Saturday, April 2, 2022

2022 10th Silwerskermfees Film Festival - Day 4: M-Net boss Jan du Plessis: 'We're fully committed to growing local film.'


by Thinus Ferreira 

As the channel director for MultiChoice's M-Net channels on DStv, the veteran industry executive Jan du Plessis is the boss of M-Net but you can literally call him "Mister Silwerskerm" - and many have and do.

Jan du Plessis has been involved with the Silwerskermfees film festival since its very inception more than a decade ago.

At the 10th Silwerskermfees, taking place at The Bay Hotel in Camps Bay, Cape Town, I spoke to him about how there's never been more opportunity than right now for local filmmakers and local talent across Africa to shine and how MultiChoice and M-Net remain firmly committed to continuing to invest heavily in local film production across the continent.


What advice do you have for aspiring and existing filmmakers as the local and international film industry is emerging from two years of lockdowns and a global Covid pandemic. What should they do now?
Jan du Plessis: It's really honing in on the story they want to tell. 

Be authentic, be true to your idea. Don't write something you think someone might like - stick to your story. The moment that truth, that authenticity comes across - I've been in thousands of pitches in my life and you immediately within the first few minutes you see when a person knows what they're talking about, they know the topic or they're incredibly passionate about it.

When you read a script and it hasn't really grabbed you in the first 15 or 20 pages, then you know it's not going to grab you later on. It's about authenticity.


What is a trend in terms of how the global film industry has now changed and got damaged? What is happening now that wasn't the case before Covid?
Jan du Plessis: When we look back years from now we will realise that we were actually part of a very prominent, historical moment in cinema. 

What I mean with that is when you just look at prior to Covid, there was this bubbling and growing and really incredible independent film markets and production.

Then suddenly the pandemic and that lower budget film started making less and less money and it became far more difficult to fund these films.
If you then look at the results of films over the past two years, it is Spider-Man, it is franchises. All these big films make lots of money, then suddenly where there used to be this wonderful middle-ground for independents disappeared.

Then when you bring it back to the South African context, it's even more prominent.

We've got less than a handful of films the last two years that have made lots of money, including Spider-Man: No Way Home which by the way, fascinatingly, has made more money than films released prior to Covid. But then it just drops and there's nothing. 

I have lots and lots of conversations, daily, weekly with the two distributors because we obviously help them to buy and then we identify product for them, and they are massively concerned because where a film used to make R5 million and they could collect R5 million - and these people are very clever, they're experienced and they get it right far more than what they get it wrong - so those R5 million South African box office films are suddenly barely R1 million.

And the lower millions range films - which are the films we love, the art house and more audience challenging films - used to make R800 000 to a million and those barely break that level now. So it's so scary. 

The result of that - if you look at what films are available at the European Film Market (EFM) earlier this year and that's coming to Cannes now in May, you will see in the past there used to be 50 to a 100. Now there's 20. 

And then the streamers with big, big pockets just take worldwide rights. The moment there's a John Wick: Chapter 4, these big-pocket over-the-top (OTT) players come and grab them.




What have you picked up from the 10th Silwerskermfees - how does it feel or look different?
Jan du Plessis: For two years we were planning every 6 months a Silwerskermfees film festival and then it couldn't happen. And last year we had a virtual webinar. 

In the meantime, in our back pockets, we were finishing a film and then keeping it for this festival, and three or four of these films had stop-starts because of Covid, and financially the impact was massive as it would add huge sums to budgets that were already stretched.

The fascinating thing is then when you look at this variety of films spanning so many genres at this year's film festival. We have Gaia as the first Afrikaans ecological horror film, we have a romantic comedy - I'm thrilled that it all came together. I'm relieved and surprised and very proud.


Why is it important for the local film festival in South Africa, like a Silwerskermfees, to exist?
Jan du Plessis: This festival has really been operating as an incubator, especially the short film project typically has been a fantastic incubator for new local films and new talent.

I'm obviously very proud to expose the new films to a new crowd and for them to get their moment in the limelight but for the M-Net and kykNET it's a fantastic moment to identify new talent and tho showcase new talent. It's a wonderful thing to be proud of and to have these five very diverse, very different, very uniquely South African films, shown all at once in one place.

