The Sunday News
Bruce Ndlovu, Sunday Life Reporter
THE Lenni Mdawini-Sibanda written and directed film, Liabilities of Love, is set to make its debut on Sunday night on Zambezi Magic, with the debut of the flick set to be the multi-talented Noma “Lady Tshawe” Damasane’s breakthrough role on TV, as it is the first time the actress will play a leading role on a small screen production.
The film will kick off the channel’s Zambezi Magic Movie Festival season, with a new flick made by some of the continent’s best filmmakers making a debut every Sunday evening at 6 PM on DStv channel 162.
Despite her acclaim as one of the city’s most well rounded and versatile theatre actresses, thespian cum poet Lady Tshwane has yet to showcase her talents to a wider audience on TV, something that may yet change with the première of her debut starring role movie appearance this Sunday.
In an interview with Sunday Life, Lady Tshawe said that the transition from stage to screen had been a challenge, as despite her experience on stage she was a relative novice in front of the camera.
“The experience was a bit different and difficult for me because I am used to theatre and this was first time doing something for the small screen. I’ve done some stuff in front of the camera before but this was my first time as a leading character. It took me a while to adjust to the format that is required by TV. In theatre, everything that you do is live and has been rehearsed beforehand. Even if you make a mistake, because it is live you roll with it and make it a part of the act,” she said.
Lady Tshawe said she had to dig deep to pull off Samu, the character that she portrays in the film.
“In TV things are different. If there is a mistake, you cut and if there’s a need for a different angle you also cut. So, it means that you have to rediscover the same emotion for one scene perhaps 10 times if that’s how many times it takes to shoot the scene. There is just the camera and you can’t feed off the energy of the audience because there’s none watching you,” she said.
Despite the challenges she faced, Lady Tshawe said that she hoped that her romance with the small screen would not be a brief fling, as she felt she still had more still left to showcase.
“It was a difficulty (acting in front of the camera) that I embraced and a difficulty that I enjoyed. I love movies and I enjoy films and I had to go back to people that I looked up to and learn how they also navigated this. If given another opportunity to do something on camera again I would do it. Of course, the techniques involved in acting for the stage and acting for the camera are different but I enjoyed it all the same,” she said.
The film’s director and writer, Mdawini-Sibanda, said everyday conversations with young people had sparked the idea of doing the flick.
“This is a film about internet dating and how it affects young people, more specifically young people in the workplace. It is focused on the young working class and things like online dating and dating in the workplace and how they’re often not prepared for the consequences of what that entails.
“The idea of the film itself came out of my interactions with young working people and what they go through in their everyday lives because of their online activities and interactions. Basically, from them I got the impression that they’re usually not prepared for the consequences of online dating and its related vices,” he said.
The director said he realised that the lives of young African people in the digital age were a subject that was rarely tackled in Zimbabwean film, hence the desire to do something that touched the subject.
“What I realised about the Zimbabwean film industry is that there are not a lot of productions that deal with issues like cyber bullying and online dating. There are few films that tackle the lifestyles of young people in this digital age and how it affects their lives. Yet this technology is all around us,” he said.
