Weaver Of Tales

Versatile, creative and oozing talent – Akin Omotoso is making his mark in the movie business.

- Shanaaz Prince

HE’S been an actor, writer, producer and director and if you ask him which discipline he loves the most, he wouldn’t be able to choose. Because for him they all boil down to one thing – telling a story. That’s what he really loves.

Akin Omotoso is good at it too. The romantic comedy Tell Me Sweet Something, which he co-wrote and directed, raked in more than R2 million at the box office and won the award for best narrative feature at the BlackStar Film Festival in Philadelphia in the US last year.

His newest film, Vaya, which tells the story of three strangers trying to make their way in Johannesburg, was the only South African film to be selected for the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival in Canada.

The movie is set to hit South African screens sometime this year. It’s based on the real-life stories of people living on the streets – some of whom appear in the film – and explores the hard realities of life when you’re not in control of your own destiny, the 42-year-old filmmaker says.

The three strangers find themselves on the same train bound for Johannesburg and arrive full of hope and plans, unprepared for life in the unfamiliar city.

Akin knows what it’s like to arrive in a new place and try to make your way there – he was born and grew up in Nigeria and moved to South Africa with his family at the age of 17.

His father, writer and academic Kole Omotoso, had accepted a job in the English department at the University of the Western Cape and so the family moved to Cape Town.

Akin completed his last year of school at elite boys’ school Bishops and went on to study drama at the University of Cape Town. While his struggles weren’t the same as the characters in Vaya, the themes of new places, expectations and fears struck a chord.