Very interesting are all these talks and all these international companies that are now noticing our films, attending our festivals and acquiring international distribution. We've been noticed - both because of the films and because of the international co-production series.

I was at The London Screenings, the London upfronts market focused on TV series, a month ago and I can't tell you how every single person who I was in the past just buying content and asking "What's new? Show me your new BBC Western series The English with Emily Blunt?", would barely finish pitching new product to me when they would now say "But I want to introduce you to our head of co-production who is very interested in South Africa and here is so-and-so.".

One of the very proud things I'm very thrilled about is that one of our M-Net Original series, Reyka from Quizzical Pictures, got sold to Channel 4 in the United Kingdom and has actually been scheduled in their prime time drama slot on a Sunday night with a massive marketing campaign.
I think it took a while but we're getting there. We've been noticed.




You're an iconic industry veteran - you've seen everything over decades. But is there maybe something new you've seen or a new awareness you're taking away from or a new impression from this year's 10th Silwerskermfees?
Jan du Plessis: I really find that the more we've been going through these years in developing product and giving people chances to realise their dreams - and although you guide, it's not interference - you try to help people to get their product to the level they dream it could be - for me the thing that surprises me is the really bizarrely uniqueness of the ideas that came out of our talent this year.

You look at a film like Gaia and you think oh my goodness, how did you think this up? Or you look at Stiekyt and it's just fascinating. 

I think just when you think the level of creativity, the level of finding brand-new things that the world will take notice of has peaked, there are these South African filmmakers who step forward with these amazingly weird and wonderful things. 

And that's what cinema is about - it's about surprise. You want to sit there and be surprised. You want to go: "Yes, it's another romantic comedy, but wow, I've never seen this story or this story told this way." 


M-Net also has M-Net Movies as a strong brand, and MultiChoice is increasing its investment in local content in South Africa and countries across sub-Saharan Africa - is funding and creating local films still important within that overall mix of the local content offering? How does creating new local movies fit into that strategy?
Jan du Plessis: If you look at the research, consistently two of the reasons why people subscribe to our service are sport and movies.  
 
Over the years movies have gone through ups and downs but at the moment M-Net's movie channels continue to feature in the top 10, top 5 channels in many cases. 

What I find fascinating is that movie channels 3 and 4 - where 3 is targeted to the DStv Compact audience and 4 for DStv Access - and you look at the target audience, they actually watch 3 and 4, they compete with one another and for a channel not designed for that. 

So we're absolutely, fully committed, we're constantly looking at new deals, we're constantly renewing deals, we're constantly buying everything we can place our hands-on in the movie space.
Then on the local side, the mass market channels invest massively in Southern Africa, also East and West Africa, and then you also have kykNET. 

kykNET now has three sets of movies - there's the short film, and then the hour-long made-for-TV movie that really school people and train them and gives them an opportunity to make a film, and then the feature film like the ones shown at the Silwermskermfees film festival.

I feel there's never been more opportunity than now for local producers, local directors, local talent in front of and behind the camera. 

On top of that, we have to really be one step ahead because there are the OTT players who come with big pockets.

Our unique selling proposition is definitely to have local content and be hyper-local and to give viewers recognisable, aspirational stories where they can watch and feel "this is me. I recognise myself".


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2022 10th Silwerskermfees Film Festival - Day 2: Not a white napkin to be found - how South Africa's event industry is starting to bounce back.


by Thinus Ferreira 

With South Africa's events organising industry that experienced an extinction-level event the past two years, the 10th Silwerskermfees film festival - cast in beautiful golden shimmer walls this year - is one of the first of several fairy lights-lined events slowing flickering back on for a decimated industry. 

"We've missed the feedback and the energy of the guests attending an event. And a big part of events is the feedback from the guests and visitors and delegates attending," says the experienced and sought-after events organiser Edmund Beukes of XL Events in Cape Town who was once again roped in this year as events manager at kykNET's 10th Silwerskermfees.

