It’s no secret that, along with South Africa and Nigeria, Kenya is right up there as one of the biggest producers of content in Africa’s entertainment and media landscape. As stated in the PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Africa Entertainment and Media Outlook 2023-2027 report, Kenya’s entertainment industry (including cinema, OTT, TV etc) revenue grew 9.8% in 2022 and is worth over $2 billion.



“I would say the film space in Kenya has really grown. Even if you look at TV, we have a lot of different shows,” says Kenyan actor Sarah Hassan.



“Looking at what there is, is a testament to the growth of the industry… We still have a long way to go, but we are moving in the right direction.”



This is especially true with the continued reinforce- ment of local post-production facilities and expanding financing. However, the sustainability of the film industry requires the formation of local ecosystems rather than relying on external support.



According to Tanzanian filmmaker Amil Shivji, factors such as limited infrastructure, low government support at times, and limited exposure to the global film world, is what has prevented the rise of the industry in East Africa.


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="alignleft is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="682" height="1024" src="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/IMG_2734-682x1024.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-62889" style="width:449px;height:auto" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/IMG_2734-682x1024.jpg 682w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/IMG_2734-200x300.jpg 200w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/IMG_2734-768x1152.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/IMG_2734-1024x1536.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/IMG_2734.jpg 1333w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 682px) 100vw, 682px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption">(Image Supplied)</figcaption></figure></div>


“Unlike our fellows in Nigeria, South Africa or in North Africa, I think East Africa hasn’t really had an in- dustry as such. There has been a lot of volume of films; Tanzania makes close to 2,000 films a year but none of those films travel. Those films don’t cross borders. And I think we are relegated to choosing between two or three platforms for distribution,” Shivji adds.



However, as a writer, director and producer who has also lobbied for better film policies, Shivji says there are opportunities that come with not being so visible as an industry.



“The exciting thing about not having the formal struc- tures of an industry is that we get to pave our own path and redefine what an industry can look like. We can look towards Hollywood, Bollywood and Nollywood and see



the things that we like and don’t like… Make them make sense for us in Tanzania. I think that’s the advantage of not having things structured in stone yet and, for us, as Tanzanian filmmakers, to play around with and devise our own stance of an industry.”



“We have everything needed to make a good industry,” Rwandan actor Eliane Umuhire tells FORBES AFRICA. “But the only thing missing is the means, not only from the government, but also from the private sector.”



Filmmakers in East Africa are now able to live on online revenue gen- erated from their work. This is more prevalent in Rwanda, Ethiopia and Kenya, according to a 2021 UNESCO report. Furthermore, the report shows that in countries like Kenya and Rwanda, female representation has increased by 30%, both in front of the camera and behind the scenes. “In Rwanda, we are a country that has 62% of women in parliament. So, having women represented [in the film industry] has never been a question. Also, growing up and choosing to be an actress, I’ve never felt the need to fight to prove that I can be an artist as a woman because even the people who taught me, who took me under their wings to train me as an actress, were women,” adds Umuhire.



This is also evident in storytelling.



In 2016, David Oyelowo starred alongside Kenyan actor Lupita Nyong’o in the Disney drama, Queen of Katwe. The movie depicts the life of a young girl, Phiona (portrayed by Madina Nalwanga), battling the odds in Uganda until she becomes a leading chess player under the guid- ance of Robert Katende (played by Oyelowo).


<div class="wp-block-image">
<figure class="aligncenter size-large"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="683" src="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/GettyImages-613632918-1-1024x683.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-62891" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/GettyImages-613632918-1-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/GettyImages-613632918-1-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/GettyImages-613632918-1-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/GettyImages-613632918-1-1536x1025.jpg 1536w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/GettyImages-613632918-1-2048x1366.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /><figcaption class="wp-element-caption"> Lupita Nyong&#8217;o and David Oyelowo attend the gala screening of &#8216;Queen Of Katwe&#8217; (Photo by Jeff Spicer/Getty Images for Disney)</figcaption></figure></div>


Oyelowo recalls how “there was pressure from people” who attempt- ed to make his character the lead in the story. But he and director Mira Nair pushed to making Phiona the main protagonist.



“Then that story becomes universal because little girls are looking at this girl in the story become the hero and aspire to be that,” Oyelowo adds. “Hollywood is looking to Africa because they are doing prequels and sequels and everything, and we have fresh stories coming out of Af- rica.” “My dream is to see our artists live out their arts as any other person would in any other country, and seeing more of our stories on our TV screens,” Umuhire says. “Our children need that. They deserve to see their culture celebrated. They deserve to see themselves represented, so that they can dream that for themselves.”

