Comedian, actor and movie producer, Ayo Makun, more popularly known as AY, has sealed a movie production deal with Huawen Movie Group in China for his
Comedian, actor and movie producer, Ayo Makun, more popularly known as AY, has sealed a movie production deal with Huawen Movie Group in China for his next movie, ‘30 Days in China’.
The movie is part of AY’s comedy franchise, which includes ’30 days in Atlanta’ and ‘10 days in Sun City,’ where he films adventures in different countries.
The deal, which is aimed to produce the first major China-Nigeria film, also comes on the heels of the stand-up comedian’s works on ‘Merry Men: The Real Yoruba Demons’ which is set to premiere next month.
Moses Babatope, a co-founder of FilmOne Entertainment who accompanied AY to the meeting in China said that the Chinese collaboration will open up Nollywood to China’s colossal cinema-going audience and enable them to create better quality movies.
“We will be exposed to a lucrative and moving Chinese film market. It’s like skipping many hurdles and getting access to an existing mature market. The idea of the partnership is that beyond their willingness and their interest in Africa is their capacity. Huahua has the equipment, we visited their facility in China and we are going to be accessing that. Collaborations like this will enhance our filmmaking craft,” Babatope said.
The reason for this collaboration between China and Nigeria, is not far fetched. China has now passed France, India and the United States as Africa’s largest trading partner, with billions of dollars invested in various sectors of the economy. In 2018, the volume of Chinese trade in Africa was $204bn according to China’s ministry of commerce. Now the world’s second largest movie market is turning its sights to one of the world’s most prolific film industries, which churns out thousands of mostly straight-to-DVD films a year.
