The legendary Jerry Mofokeng wa Makhetha is one of the few people who are in the industry that are allowed to question and critic the status quo.
The annual South African Film and Television Awards (SAFTA) took place this past weekend, and they were held at the Gallagher Convention Centre in Johannesburg.
While accepting an award with fellow Scandal actors, the 67-year old Jerry couldn’t bite his tongue, and took one for anyone and everyone without a voice in the entertainment industry, all while expressing his unhappiness about the casting of influencers just because of social media following.
In the speech he said: “Cast actors, not models. It’s not about the number of followers you have. It’s about the craft that you bring to the set”.
Taking to his Instagram page to further elaborate his speech with a picture that captioned the moment from the award ceremony, he captioned his post by writing: You get on set ready to rehearse. The influencer arrives 2-hours late and it’s no issue. They saunter into the dressing room and then the makeup artists have to work around the phone that is glued to their hand. They finally get on set and the director has to be careful not to cross them. The producers and the channel must always be happy.”
“The scene is blocked and you feature prominently when they are not in a close-up. Then the cherry on the cake is when you are told to tone-down your acting because you are not number 1 on the call sheet. You dare not upstage or upset the ‘Lead’. This is not an exaggeration. Acting is like playing a tennis game. It’s a give and take. The more you give to your fellow actor, the more they give you – the more you challenge each other. Then the magic happens. It’s painful to play against a wall.”- he added to his post.
In his comments section, he had a lot of fellow actors expressing that they share the same sentiments with him, such as Nthati Moshesh who said: It needed to be said out loud. Thank you ntate Jerry
” and Lorcia Cooper who said: “This means the world Ntate and the truth cannot be denied. Thank you for saying it.”
Makhetha revealed to Drum that the speech was not at all planned.
“Scandal had won the first award and Grace went to collect it. When Scandal won the next award, I decided to go up there because I felt that I am also part of the Scandal family. When the young people were done, they gave me the mic and I just said it, completely unplanned. Something that occupies your heart can come out just like that,” he says.
He added that he hopes he does not lose jobs after this, but it is an important issue to be addressed.
Noticed how true this is? Most TV shows hire models with a lot of followers than actual actors/actresses who studied hard for this, it’s sad. pic.twitter.com/30S7EpYgjO
— Rumani® (@RealMrumaDrive) October 1, 2023
Main Image: SNL24
The post Jerry Mofokeng wa Makhetha calls out South African directors in his SAFTA’s speech appeared first on Entertainment News South Africa.
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