Veteran actor Yemi Solade has said that the true pioneer of Nigeria’s home video industry is Ade Ajiboye, popularly known as Big Abass, and not Kenneth Nnebue, producer of the 1992 hit “Living in Bondage”.
Solade made the remark during a recent appearance on The Father’s Path with Temitope podcast, where he addressed what he called “media confusion” about how Nollywood truly began.
According to the “Twin Brothers” star, Yoruba filmmakers were already recording and distributing their works on video before the English-language boom that followed “Living in Bondage”.
“The first man that shot home video in this country, his name is Ade Ajiboye (Big Abass); he’s alive,” Solade said.
He explained that the Yoruba theatre scene had started experimenting with recorded performances long before 1992, using camcorders and selling videos in bookshops, the same way evangelists sold recorded sermons.
“We have been doing it… there was celluloid, we did that,” he added, while also referencing early cinema icons like Hubert Ogunde, Baba Sala, Ade Love and Ola Balogun.
Solade argued that the main reason Yoruba filmmakers are not celebrated as pioneers is because they didn’t properly document their contributions.
“It all started like that… my people in the Yoruba setting didn’t document anything,” he said.
“That’s why some people in the film industry will come out to boast saying they started. They didn’t start anything. Living in Bondage was not the first movie. But because they romanced the media while my people were doing the act. Agreed, most of them weren’t schooled and they didn’t have access to media.”
He also mentioned that industry veterans like Adebayo Salami (father of Femi Adebayo) and Jide Kosoko can testify to the early days of Yoruba video films.
“It’s only in the Yoruba setting that you would find practitioners who will tell you they’ve been around for over 60 years,” Solade said
