Kofi Asamoah
Unlike the many persons lamenting bitterly on the negative effects of telenovelas on our local films, Kofi Asamoah, boss of Kofas Media, believes those foreign series are rather beneficial to the Ghanaian movie industry.
According to the hottest producer of the moment, telenovelas are no threat to Ghana’s film industry, neither can they compete with any local content. They rather serve as a challenge for producers to step up their game.
“Telenovelas are good for the movie industry, because it throws a challenge to film makers and helps us identify what people want on the market. It has now given us the indication that, Ghanaians love to watch drama or romantic novels. The challenge and onus therefore lies on us to produce something similar to match up this demand or desire,” Kofi Asamoah said in an interview with Flex newspaper.
“No matter how many people watch them, telenovelas are not a threat to the industry at all. Their content can in no way compete with our local content, because we give viewers content they can associate with. How many scenarios or situations in these telenovelas can we even relate to as Ghanaians?” he quizzed.
Kofas further noted that, people compare telenovelas which come in episodes and run for an hour everyday to our local drama series, which probably air once a week, and that is why the former is currently enjoying massive patronage. “These telenovelas are not really that super nice, but their patronage is high because it’s always in the faces of people on our TV screens, hence the addiction. Our weakness lies in we not being able to produce such number of episodes viewers long for and we don’t even have that kind of budget for a novel on TV,” the Amakye & Dede producer added.
In his final words, Kofi Asamoah however called on the National Media Commission to ensure that, telenovelas are not shown at the detriment of local contents on every TV station, in order to motivate producers to do more. Kofas Media’s audition for new talents was a success and it had over 700 aspiring actors on the day. They are currently adding finishing touches to their forthcoming TV series titled No Yawa, which would be aired on UTV very soon.
Plan of introducing Ghana’s first ever weekly TV series is also underway in the camp of Kofas Media. They will call it ‘TelenoGhana’ so Telenovela fanatics should keep their fingers crossed.