"It's nice to experience the positivity and buzz that's so energising of real-life events - that adrenalin-rush," he says. "We've missed that. It's a different kind of motivation that's difficult to put in words."

About starting the engine of real-world event organising back up in South Africa after two years, Edmund Beukes who earlier this year already did a slew of events countrywide from magazine media events to weddings, says "in a certain sense you've forgotten what you've forgotten after two years - there's a certain muscle memory with certain things you have to regain again".

"The terrible thing about the Covid lockdowns was that so many of the suppliers who unfortunately were forced to close up shop. You have to go and find new possible suppliers for various things."

"Then, the nature of the business of eventing also changed. Currently we're extremely busy with a lot more smaller events and our bigger clients are not even all back in full force."




"Luckily, I want to say we're almost not coping with trying to help everyone suddenly rushing to have their events, but I'm also wondering what's going to happen in a month's time as South Africa opens up again and all the big companies return to the eventing space."

"You look back and are extremely grateful for the work you do have but you're also slightly apprehensive about the future."

"We already have to think about two months from now and you're apprehensive about making commitments about the future and what if there's a next Omicron. Is there going to be a new shutdown again? There's been a realisation of how little in life you can actually control."

About event management in South Africa and the damage the industry suffered because of the extended Covid lockdown, Edmund Beukes says "it was horrific".

"The place you rent carpets from, the place doing the type of draping the client wants, the conference space and expo space - they're not back yet. Those companies are still struggling immensely but they have to keep going under duress. And some of them are the sole supplier of a certain product or service in the market."

"It also damaged a lot of smaller companies but it also separated the chaff from the wheat. I think the stronger survived. I think some who struggled before Covid, the lockdown was the straw that broke the camel's back."

"It also helped me to steer my company into a new direction. We had to be inventive and creative and had to dream up new things to do, and you had to look with fresh eyes at things. Sometimes you build your business like an anthill - you just add on and add on without relooking the foundation you've built your business." 




Of French ticklers and gift boxes
During the lockdown period, Edmund Beukes says his company branched out into packing gift boxes that in a sense replaced the connection and space of a brand's physical event in people's minds.

"It's one of the new parts of the business that isn't receding as real-world events return but is something that is continuing. Now I realise we're not geared to do both and now we have to invest again to take that part of the business further."

"We also moved homes - which is something we've stopped. We don't do that anymore."

He says over the past two years the recent gift box packed for a Showmax series was an interesting one.

"When we had to source the French ticklers for Showmax's Seks in Afrikaans series it was all of the calls to find 90 French ticklers for gift boxes that was the most interesting thing of everything. It was so much fun because you realise how many themes can go into a box."

"Even the sound that the wrapping paper makes when you open it, the smell of the candle you include. And I think people love great food. They want to snack, they want to taste - and then a gift box is a success."









Tiffany chairs and trust
For this year's 10th Silwerskermfees he says some of the things XL Events originally wanted to bring in couldn't materialise due to it being imported and the logistical shipping challenges around getting it from China with delayed cargo ships and that country's factory energy issues.

"What's nice is the creative freedom that comes with the Silwerskermfees in terms of event management - to go and sit and think. Because we've been planning so long in advance, we had a lot of time to think, which means you can conceptualise something fully in your mind before you execute and it's not merely a sausage factory."

Edmund says guests will see a lot of detail at kykNET's 10th Silwerskermfees this year. "It's enjoyable to work this way because you can work systematically and add things".






His message for South Africa's event and entertainment industry is "humility". 

"It was incredible how companies have been helping and supporting each other during this time. People and companies became more flexible. It's great to see how people have been standing together, stronger. Prices came down - good and bad."

"I want to say South Africa's event organising is almost back with a bang. Two weeks ago we almost couldn't find a white napkin to rent - it's an incredible sign. And the big companies are not even back yet.

As to how South Africa's event industry compares to other countries, he says as far as event design goes, South Africa is far ahead of many other countries.

"We've had many international clients and when I look back at photos of things we and others have done in the past  - South Africa is really on another level. To our detriment sometimes, I think we drive ourselves almost too hard. It's always 'yes, another new chair', 'yes, another new form table'."