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East Africa’s Tinseltown Boasts Its Own Creative Narrative

The five top-earning Oscar nominated actors earned a combined $41 million over the past 12 months—less than half the $87.5 million the Rock made last year as the world’s highest-paid actor.



Make art or make money — that’s been the conundrum for A-list actors going back to the days of the first talkies. And unlike the tumult that has rocked the movie business in the past year, that is one Hollywood tradition that has remained entrenched and unmovable.&nbsp;&nbsp;



The five top-earning Oscar nominated actors this year made a combined $41 million over the past 12 months—less than half of the $87.5 million&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/maddieberg/2020/08/11/the-highest-paid-actors-of-2020-dwayne-johnson-ryan-reynolds/?sh=2daa50ec112b">the highest-paid actor</a>&nbsp;Dwayne Johnson (The Rock) earned last year. Only one of them, Viola Davis, made last year’s lists of top-earning actors or&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/maddieberg/2020/10/02/the-highest-paid-actresses-2020-small-screen-stars-like-sofia-vergara-ellen-pompeo-and-elisabeth-moss-shine/">actresses</a>, and it was thanks to her television role on&nbsp;How To Get Away With Murder, not her nominated starturn in&nbsp;Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom.



“In a world where accomplished performers have decent choices, the material and the talented director often mean more than the money,” says Ken Ziffren, a partner at leading entertainment law firm Ziffren Brittenham. “To get nominated, even though they may not win, by SAG or for the Oscars, can also materially improve economics in the future.”&nbsp;&nbsp;



The top-earning Oscar contender, Sacha Baron Cohen, illustrates the dichotomy between the popular and the films deemed award-worthy. He is nominated for two Academy Awards on Sunday night: One for his role as political activist Abbie Hoffman in the drama The Trial of the Chicago 7, andthe other for writing the adapted screenplay for Borat Subsequent Moviefilm, a sequel to the hit 2006 comedy, Borat, which Amazon acquired for $80 million. 



The statuettes he’s up for may look the same, but the money he made doing the two films couldn’t be more different: He earned about $20 million for&nbsp;Borat —&nbsp;twenty times the $1 million he received for&nbsp;Trial.&nbsp;The yawning pay discrepancy illustrates the choice that industry players have had to make for decades: do a big-budget blockbuster for fat cash or a prestige film for acclaim and, less cynically, the love of the craft. In rare cases, as with&nbsp;Borat, the two can overlap, but more often than not, the performers vying for an Oscar aren’t taking those roles for the money.



That said, an Oscar win is often the right mix of publicity and validation to help increase future earnings potential. Take Angelina Jolie, who was&nbsp;<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/maddieberg/2020/10/02/the-highest-paid-actresses-2020-small-screen-stars-like-sofia-vergara-ellen-pompeo-and-elisabeth-moss-shine/">the world’s second highest-paid actress</a>&nbsp;last year with $35.5 million in earnings. Prior to her Academy Award-winning performance in&nbsp;Girl, Interrupted, Jolie had mainly acted in independent films that failed to garner a wide audience—or big paychecks. Her supporting actress win in 1999 changed her fortunes: She landed the titular character in the 2001 video-game inspired adventure film&nbsp;Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.&nbsp;By 2004, she was commanding $10 million per role, plus backend, for big budget flicks, and that number has only gone up since.&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;estimates she received $20 million for her recent starturn in&nbsp;Maleficent 2.&nbsp;More recently, 20016 Oscar winner Brie Larson moved on from smaller budget fare to join the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Captain Marvel. Her first starturn as the superhero, 2019’s&nbsp;Captain Marvel, was the first female-led superhero film to gross over $1 billion at the box office.&nbsp;Forbes&nbsp;estimates she made more than $10 million in total for the film.&nbsp;



Here’s a look at this year’s Oscar paydays:



<h2 class="has-text-align-center wp-block-heading" id="h-5-daniel-kaluuya-3-million">#5 | Daniel Kaluuya: $3 million</h2>



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1313212178-1024x576.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-50907" width="622" height="349" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1313212178-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1313212178-300x169.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1313212178-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1313212178-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1313212178-2048x1152.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 622px) 100vw, 622px" /><figcaption> (Photo by GALECA.org/via Getty Images)</figcaption></figure></div>



After earning his first Oscar nomination in 2018 for starring in Get Out, Kaluuya is the favorite to win the award for best supporting actor this year for his role in Judas and the Black Messiah. While he and co-star LaKeith Stanfield earned the same amount of money for their work on the project, Kaluuya collected an extra check for an XBox ad based on his Get Out role.



