Think about your top 5 films and series; you will most likely remember the name of the lead and director. If you’re lucky, you will remember who wrote the project. This may not mean anything to you, but to the writers, it’s something.
Writers are just as important to the film as the director and actors, and most writers feel underappreciated when a project they spent a long time on sidelines them. This isn’t specifically a Nollywood problem but a global issue.
In 2023, the WGA (Writers Guild of America) went on a 147-day strike to fight for streaming residuals and guardrails against AI, amongst a long list of issues. Studio executives and production companies sometimes treat these talents as tools to be exploited and cast aside at their convenience.
Nollywood writers like Lois Truly are among many writers fighting for Nollywood to do well by writers. In a recent interview with Streamdorm, we asked her how she felt about this topic.
Streamdorm: Writers are just as important to the film as the actors, directors and producers. Do you feel underappreciated whenever movies or shows get released, and the writers are not marketed as loudly as the director and stars are?
Lois truly: “What I feel is disrespected, because it really doesn’t take them anything to give writers credit; they just don’t respect writers enough to try. You’ll hear all sorts of excuses, and they all boil down to an utter lack of respect for our craft.”
Streamdorm: You have campaigned for writers to get paid more; are you seeing a change in the right direction? Also, on the publicly discussed topic of “incoherent Nollywood scripts”, do you think money plays a role in that? For example, rushed third act, etc.
Lois Truly: “Now that people are starting to have access to more funding, I see a change in the right direction, but to a very minimal extent, because most screenwriters are still not being paid their worth in Nollywood.
Absolutely! Money plays the biggest role in the incoherent Nollywood scripts conversation, because filmmakers have to have enough money to engage screenwriters long enough for us to sit with the story longer and write them better. You can’t give a writer two weeks to write a script or not pay them enough to not take any other writing jobs to survive and complain they missed something…of course they did…you would too. Some writers need to bring more excellence to their craft, but most of the problem with the quality of our scripts in Nollywood is money.”
In recent years, Nollywood has improved, but it still has a long way to go. Writers want compensation; they also deserve more time and credit. When writers are not treated well, audiences notice it in the quality of the project, and even as we enter the age of AI, it is clear it can never replace the mind of a creative human.
