There is a great divide in the Ghanaian movie industry and this became more evident prior to the last Ghana Movie Awards when the local dialect actors ‘Kumawood actors’, threatened to boycott the event. Some Twi actors since and after the awards have complained bitterly about how some of their ‘counterparts’, the English speaking actors treat them especially at public events. Some mentioned that the English speaking actors tend to embarrass them when they even get close to them.
The Ghana Movie Industry is one industry running on different dialects. It doesn’t matter to me if an actor belongs to Kumawood or Gollywood, they’re all part of the creative industry. The fact that somebody speaks English in his/her field and another speaks Twi in his/her field does not make one better than the other.
When I read this report in Graphic Showbiz, it was like reading about two different countries competing against each other. The actors who complained about the excessive snobbish behaviour of some English actors were, Kwaku Manu, Akrobeto and Salinco.
Kwaku Manu mentioned that on several occasions, he had tried chatting with some of the English-speaking glamour-type actors at events and the responses he had received were rather chilly, quoting him: “As though those of us who act in Twi are second-rate.”
Citing an example of one of such embarrassing as the 2011 Ghana Movie Awards, he said, he personally approached three English-speaking actors in a conversation and their reaction suggested that they did not recognise him as a colleague actor. The actor also mentioned that on another occasion, Nana Ama McBrown introduced him to some English-speaking actors at an event and he experienced a similar humiliation. “I get the impression that they see themselves as better than us and therefore look down on us” he said.
