out and encourage ourselves to continue on a similar path. I congratulate Osofisan on his 80th birthday anniversary. K’emi ola o gun, sir.