The Importance of Location Managers and Real Estate Agents in Nolllywood and the Film Industry

Photo credit:  http://www.tadejznidarcic.com/nollywood

The Importance of Location Managers and Real Estate Agents in Nolllywood and the Film Industry

There is no film or TV production without a location manager. And every location manager needs the service of real estate agents in locating the appropriate and suitable locations for a film or TV production.

As already known:"The location manager handles the creative side of finding appropriate locations, but they also handle the logistics needed to make that location work, like paying the property owners, securing permits, and alerting neighbors about the film shoot. The location manager reports to the production designer, but collaborates frequently with the director. The location manager oversees and hires the entire location department."

Photo credit: Ekenyerengozi Michael Chima. Lagos in Motion. 2016.

The real estate agents help the location managers to secure the required property of lands and buildings from the property owners, facility managers and permits for shooting at particular locations.

Real estate includes the land along with any permanent improvements attached to the land, whether natural or man-made—including water, trees, minerals, buildings, homes, fences, and bridges.  

Photo credit:  http://www.tadejznidarcic.com/nollywood.

Real estate agents in Nigeria have not realized that they are important to the production of movies, TV series, documentaries and music videos and they can contribute a lot to the advancement of Nollywood and the Nigerian film industry. They should have regular communication with location managers, production managers, production designers, producers and directors in film and TV productions.

Bankable stars in Nolllywood build or buy houses worth millions of naira.

The importance of real estate in Nolllywood and the Nigerian film industry can also be seen in gentrification. Gentrification in urban studies means the renovation and transformation of a neighborhood, previously occupied by the lower class to suit the tastes of the middle or upper class. (Atkinson and Bridge, 2005, smith 1996). It can also be seen as a lens through which to examine a variety of intersecting phenomena in a city or neighborhood context. (Lees et.al, 2008); which can be seen in various Nigerian movies and TV series showing the social class hierarchy of the Nigerian society with the actors playing personalities in the middle class and upper class either living in, building or acquiring palatial mansions and those in rags to riches stories shown relocating from the ghettos to upscale neighborhoods to keep up with the Joneses. In fact, several bankable stars in Nolllywood are often seen announcing acquiring new mansions or building houses on different locations in Nigeria and others have become brand ambassadors of popular real estate companies.

- By Jaiyesimi Olamide Yusuf,

Senior Features Editor, NOLLYWOOD MIRROR®Series.