"Go look at America's Grammys. They've been using Tiffany chairs for years and years. We've moved on already and you'd think that they would also have moved on but they haven't."

"As South Africans we're way more creative and inventive and it also shows the calibre of corporate clients in South Africa who is willing to experiment, willing to allow for creativity and willing to adapt and change with the times and willing to trust event organisers who bring new ideas for their events space."


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2022 10th Silwerskermfees Film Festival - Day 2: With South Africa's global co-productions still in infancy, MultiChoice to announce Afrikaans series with Canal+.


by Thinus Ferreira 

While South Africa's film and TV co-productions market is still in its infancy, the future for series shot in the country with international partners attached looks promising, with the MultiChoice Group that is set to announce soon that it will be doing a new Afrikaans TV series as a global co-production with France's Canal+.

Nomsa Philiso, the MultiChoice Group's new executive head of programming, who was one of the panellist at 2022's 10th Silwerskermfees in a panel discussion on fostering co-productions, told attendees that while South Africa's film and TV co-productions with other countries are still in its infancy, there is a lot of scope to expand on new partnerships and in new parts of the world.

She said that the idea is to make sure that South Africans go out there and tell their stories as good as anybody else on the world stage.

In terms of what MultiChoice and M-Net are looking for in terms of international co-productions, she says "people tend to bring what they think we like - because it worked last year - but we want to evolve. We don't have all the ideas as the broadcaster - the ideas live in the minds of the people who supply us with content."

"It is them who must take us to the next level in terms of what is out there, what stories are we not telling." 

She said "our stories haven't been told in the manner that we want and we see now that the opportunities exist to leverage on that in a much stronger way."

Kaye Ann Williams, M-Net's head of local content and independent films, said the blue ribbon pay-TV broadcaster is "from a genre perspective definitely looking for crime content but don't get stuck in that - look at sub-genres that could be married to that like comedy, like psychological thrillers, like action".

"The other opportunity for pitching is definitely in the factual space. We know that our premium audience loves documentaries."

"We know that they view them elsewhere and they enjoy it and consume it on our platform as well, so there's definitely an opportunity to go into the high-end factual documentary space, but again it must be very compelling and it must sell."

Allan Sperling, the MultiChoice Group's executive head of physical production, said "an Afrikaans co-production that has been signed and we're going into production within the next few months".

"It is also possible to do Afrikaans international co-productions. We're in partnership with Canal+ who are taking the French rights and the rest of the world will be up for sales and this is where we're looking to recoup and the producer also gets proceeds from that. So it is also possible for Afrikaans shows to become co-productions," he said.


As passionate as possible
Panellist and producer Layla Swart, co-owner of Yellowbone Entertainment producing the fantasy drama series Blood Psalms for MultiChoice's video streaming service Showmax as a co-production with Canal+, said packaging a show for co-production is extremely important.

"Because we're existing in an industry that is in its infancy, we're also trying to figure out what our audiences want, we're trying to figure out what our partners want from us as South African content creators, and often there's an unknown. Everything relies very heavily on how you present yourself and your product."

"It's exhausting and I know it's very difficult at the moment to be a producer. It's a privilege to be able to sit here and to say I've done a co-production," she said.

"I'm acutely aware of how difficult it is to put something together and how difficult also is with co-productions because they take long - bringing partners on, and then aligning a vision, and also aligning finance and business models are not a quick strategy."

"It definitely pays off at the end because your project has scope but it's not an easy process. We can only be as passionate as possible about what we're making, finding the right people to make it, and then package it as well as we can."


With Yellowbone Entertainment which has been struggling with getting the department of trade and industry to pay the promised film rebates for Blood Psalms, Layla Swart said "every producer will say they've been having struggles with the South African government specifically with film rebates and tax incentives".

"Why that is so crucial is because producers are emerging producers."

"Many of us don't have a lot of capital and resources behind us. What the government instruments are there for, is for you as a producer to be able to bring something to the partnership, for you to be able to entice international people to want to work with you, and want to shoot here and want to use our crews and actors and our stories."

