First of all, let me make it clear that I respect both Martha Ankomah and Lydia Forson for their talent—therefore using their unfortunate situations as a case study does not have any element of contempt.
I met Martha Ankomah somewhere last year at Alisa Hotel, Accra and she was full of positive energy and smiles. Similarly, Lydia Forson has a great personality and an extensive realistic view on several world issues, though some are unnecessarily entrenched. I have had some great conversations with her in the past and as a Nigerian will say ‘I respect her hustle’.
Now that the above has been made clear, let’s look at how our actors/actresses can make the best out of their talent, passion and craft without falling into the African disease pot of “being everywhere but known for nothing great”.
The Over-commercialization of Martha Ankomah Being a Taint on Her Talent
If you’ve seen any of Martha Ankomah’s movies, you would notice that despite the fact that she is always surrounded by several talentless actors/actresses, her raw excellence consistently stands out.
Martha Ankomah is a great actress at the raw state and needed rough edge touches by some of the great Directors who have clear understanding of film-making but she couldn’t wait for this to happen. She couldn’t say ‘NO’ to some of the most senseless scripts and literally took up every offer that came her way.
We are seeing the end result today, which is; Martha Ankomah has countless movies to her but none does justice to her immense talent. She is not regarded in any different light; she is just like the many ‘can’t act’ actresses we see on our screens daily.
Over-commercialization has killed her talent, vision and the chance of becoming one of Ghana’s greatest.
I am sure she has over 100 movies to her name but which one can we remember as a great piece?