Originally published in Sisters of the Screen: Women of Africa on Film Video and Television by Beti Ellerson. Africa World Press, Trenton, NJ, 2000. Interview by Beti Ellerson at FESPACO 1997, Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, February 1997; combined with a short written correspondence, December 1998. Alexandra Duah passed away in 2000.
Alexandra, could you talk about your acting background and how you came to cinema in general?
I initially trained in cinematography and qualified as a film editor. People say that I am not very easy to live with because any time I go out of a place and return I am able to detect that a chair has been moved; that a flower has been touched. My children know how I am and they have begun calling me "Radio Ghana" because I query every thing that I see. I got my actor training from an old actress named Jean P. Martin in London.
I have, over the years, taken acting seriously. Every little word, every little statement, I make sure that I conduct enough research to be able to know the bearing my statement has on the entire script or story and my relationship to the other actors. I think about costuming and everything. When I am on location, I am not just an actress, I am more like a mother who tries to solve problems between artists and producer, but then, having done all these things, I am satisfied with having my name only as actress in the credits.
However, since I acted in Sankofa, where I played the role of Nunu, no producer has offered me any script, no one has hired me. I now consider myself Ghana's international actress who has found herself redundant. As an actress, I think that I have been let down miserably. I have now decided to try to go back into what I learned in film school.
When you say producer, do you also mean film director?
Yes, the producer often does it all. But yes, I am talking about the director.
You have acted in some highly acclaimed films. Could you discuss your experiences in these films and other roles that you have played throughout your career?
I managed to land on Sankofa in 1989, when Heritage Africa, a movie produced by Kwaw Ansah, was premiered here at FESPACO. It also won the Grand Prize the Etalon de Yennenga at the time. It was then that some friends from America saw me and said to Haile Gerima, "Go to Ghana—you will find your woman there." And that is how I got the job. In Heritage Africa, I had a role symbolic of "Mother Africa." Usually Africa is seen as miserable, illiterate, an old lady, but she is full of wisdom and that is how I portrayed this woman in Heritage Africa. The director had a special perception of who this special woman was and he created her as someone who was deep, full of wisdom, clean, smartly dressed, and highly traditional.
Sometimes I expressed myself in a loud manner, and whenever the director saw me going off the beat he found a way of bring me back by saying "Alexandra, this woman is a cool woman." I think that this is what we need of directors: they should not leave the actor to do what she or he wants because she is a good actor. This is what I always tell the film students at NAFTI, the school for film and television production in Ghana. Most of the students fear approaching seasoned actors like me for their graduate productions. I tell them that they need to have the courage or, otherwise, when they come out they will end up using mediocre actors and their films will never get anywhere.
After Heritage Africa, I played the role of a spiritual leader in Ama, a film by the Ghanaian filmmaker Kwesi Owusu. In one scene, she was in the church singing "Hallelujah" and then in the next scene she was on the back of a horse dancing the traditional war dance. Although I played well, I feel that I did not have enough time to digest the role. That is one of those things: I can't be good in all cases, but I did my best under the circumstances.
Because of the huge cost involved, it is very difficult to make a proper movie on celluloid in Ghana. So over the last ten years producers/directors have tried to content themselves with producing features on video.
Have you also acted in these video films?
Yes, I have acted in several of these video films. In one video film I played the role of a woman who, though satisfied and well taken care of, sometimes needed the warm embrace of a man, but her husband was too busy. I thought to myself, "You have been playing roles as "Mother Africa," what will the public say if your character makes herself that cheap by sleeping with her daughter's boyfriend?" I developed a very sympathetic character that appeared quite decent and responsible. She showed that money isn't everything and once in a while, a woman, no matter how old she is, needs a warm embrace. It is through this identification with the spectator that I managed to survive that role by not disgracing women.
I played in another video film called Youngblood. This was a film portraying a woman who wanted to make money at all costs, so it was about integrity. The woman was married and had a little shop. She observed that her counterparts were swimming in affluence; however, she did not know how they made their money. She advises her husband to retire so that his severance pay could be used to expand the shop. The husband retired and she expanded the shop, yet her friend kept insisting that there was a lot more she could do. The friend told her that she would take her to a friend who would give her a handkerchief, nothing more. Each day there was still another thing to do and it got to the point where she could not come out of the house because she had tied herself completely up in knots and in the end she died a shameful death.
I think the film taught our women that we must be content with who we are, and strive harder and make money through honest work. There is no point in using juju or preparing special foods to eat, from which some have actually died. I accept scripts that are educative, nothing that demeans or demoralizes women.
What were your experiences during the shooting of Sankofa? What were your impressions of your character Nunu?
I will always give a big Thank-you to Haile for giving me the chance to play Nunu in Sankofa. I actually learned a lot and maybe this is the reason that I am still alive. My experiences with this film made me realize that I don't need anything. I am just thankful that I wake up in the morning and can breathe free natural air and move about freely in my own country.
As for the role of Nunu, I see very much myself in the character. I am a princess, my father is a king, my whole paternal family came from royalty, and we are a big family, at least three thousand. Our family includes intellectuals, the moderators of the Presbyterian Church, a chief priestess, a woman medical doctor, teachers. The first black woman to be sent to Switzerland by the Basel Mission to help translate the Bible into our language comes from my home.
We have everything and yet we are greatly persecuted politically, because we despise oppression. We have the ability to see beyond and to read between the lines, and thus sometimes we clash with authorities. This made me start secondary school, barefooted. My father had been forced into political exile in 1958, and I started secondary school in 1959. I did pass the common entrance exam, and had an interview at a prestigious secondary school, but my father could not afford to pay the fees. So I had to go to another secondary school in my hometown as a day student. A princess going to school as a day student!