"That is the biggest struggle. It's killing our industry to be honest and we're heavily reliant on our broadcasters to such an extent that we feel we can't mobilise anything on our own and I think with the broadcasters being inundated, there's only so much broadcasters can greenlit."

"Our biggest challenge is how do we empower producers and production companies through incentives, that are supposed to be there, to sustain the industry."


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2022 10th Silwerskermfees Film Festival - Day 2: Showcasing the tenacity of South Africa's film industry.


by Thinus Ferreira 

As 2022's 10th Silwerskermfees launched as a hybrid-event - the year's first major film festival of the calendar as South Africa starts to return to a semblance of what once was - there's a collective sigh of relief under attendees from across the local film and TV industry who had to survive the past two years under unimaginable circumstances.

With both in-person screenings and panels, as well as virtual streaming taking place, the individually QR-coded, proven double-vaxxed and lanyard-clad crowd - smaller and more subdued than in previous years - are darting since Wednesday from Rotunda sessions and short films screenings to feature film discussions and breakaway catch-up coffee dates. 

A sense of relief permeates The Bay Hotel as attendees - ranging from the country's top TV and film execs to producers, directors, actors, distributors, film commissions and industry bodies are allowing themselves to slowly exhale. 

Waldimar Pelser, M-Net director for kykNET channels, says he's immensely looking forward to "what the lockdown period released in filmmakers".

"I'm also looking forward to take a guess as to which of the short film filmmakers within a few years will end up as the producers of big feature films and which of them will achieve success in television".

"The Silwerskermfees film festival remains an incubator of new talent and people who go on to achieve breakthroughs on the small screen on kykNET, and on the big screen- and you never know who they'll be."

The 10th Silwerskermfees is also the first time that Nomsa Philiso, the MultiChoice Group's new executive head of programming is attending.

"For me, as long as I've been in the industry I have been, I've not been to the Silwerskermfees - my first interaction with it was during Covid, it was remote; so I'm really looking forward to be interacting with everybody, and from a partnership point of view to reassure our providers that we're here and we're looking forward to working with them."

She says local South African film festivals like the Silwerskermfees are crucial to grow and maintain the country's film and TV industry. "It's part of our industry development because it's a platform to showcase some of the content that we would ordinarily not see".

"As a broadcaster you're often focused on certain things and sometimes you might miss the gems. Forums like these allow you to tap into spaces where you wouldn't ordinarily. And it's also the interaction with people and networking and building our industry."




'Boere-Cannes'
The veteran South African film critic Leon van Nierop who has been part of the Silwerskermfees since the very first edition with just 18 people that started in Prins Albert screening 6 older films in the Jan Rautenbach Schouburg, says the Silwerskermfees has morphed in the "Boere-Cannes", taking place the past few years at The Bay Hotel in Camps Bay, Cape Town a bit like the Cannes Film Festival.

"It's for Afrikaans people but also South African people and Karen Meiring [former kykNET director] had the insight and vision to bring the Silwerskermfees to this fantastic setting. The short film initiative is also fantastic: You first learn, and you're mentored. And some of those short films then become feature films."

"That's why the festival is important because it's also a learning school - with all different kinds of conference sessions and workshops."

Leon says he's looking forward to watch a movie with a cinema audience. 

"Not a lot of films have been produced the past two years. So, to suddenly see what was made like Gaia, made in 2020 for the big screen and waiting since then for a release date - I'm looking forward to seeing that."

"And just the atmosphere that is here - it's a networking atmosphere, so you can network with the people who you couldn't see and was impossible to do the past two years. It's great to see all of the familiar faces."


Seeing people in person
Paul Venter, manager director and producer at Homebrew Films, says "I think what we're all looking forward to the most is seeing people in person".

" It's about sitting down and making connections because you can Zoom and you can email and you can do what you want, but there's no substitute for grabbing someone by the shoulder after a film and saying 'Let's quickly catch up' and the next minute you're going to make another film."

"So it's that kind of energy and dynamics that we miss and which is the advantage of a film festival".

