Translating telenovelas to Twi good – Socrates

The emerging trend where telenovelas on Ghanaian television are being translated into Twi is good for the movie industry, movie producer Socrates Sarfo has said.

According to him, translating Mexican and Indian soap operas into Twi comes at a cost which will in the near future force stakeholders in the industry to rather ask for the script of these television series and reproduce them with Ghanaian actors to enhance the movie industry.

Speaking on Entertainment Capital on Accra100.5FM on Saturday 11 March, he described the trend as “hopeful” for the Ghanaian movie industry.

“I see a good trend coming up in terms of the telenovelas. Now we have started translating them into Twi, which I think is a good sign. I see hope there, hope in the sense that they have realised people enjoy the telenovelas in the local context or Twi language, and translating them into Twi is expensive. So, for example, if you buy the content for $1000 and the Twi translation also costs you $1000, you ask yourself what the patrons like: ‘Is it the Twi or the story?’ and it’s the story. So I see a future soon where the scripts will rather be picked and we will re-enact it locally so the format will change,” he told show host Bismark Boachie (DJ Premier).

Recently, actress Christiana Awuni, speaking on the same show, had said she would back calls for government to place an “embargo” on the broadcast of telenovelas as it posed a threat to the movie industry.