Veteran thespian Ayo Adesanya while taking her turn on Memoir of a Naija Girl, provided her estimation on why a lot of veteran stars are broke and end up begging for funds.
Ayo Adesanya said: In the movie world when you’re getting to a certain age, possibly maybe because you’re no longer that relevant, people hardly remember to call you to come and work. Because of the kind of work I do, you must be invited.
It’s a trade. When your light is out there for people to see, everybody comes. People who want to come and trade with you will come. They’ll call you “we want you to come and be a part of this project, come and read, come and do this, come and do that.” At some point when you’re not so agile, people tend to forget that this person is still in the industry.
So because they don’t remember, these particular set of people get forgotten and when you don’t work, you can’t do anything for yourself. How will you be able to pay your medical fees when you don’t work? And asides that people have this notion that because it’s Nollywood, it’s big. But how much are we getting paid? That’s another thing, it’s not as if we make money.
We make fame, we don’t make money. But then it is now left for you to use that fame and turn it to money. When you get all these brand deals, ambassadorships, you’re already a brand so you sell that brand to work with others to sell. It’s very lonely.
Contrary to what people think that as a celebrity you have the whole world, you can just snap a finger and you can just get whatever you want, it is very very lonely. Because people assume so much. People just assume your world is fun, your world is lively. Everything boils down to you to know how to live your life so that it doesn’t become boring, it doesn’t become lonely. It’s lonely but people don’t know.