He says it's important for something like the Silwerskermfees to exist because "it's a decade later and they've done 50 feature films, they've done more than 100 short films - it's just a boon for the industry as whole; it gives jobs, it helps develop new talent, it makes people excited, especially if you look around you and see the diversity and age: The young people coming in - that's why film festivals happen." 




SA's film industry is stronger together
Kaye Ann Williams, M-Net's head of local content and independent films, says she's also looking forward to seeing everyone in person and "connecting with people and chatting with them. It's been sorely missed".

"Why something like the Silwerskermfees is important is the networking - this is how people make deals and form partnerships and build relationships and think of their next big story. We've all missed this. You don't get the same vibe with a virtual event."

Nicola van Niekerk, M-Net senior manager for scripted content and factual entertainment at kykNET, says "the most important thing about this year's Silwerskermfees is that it really showcases the tenacity of the South African film industry".

"While many other countries saw their film industries shut down completely for Covid our producers did not and our crews worked and we all invested in getting these films out. The films here - while they are slightly smaller and filmed under very difficult conditions - show just the absolute willpower and the growth of our industry and how strong we are together".

She says she's looking forward to seeing the audience reaction to Indemnity, the Travis Taute Gambit-produced film starring Jarrid Geduld as a proudly South African action film, as well as Stiekyt set in the world of drag artists and produced by Homebrew Films.


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2022 10th Silwerskermfees - Day 1: Programme director Ricky Human on the growing need to tell authentic local stories.


by Thinus Ferreira 

It was on a night late into November 2021 and during a crunch time for everyone to complete their annual workload before their holidays while her little puppy was howling next to her on the floor also to get attention and not understanding why she was still up as she had to stay up past 23:00 in a virtual meeting with eight key execs on festival objectives.

It was the moment that film producer and festival programme director Ricky Human realised that the Silwerskermfees is really a passion of hers to organise.

The 10th Silwerskermfees Film Festival  – an Afrikaans film festival nicknamed "Cannes in Cape Town" but not limited to just Afrikaans films and content – is bouncing back with a hybrid, real-world and virtual offering stretching over three days from today at Cape Town's The Bay Hotel.

"With the Silwerskermfees we have successfully built a local interest platform and network for local filmmakers to showcase their works, gain exposure and build their own film careers to support our ethos to grow and sustain the local film industry," says Ricky when I ask her why it's important for a film festival like the Silwerskermfees to exist.

She's adamant: "Our focus will always remain local with international interest".

"The Silwerskermfees stimulates the industry with fresh ideas and a pipeline of continuous content and gives producers and film talent – behind and in front of the camera  – the opportunity to be recognised in the South African film industry and on international platforms."

"In terms of the full-length premieres, the festival generates publicity and a buzz around the films before the films' releases in cinema or on MultiChoice's DStv BoxOffice."

Many prolific and esteemed South African filmmakers have taken their first steps into the industry with the Silwerskermfees' short film project.

"To mention two examples out of many: Amy Jephta, whose most recent film Barakat was this year's official South African entry for the Oscars, was a previous Silwerskermfees short film winner with the 2017 short film Soldaat."

"After winning the Best Short Film category in 2013 with the movie Toevlug, Christiaan Olwagen also went on to create feature films such as Kanarie and Poppie Nongena, which won several international awards."

"Then, some of the short films have also been adapted into feature films - as is the case with Beurtkrag and Vlugtig, which premieres at the festival this year," Ricky says.


Covid-19's spoke in the film festival wheel
Instead of continuous operation and with planning ongoing for a next year's festival the moment a given year's festival is done, film festival organising globally ground to an immediate halt in 2020 because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

kykNET had to stop the Silwerskermfees as well that is now taking its first gingerly steps back as a hybrid event.

"The most significant disruption during this pandemic was the 'stop/start' experienced by the productions during filming," Ricky Human says.

"We are fortunate to be able to showcase such a great variety of local content. From an operational point of view, we have such a dedicated and committed team that never lets their guard down, and each stumbling block is negotiated and resolved amicably."

"Fortunately - and similar to many other film festivals - we were able to host a very successful Silwerskermfees Webinar on a virtual platform last year, and this year we are able to celebrate our 10th anniversary festival as an exciting hybrid festival."

