In life, there is no success story without history and that is exactly the tale of a top Yoruba actor, Odunlade Adekola and what he is today.
For him, he started singing right from his childhood because his dad was a choirmaster before he established his own church in Abeokuta, Ogun State. Born into the ministry, Odunlade joined the choir where he developed passion for music. His love for acting later came up.
He then joined Bolaji Amusan aka Mr Latin’s theatre group. At that moment, actor Adekola, Yorubamoviegist.com gathered, was already working at a factory in Obada known as “Ile Ise Awo” where dishes are manufactured.
Finding himself in that condition, Odunlade chose not to relent as he believed so much in himself, combining acting and the factory job. In 2005, he was shortlisted by his boss to play a lead role in one of his blockbuster movies and Odunlade, Yorubamoviegist.com was told, saved his 3 months salaries to buy himself the necessary costumes needed to play the lead character in the said movie, but he was disappointed thereafter at the location when the then rave of the moment outshone him to the role.
The said actor, who had never participated in the rehearsal, was given the lead role to play. Sunday Dagboru as Odunlade Adekola is fondly called couldn’t bear the pains, but burst into tears.
At that point, he was discouraged and almost quit, but for Mr Latin’s advice, which induced him to stay. Away from that, when Odunlade produced his movie where he played the lead role, he was also humiliated by his marketer, who wasn’t happy with the fact that he took the lead role instead of giving it to a star actor, but the movie did well in the market when it was released.
Subsequently, he started getting more movie roles to play. Right now, Adekola is the biggest Yoruba actor at the moment and indeed, the most prominent brand that section of Nollywood has had for a while. It is difficult to mention any actor who is as popular as Odunlade Adekola in Nollywood let alone a more prominent name in the Yoruba sector of the movie industry in Nigeria.
He is easily in the frontline when any compilation of the list of those dictating the pace in the Yoruba movie industry is compiled. Though, he joined the Association of Nigeria Theatre Arts Practitioners and was under the tutelage of the late actor and producer, Isola Durojaiye better known as Alasari in 1996, but he started to be noticed in 2005.
Known as a jack-of-all-trades as far as movie production is concerned, Odunlade seemingly excels in all: scripting, producing, directing, sound-track and starring in several films over the years. As everyone who has achieved a measure of greatness, he did not achieve the feat on a platter of gold. He earned it by being humble and ready to learn, paying utmost attention to details and riding the waves of determination all the way.
For him, it was a long road to stardom, but not many are aware of the several years he had spent to understudy more prominent figures before exploding on the scene in due time. His image looms so large that he earned an ambassadorial deal from several multinational companies including Glo
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