Nollywood: Mo Abudu wants a different term

The EbonyLife TV boss has produced high-profile films like Fifty, The Wedding Party and Oloture but would rather prefer they’re not termed as Nollywood films, due to her dislike of the history of the word.

“Do you know the history behind the word? A Canadian journalist came to Nigeria and decided that he was going to give us the name Nollywood, and that was it. It’s stuck since then.

“I hate the word Nollywood. The term Nollywood itself is a bad genre of filmmaking. We all know what Nollywood is supposed to represent — it’s the VHS films that were made back in the day.

“So, to still be called Nollywood, for me, is a no. We need to use terms like African filmmakers or Nigerian filmmakers,” she said.

Abudu further told Deadline that her obsession with making the Nigerian film industry global is why EbonyLife TV is working with Elba’s Green Door Pictures.

She noted that it’s important to work with someone who knows African filmmakers and is committed to exporting filmmaking from the continent to the international stage.

“I have an obsession with making a big blockbuster that the world is going to see, but putting things into context for Africa, we don’t have the budget,” she said.

The 58-year-old noted that the type of partnership she has with Elba will help improve the growth of Nollywood’s local projects, incomes and revenues.