About how this year's Silwerskermfees will be different, she says "The real difference for our festival on the ground is our limited venue capacities due to Covid protocols. Still, the level of excitement overall is higher than ever before with such a long waiting period to celebrate the festival returning.".

About what a film festival like the Silwerskermfees, and other South African film festivals need more of, and the type of support required and that could be improved, she says "All local film festivals, including the Silwerskermfees, can only grow when they are fully funded, and this always happens through several sponsorship partners, government-supported film bodies and private sponsors".

"Looking forward, we would like to add more genres and opportunities for local filmmakers to participate in the festival and grow local audience participation."




Pushing boundaries
"For me, it's always about the programme and how to inspire our filmmakers to showcase their works to others," says Ricky Human.

"In particular, we are proud to have Academy Award-nominated and winning films from 2021 as part of the line-up: Barakat, which has already scooped several awards and was South Africa's official entry for the Academy Award; as well as Lakutshon Ilanga (When the sun sets), the Student Academy Award winner and premiere at our festival."

"Then there is also the Academy-nominated documentary front-runner for 2022, Writing with Fire, which will be screened at the Silwerskermfees just three days before the Oscar winners are announced!"

"How wonderful it is also to have our own Silwerskermfees awards night event the day before the Academy Awards will place in Los Angeles," says Ricky.

Some of this year's Silwerskermfees short films are pushing boundaries and creating talkability. The number of short films in Afrikaans is also much more than in previous years."

"Then, we're also incredibly proud to be able to allow film lovers from across the country to enjoy all the films from anywhere in the country. This is the first time we are doing this, and the interest has been overwhelming, showing that there is an appetite for proudly South African films."


Ongoing quest to find new voices
While kykNET's Silwerskermfees is primarily about celebrating Afrikaans film, it's not exclusively Afrikaans. 

About why it's been important to not have a film festival ensconced around Afrikaans but to make it accessible to a broad, local multi-language community and film industry in South Africa, Ricky Human says the festival was a kykNET initiative with a focus on diversifying talent and finding new voices from the Western Cape and grew from there.

"Through all the festival initiatives over the years, it has organically grown to a multi-cultural, local interest festival. Collaboration is a given, and the goal of the festival ultimately is to sustain the local industry at large."

And her message for South Africa's film and TV industry about this year's 10th Silwerskermfees film festival?

"Don't shy away from telling authentic local stories as there is a growing need for it - not only locally but also on international platforms."


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Friday, April 1, 2022

INTERVIEW. MasterChef SA S4 winner Shawn Godfrey: 'I was properly exhausted but the one person that didn't stop studying.'


by Thinus Ferreira

In a sit-down interview South Africa's new MasterChef SA 2022 winner, Shawn Godfrey from Cape Town opens up about the highs and lows, withstanding the heat in the kitchen, controlling his emotions, his strategy and tenacity to ultimately win and his "decision-tree" for the final, relentlessly studying while others socialised, and why his MasterChef win is a win as a dad for his kids.

You went into your final challenge and basically packed out everything - every kitchen appliance - first at your workstation. Was that strategy? Did you think you must use more types of equipment to show how and what you've learnt since the brief was to show your evolution in the MasterChef SA kitchen?
Shawn: It was quite an active decision. I'm an engineer. So I started my career as an engineer. My brain thinks in order. As soon as my world becomes cluttered or I don't know where I'm going, I start falling apart.

One of the first things in the MasterChef SA kitchen as I went through the episodes - the better I was at the start in preparing all my equipment and my order of event, the faster I was actually getting.

Everyone would race off to the pantry, would race off to start cooking. It was quite funny - I would be the last man still writing in my book and still putting my equipment out in the order as I'm going to cook. 

It was just a way of me feeling I could be calmer than being frantic and running backwards and forwards and fetching equipment the whole time.


Were you comfortable in using all the equipment you felt you had to for the final or were there things you felt you don't really want to use but that you need to?
Shawn: Everything was an active decision but had I used it before? No. Like a sous vide machine - I've never used one before. 

But what I did is to study the principles of using one, so I watched YouTube video after YouTube video, I was studying recipe books on what technically I need to do. So it was a technical execution over an experience execution. 

