The Film Blog: We’re not sure about First Stars

For all of the problems Nollywood has (and has had,) a lack of raw talent is at the bottom of the list. Perhaps a bigger problem might be turning that talent into a considerable degree of competence. But, and as is the case with practically every industry, the biggest problem facing talent in Nollywood, is getting connected with opportunity.

Enter First Stars, a Reality TV show that attempts to solve both problems (albeit on a fairly small scale) at once. Sponsored by (you guessed it) First Bank, it’s only the latest in a gaggle of Nigerian banks dipping their toes in the film and television business in some form or the other. The premise is simple enough – audition a hoard of young hopefuls, whittle them down to a select few, place them on TV to battle it out every week to remain in the competition. We’ve seen American Idol, we know how this stuff goes. We’ve seen how “Idol” shined with contestants lighting the stage on fire, singing their hearts out to millions of viewers night after night.

We’ve also seen the Voice take this and ramp it up, adding battle rounds that featured contestants singing both with, and against each other, regularly slipping into vocal hysteria as they attempted to outdo each other with as many belts and high notes as could be packed into under 3 minutes.

But for the “emotional journey of ‘passion’ and ‘people’,” (two core values of FirstBank, by the way) First Starts purports to take the viewer on, that appears to be the most glaring deficiency of the show. Or in the design of the show, because, singing shows aside, any reality show about movie-making was bound to be lacking in the spectacle that has come to be expected of the genre.

Movies might be magic, but the making of that magic isn’t as entertaining a process to watch. Even more so in a clime when reality competitions appear to be dying out. American Idol, for example, wrapped up its final season in April of this year. Even before that, the last few seasons saw an increased focus on drama between the judges, (launching a bitter feud between Mariah Carey and Nicki Minaj that persists till this day) because there was simply very little left about the actual competition that hadn’t been seen.

Which of course brings us to the judges, on panels made up of a healthy mix of “old” and “new” Nollywood (classifications which, by the way, we seriously need to come together as an audience to rethink those classifications,) including Omotola Jalade-Ekeinde, Iretiola Doyle, Deyemi Okanlawon, Tolu Ajayi, Theo Lawson, Tosin Otudeko and Walter Taylaur.

If nothing else, it’s served as a reminder of the great talent we’ve always had.

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