by Thinus Ferreira
The documentary film Madu, on Sunday 14 December at 21:00 on National Geographic (DStv 191 / StarTimes 220) would be Billy Elliot if this story about a ballet dancing boy were set in England.
And while the 12-year-old Anthony Madu from Lagos in Nigeria does eventually end up in the United Kingdom, Madu is a thoroughly African story, told through an African lens, with a documentary filmmaking imprimatur that fuels the faith every person has that a better future is possible.
Madu, beautifully lensed - with graceful transitions and music befitting a documentary about a boy whose ballet talent takes him from the dusty streets of Lagos to the prestigious Elmhurst Ballet School in Birmingham - has plenty of twists and developments along the way.
It's Covid times! There's an unexpected medical issue! And amidst it all, Madu's documentary eye tracks a boy's dream and escape to a bigger, better and brighter life - through ballet.
The genesis of Madu started when Anthony Madu's video of him doing ballet dancing went viral on social media. The filmmakers realised they needed to jump - uncertain of how the story would unfold, but sure that Anthony would be going places - literally and figuratively.
And they were right.
Through months of filming, using parallel unit crews in both Lagos and Birmingham, and with production coordination through Los Angeles, they managed to capture everything for an extremely compelling and well-told, street-to-stage story that will leave you astounded.
I sat down with Madu directors Matt Ogden and Joel 'Kachi Benson to talk about this perfect film to watch on National Geographic and Disney+ during the Christmas period.
Your cameras captured Madu's acceptance into a ballet school abroad, travelling there and everything that happens there. Can you talk about the challenge of how it all came about and how you managed to act so quickly to be able to start following this story?
Matt Ogden: How it started is that a friend, a producer of mine who actually gave me my first job many years ago as a director and we've worked on projects since then, Jamie Patricof, sent me this video that was posted on social media.
It was of this 11-year-old boy dancing in the rain, barefoot, doing ballet moves.
I just felt something in his body language - this confidence, this passion that he was exuding even in the rain. I wanted to know more. My curiosity as a human and a filmmaker compelled me to go further down the internet rabbit hole and I found him.
'We knew that the kid was
going to go somewhere'
Within a week, I was on a FaceTime with Anthony and his family.
Then I was looking for Nigerian filmmakers to collaborate with and co-direct with, and as soon as I saw Kachi had a short film called Daughters of Chibok, as soon as I saw that, I did a FaceTime or a Zoom with Kachi.
Right away, his story of becoming a documentary filmmaker, to me, mirrored Anthony's story as a ballet dancer. We took it out to market to pitch and Disney saw it.
They and we all felt like "Okay, we know this kid is going to go somewhere. We didn't know it was going to play out - England, the US, Italy, or maybe he never leaves Lagos and just gets to perform on a big stage in downtown Lagos.
But we knew there is a story here. Disney greenlit the project just on act one. It's so rare. They loved the idea.
Joel 'Kachi Benson: Yeah, I mean, you said it so well. We knew that the kid was going to go somewhere. Anthony is an amazing kid with a great story, with so much grit and determination.
We knew he was going to go somewhere. We were so fortunate to have Disney say, "You know what, we'll support you in the making of this".
And around the time he gets the information, the announcement that he's been accepted into the school, it was incredible for us to have been there at that moment to be able to capture him going to England for the first time and getting accepted into Elmhurst Ballet School.
It was beautiful. The ballet gods shone upon him and shone upon us.
So a spoiler alert here, and people reading should come back after having watched Madu on National Geographic or Disney+, or perhaps you're here now because you googled this and wanted the answer.
But a third of the way through Madu, there is this added revelatory discovery that Anthony is basically blind in his right eye.
How did you as documentary filmmakers, react to this additional twist?
Matt Ogden: I'll let Kachi tell it. Kachi, do you remember that moment when we saw it together?
Joel 'Kachi Benson: Yeah, I mean, again, we're making a film that is so intimate, you know. It wasn't a large crew so usually it's the DP's inside filming, and Matt and I are outside on the monitor, just watching.
I remember that Anthony was in a classroom and he kept whispering to himself, "I can't see the board, I can't see the board".
And Matt and I just looked at each other like "What could he be talking about? What's this about?" And Anthony kept saying that. And he went up to the teacher and complained.
With documentary filmmaking, you're documenting real life, so you don't know what life is going to hand to you; you don't know what you're going to get.
This further really deepened the story and also really showed the stuff that the kid was made of.
'We ended up making a film thatwe believe will continueto inspire millions'
Beyond the bullying and the teasing that he had endured in Nigeria, now Anthony comes to this place where there is seeming acceptance and belonging - but now he's confronted with a whole new challenge that is unexpected.
And what does he do? He takes it on, and that really makes him even more lovable. You're rooting for him to succeed. So it was unexpected but we had to accept it, we had to embrace it, embrace the challenge and document it all.
Seeing him having the courage and witnessing him having the courage to speak up and say "I need help" is important in anyone's story.
Matt Ogden: As documentary filmmakers, we always have fear - the fear of uncertainty. We don't know what's going to happen next but you kind of have to embrace it. You have to surrender and let go because it's all, as Kachi says, discovery.
When you become too rigid or too attached to an outcome that you picture in your head, you're not going to be true to the story. If you can surrender and just go with the uncertainty - that's where the magic happens.
It struck me that as difficult as it was for Anthony to succeed despite the circumstances of his location being Africa, it is as difficult to make a documentary in Africa about an African story.
Do you have any reflections on how difficult but worthwhile it is to tackle these endeavours, where you don't know whether it might actually result in something, although you did end up winning an Emmy for Madu.
Joel 'Kachi Benson: I don't think that filming on the continent of Africa the challenges here are peculiar to just here.
I think that every place has its unique challenges. As long as you're documenting real people, with real stories, real emotions, real issues, that could get in the way of your project, there will always be challenges.
It's really about how you navigate these challenges.
There's something that Matt would always say, which is that at the end of the day, it's about what serves the story. What is in the best interest of the story, so when we're confronted with these challenges - whether internal or external - we always ask ourselves, what do we do in the interest of the story?
That always guides our decision-making.
I'm not going to say that there were no challenges but at the end of the day, we ended up making a film that we believe will continue to inspire millions of people across the world to pursue that impossible dream and that's what matters.
How would it have been if we were documenting a kid who was fighting challenges to pursue his dreams and then we gave up?
You had a Nigerian film unit, one in the UK and then Matt you in the US - different time zones and basically a tri-continental type of project. What was it like to keep Madu on track across three continents?
Matt Ogden: Lots of jet lag, lots of coffee, some Red Bull you know, but listen man, we do what we love and Anthony was a joy to work with. The crew, everyone, really believed in the story.
Joel 'Kachi Benson: Sometimes it would be Matt flying from Los Angeles to Lagos to film.
Sometimes it would be myself flying from Lagos to England and then Matt joining me from LA. So I think he suffered the most jet lag because I'm on the same time zone with the UK but we had amazing producers - they were really, really amazing and they made our lives so much easier so that we could focus on making the film.
Matt Ogden: Yeah, Kachi and I talk about this phrase "collaboration of cultures". That applies to the story itself of Anthony in two worlds - his community in Lagos, Nigeria and this ballet school in Birmingham, England.
It was shot on two continents, with me and Kachi from two continents in two different cultures, so our collaboration of cultures paralleled Anthony's - even the two crews.
Mateo's our DP, actually from South Africa, Charlie our DP in England and his crew, and their communication with each other - it all worked together because there are two worlds in this film.
Madu is on Sunday, 14 December at 21:00 on National Geographic (DStv 191 / StarTimes 220) and available on Disney+
