Mama Africa
Miriam Makeba was the first African to win a Grammy. This documentary about her won the Audience Prize at Berlin.
It’s easy to see why triple Oscar nominee Cynthia Erivo (Wicked) wants to play South African singer and activist Miriam Makeba.
Miriam was the first African to win a Grammy. She sang for John F. Kennedy and Marlon Brando. She performed with Nina Simone, Harry Belafonte and Dizzy Gillespie. She married five times, including legendary South African trumpeter Hugh Masekela and activist Stokely Carmichael, who popularised the phrase “Black power.” She pleaded in the United Nations for sanctions against Apartheid.
She paid a high price for her beliefs. She had her South African citizenship revoked after appearing in an anti-Apartheid documentary, Come Back, Africa. After marrying Stokely, she was effectively cancelled by mainstream America, with the couple moving to Guinea.
By any standards, she was a remarkable woman who lived an extraordinary life.
She’s celebrated in Mika Kaurismäki’s feature documentary, Mama Africa, which won the Audience Award at Berlin.
The documentary was the idea of South African co-screenwriter and co-producer Don Edkins, who was developing it with Makeba when she died in 2008, at 76. Edkins was also behind the Why Democracy? anthology, which included the Oscar-winning Taxi to the Dark Side.
“Riveting subject matter, terrific music and engaging interviewees”
Jonathan Romney, Screen International
South Africa | 2011 | 1 hr 30
Next month, Cynthia Erivo will be in Cape Town to star as Miriam in The Road Home, the first STUDIOCANAL film to shoot in South Africa since the CANAL+ acquisition of MultiChoice.
The SA film industry has strong opinions about the R300 million project, which is set against the backdrop of Paul Simon’s Grammy-winning 1986 album, Graceland.
Oscar nominee Guy Pearce (The Brutalist) will play Archbishop Trevor Huddleston, who launched a boycott against Paul over the album, which he said violated the United Nation’s Cultural Boycott. SAFTA nominee Thabo Rametsi (The Silverton Siege, Kalushi) will play Miriam’s husband, Hugh Masekela.
Foreign actors playing local icons is always contentious, even when the role doesn’t require a Hollywood actress to try sing, “Igqira lendlela nguqo ngqothwane.” The budget’s also getting comments, since there’s very little other commissioning on the go currently.
One thing isn’t up for debate though: the strength of the source material - something undeniable by anyone who’s seen Mama Africa or the Emmy-winning Under African Skies.
WANT MORE MAKEBA?
Mandla Dube is launching his version later this year: Miriam Makeba, Voice of Africa.
French singer Jain made a Grammy-winning music video in South Africa to honour her:
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