Fagunwa’s Ireke Onibudo now on video

By the end of this year’s edition of the Chams Theatre series, which is featuring D.O. Fagunwa’s,  Ireke Onibudo, theatre goers in Nigeria will be sure to have the epic novel put on video format for posperity .

Ireke Onibudo is one of the five Fagunwa’s novels that is to be dramatized in English and Yoruba in the yearly Chams Theatre series, initiated last year by Chams Plc, an Information Technology company.

Sources close to the initiators disclosed that plans are underway to capture the epic novel on video, shortly after the performances which will be flagged off on  November 7, in four cities of Lagos, Ibadan, Abuja and Akure. Though the video CD said the  source, will not be for sale.

The theatre series, conceived as a strategic intervention and contribution to reawaken the stage culture in Nigeria by the IT solutions company, was flagged off last year, with theatrical adaptations of Fagunwa’s Ogboju Ode Ninu Igbo Irunmale by Professor Femi Osofisan and Akinwumi Isola.

Following the  resounding success recorded during the maiden outing, Chams  Plc  has deemed it necessary to commence this year’s edition with another stage performance of Fagunwa’s classic, “Ireke Onibudo.”

At a press preview of the English adaptation at the Performing Arts Theatre of the University of Ibadan penultimate Friday, the selected audience, comprising the  media, students and lecturers, enjoyed the opportunity of watching  the performance   enriched  in tradition and theatrical innuendoes.

The 3-hour performance brought back memories of the good old days of  live theatre in Nigeria to the audience.

Ireke Onibudo, which deals with the adventures of an eponymous hero, Ireke Onibudo, according to Femi Osofisan, who is the playwright for the English adaptation, The Fabulous Adventures of the Sugarcane Man,  is another of these grand parables about man’s perennial search for love, felicity, and contentment. The great novelist, he noted, showed  that through perseverance and fidelity to one’s dreams, one can succeed in finding them.

“Fagunwa in this book, therefore places more emphasis on exploring the capabilities of the ordinary man, and woman in the grim struggle for survival that we can have to face every day. That’s why perhaps, instead of magical stunts, what we have for the most part are a succession of fables, folk-tales and animal stories , each of which presents a paradigm of our human condition,” Osofisan stated.

Professor  Osofisan is also the coordinator of the Chams Theatre Series, while Professor Akinwunmi Isola writes the Yoruba  adaptation, which retains the book title, Ireke Onibudo.

In an address presented by the  Chams Plc Managing Director, Mr. Demola Aladekomo, which was read by the company secretary,  Mr. Idowu Logile, Aladekomo restated the  commitment of his company to the sponsorship of the live theatrical performances to rejuvenate theatre and the arts in the country.

He remarked that Chams Plc has concluded plans to extend the number of shows from seven, last year,  11 this year in response to popular demand.