In those days, education was very disciplined. We had brown shoes for school and black shoes for church. I did not have any brown shoes, so I wore black shoes and I got punished all the time; though I just wanted to go to school! So one day I took off those black shoes and went to school barefooted and I got caned and then sent home. It was a terrible situation and if my parents did not put the fear of God in me and did not raise me with good morals, I might have ended up in some irresponsible man's bed. Maybe my child would have been forty years old by now.
So these experiences growing up prepared you for the role of Nunu?
Nunu's parents were persecuted...her father was a warrior and her mother was a medicine woman...they had already prepared their daughter and she was tough....Yes, I see myself much like Nunu.
What were your feelings about the character Joe, who actually, disowned and despised his mother Nunu?
Joe? Well, I think that it would be very difficult for a mother to accept such a situation because as a mother you care so much. Imagine your children are playing, the moment you hear a car screeching outside your heart jumps into your hands: "Is it my child?" The scream you hear, you automatically ask, "Is my son screaming?" You care so much for your child. So, for a child that you care so much for to turn his back on you, it is devastating. Nunu was a mother. I am a mother.
Could you talk about your experiences working with African diasporans from the United States and Jamaica during the shooting?
I used to be scared stiff of Rastafarians. My father always had a clean-shaven head. He would shave all the hairs in his nose and on his chest. He had a clean-shaven body. There I was in the midst of all this big hair. That is when I went for the rehearsals in Washington, DC in 1989. In Jamaica, I shared a room with Hasinatou, who played the role of Juma. I asked her what should I do, there were Rastafarians everywhere and then there was Mutabaruka who played the role of Shango. I had to pray hard and find a way to understand them. And sooner or later, I realized that we were all human beings and that is their way of presenting themselves.
The first day we were to shoot on location in Jamaica I had said that we should pour libation. We forgot the gin and I said it does not matter, we could use pure spring water. There was a Rastafarian man with one bunch of hair, which was three yards wide, very long, all the way to the floor. When I got the courage I went to him and I asked him, "Please, sir, is this tap water?" he said, "No, this is pure spring water." I then asked him, could we have a little to poor libation? and he said, sure and poured the water. I took a picture with him and we made friends, and that was how I began to accept Rastafarians.
What are some of the projects that you have undertaken since Sankofa?
Well, as I stated before, I trained in cinematography from 1970 to 1972 in Ghana, and I specialized in film editing. I also learned directing, writing, as well as other aspects of filmmaking. In 1992, I tried to put my writing to the test. I managed to write, produce, and direct four children's movies for Ghana Television. I actually developed the juvenile participation in the program. I know that children relate better to each other. If children are involved in acting in plays with other children, they will learn quickly. This principle comes from folklore, which our forefathers and ancestors used to mold the moral upbringing of the children.
So you actually teach acting to children? What are some of the things you teach?
Before teaching them acting I think it is important to take their welfare into consideration. As I have said, I have been considerably let down. Producers do not care about the welfare of the artist, they do not help to promote the interest of the artist, the fee they pay is so small and the actors are not fed well. In many cases, they take it for granted that the actors will provide their own costumes. In the end, the actor's attention is divided. It takes very strong and dedicated artists to continue to present a role in a way that it could be acceptable.
When I was working with the children, I realized that it was going to be very expensive. For a child you need a chaperon, you need to lecture or counsel the child about what it takes to be an actor. You need to talk to the parents so that they may encourage the child as well. Otherwise, if they don't get the encouragement to continue, they will drop by the wayside. On the other hand, I had to tell the children that they need a good education to be a good actor; acting is not for dropouts.
I think this 15th edition of FESPACO with the theme, "Childhood, Youth and Cinema," is good. Children need to know about Africa. Children need to be taught. Children need to be helped to develop as Africans. But then, we will need to use children artists in films. My question is "Are producers prepared to use African children in their movies? Are they just going to waste them like they have wasted our generation of actors?" They will only succeed if they have a future for these children. FESPACO should be encouraged because this is a location where artists are spotted.
You stated that since you played in Sankofa you found it difficult to find work. Why is this?
Sankofa was released in 1993, but to date no producer or director has approached me or hired me for work. I don't know—maybe they are not able to identify me when they see me in person. People are surprised to see me so small because they say that in Sankofa I appeared so huge and strong. Even though cinema has been with us for years, sometimes people think the character you play is really you, that you are playing yourself on the screen. Sometimes they think that I am a very strong spiritualist and they are afraid to approach me.
I would very much like to play in another film like Sankofa, or play a character like Nunu. Because of lack of work, I have tried my hand in producing my own shows. Of course, it is not easy, either, to raise as much as 40,000 dollars to produce a video. I am working on a program that has a strong message about issues regarding women. I have written a script on rape and the trauma and haunting that a woman experiences afterwards for the rest of her life. The woman fights to shed this trauma and tries to live a somewhat normal life. It is kind of a tragedy-comedy. Another script I have is about a filmmaker who waits for a long time for a producer in order to make a successful film and, meanwhile, he ends up making eight babies instead. I have some nice programs that I would like to produce.
Could you talk about some of the activities that you have done since we last met at FESPACO in February 1997?
I am teaching film-acting techniques and poise at the Academy of Film Acting. This is the first film acting training school in Ghana, which a colleague producer/director and I established in January 1998. We have so far trained thirty-six would-be actors, actresses, and those already in the system. We plan to offer training for other disciplines in the film industry.