<h2 class="has-text-align-center wp-block-heading" id="h-4-glenn-close-4-5-million">#4 | Glenn Close: $4.5 million</h2>



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1310835879-1024x576.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-50908" width="690" height="388" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1310835879-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1310835879-300x169.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1310835879-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1310835879-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1310835879-2048x1152.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 690px) 100vw, 690px" /><figcaption>. (Photo by 27th Annual SAG Awards/Getty Images for WarnerMedia)</figcaption></figure></div>



While Hillbilly Elegy may have failed to be a critical favorite as Netflix hoped, one of the film’s stars, Glenn Close, still got her Oscar nomination. Fees for the eight-time Oscar nominee and her co-star Amy Adams likely commanded about 10% of the film’s $45 million budget. Indie flick Four Good Days also contributed to her payday.



<h2 class="has-text-align-center wp-block-heading" id="h-3-chadwick-boseman-5-million">#3 | Chadwick Boseman: $5 million</h2>



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/GettyImages-915935210-1024x683.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-47417" width="741" height="494" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/GettyImages-915935210-1024x683.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/GettyImages-915935210-scaled-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/GettyImages-915935210-scaled-600x400.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/GettyImages-915935210-768x512.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/GettyImages-915935210-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/GettyImages-915935210-2048x1365.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 741px) 100vw, 741px" /><figcaption> (Photo by Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images for Disney)</figcaption></figure></div>



The late star, who died in August 2020 from colon cancer at age 43, worked until his final days and was nominated for his portrayal of Levee, an ambitious horn player in Ma Rainney’s Black Bottom, which was released posthumously. A certified commercial star after his role as T’Challa in Black Panther, this is his first Academy Award nomination. Boseman also collected a check for a supporting role in Spike Lee’s Da 5 Bloods. 



<h2 class="has-text-align-center wp-block-heading" id="h-2-viola-davis-7-million">#2 | Viola Davis: $7 million</h2>



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1311362100-1024x576.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-50909" width="661" height="371" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1311362100-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1311362100-300x169.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1311362100-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1311362100-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1311362100-2048x1152.jpg 2048w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 661px) 100vw, 661px" /><figcaption>. (Photo by AAFCA 2021 via Getty Images)</figcaption></figure></div>



Davis can command top dollar for buzzy television roles—like that of Annalise Keating in How to Get Away with Murder—and her L’Oreal campaign but takes smaller checks for passion projects. That said, after winning an Oscar in 2017 for her last role in another August Wilson adaptation, Fences, she was likely able to negotiate a raise for her nominated role in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom. Forbes estimates her paycheck for that film to be $3 million. 



<h2 class="has-text-align-center wp-block-heading" id="h-1-sacha-baron-cohen-22-million">#1 | Sacha Baron Cohen: $22 Million</h2>



<div class="wp-block-image"><figure class="aligncenter size-large is-resized"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1312531620-1024x576.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-50910" width="717" height="403" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1312531620-1024x576.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1312531620-300x169.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1312531620-768x432.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1312531620-1536x864.jpg 1536w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/GettyImages-1312531620.jpg 1920w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 717px) 100vw, 717px" /><figcaption> (Photo by The Hollywood Reporter LLC via Getty Images)</figcaption></figure></div>



Amazon reportedly shelled out more than $70 million for the mockumentary Borat Subsequent Moviefilm, and as the star, producer and writer, Baron Cohen got an impressive cut of the profits. For Aaron Sorkin’s highbrow drama about the trial of a group of Vietnam War protesters accused of inciting riots during the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, meanwhile, “everyone worked for a fraction of what they are usually paid,” one top entertainment agent said.



METHODOLOGY: The earnings above are pretax and fees, and reflect all projects that have been released in the past 12 months. Earnings estimates are based on data from MRC Data, Box Office Mojo and IMDB, as well as interviews with industry insiders



By Madeline Berg, Forbes Staff



By Dawn Chmielewski, Forbes Staff

Tag: Entertain

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

East Africa’s Tinseltown Boasts Its Own Creative Narrative

The Highest-Paid Oscar Nominees 2021