Every piece of equipment I put out there, the recipes I've written down and the equipment laid out as I was going to use it.


With all of the kitchen equipment that you and the two others as the top three won, are you realistically going to use all of that? Did you already receive it, and do you foresee using it all or are you going to sell or give some away?
Shawn: The truck arrives yesterday and filled my garage!

Yesterday at 2pm and I haven't even had a change to go and open it up. I know roughly what it is - there are a whole bunch of things that I really needed like a hibachi grill. 

I didn't have an air fryer, there's a multi-fryer, there is an industrial kitchen Kenwood mixer which I didn't have, spiralised coffee grinders. I would say 70% of the kitchen equipment we've received is actually what I need. It's very welcomed!




What do you want to do as MasterChef SA 2022 winner? Obviously, you have a career, what do you want to leverage your MasterChef SA win towards?
Shawn: I've got four businesses and 100 staff, so I am already very busy. But I am a serial entrepreneur. This is giving me a launch into my next business called TheRoastedDad and the website at theroasteddad.com has gone live, the Instagram is called RoastedDad.

Underneath that brand I'm launching two subcategories called Little Roast - it's children's cooking apparel like children aprons in leather, baby aprons, and then there are also the adult versions of it called Roasted. I'm looking to partner with a big retailer to launch that.

The second part of my journey after the MasterChef SA win is to start a pop-up restaurant that will repeat once a month for 4 nights, with chef Callan Austin who was on the show in episode 11 and chef Darren Badenhorst who owns Le Chêne and Le Coin Français.

The three of us are coming together on 27 April for an exclusive pop-up restaurant which is for 24 people for 4 nights and 10 courses. The first one is in Cape Town but we're planning to also take it to Johannesburg and Durban.

I will also be doing food influencing. I'm also going on a 3-week road trip through South Africa with my family all the way to the Kalahari, to Pilanesberg, and we're going to food-journal the whole trip for three weeks.




You obviously like making food. Do you think the pressure of that will now increase from friends and family expecting Shawn to be the one who has to make the food because he's a MasterChef SA winner?
Shawn: Hundred percent! [He laughs.] It's actually already starting to happen. 

I find now people go "No, no, I can't cook for you anymore." I go for a braai and they go "No, no, we're not cooking for you." And yet I would actually appreciate someone else cooking. It's not a case of having won the MasterChef SA title that I don't enjoy someone else's food.

Everyone thinks that now my level is up here, so it looks like I'm going to be motivating friends and family to cook for me.


From food levels I want to pivot to emotional levels. Compared to a lot of the extroverted and sometimes dramatic contestants, you seemed emotionally muted and lower on the emotional spectrum. Was it a strategy to not show so much emotion and rather focus on a task, or are you not an emotional person, or are you and you just decided to internalise how you feel instead of showing it?
Shawn: Good question, I am actually a huge extrovert, very loud, I've got friends and family at my house all the time. I'm very hyper-focused on my job. 

So I'm CEO of a lighting company where I've got 86 staff just in that company alone. I'm very focused. So if I'm working, I'm there to win something or I'm there to do something properly and I throw everything at it.

Then when I'm socialising, I also throw everything at it and them I'm loud and noisy. 

What the show definitely brought out, which I wasn't expecting of myself, what it did bring out was my obsession with detail, my obsession with technical perfection and following a recipe to the tee.

I studied like crazy. I was the one person that didn't stop studying. When people were socialising or people were relaxing I would be sitting there studying recipes, studying techniques.

It brought out a side of me that's there already - it's work life-me, and it was definitely portrayed on the show.




Was there a low point emotionally for you?
Shawn: A lot of the contestants really struggled - we had an in-house psychologist, Anton Brummer and Errieda du Toit was the house mom, so we had a lot of support.

Throughout the whole journey, it was really interesting. People were having severe ups and severe downs, and sometimes people would arrive in the MasterChef SA kitchen and couldn't seem to want to even cook. 

What happens when you hit the MasterChef SA kitchen there's so much pressure - your adrenalin goes super high. And then afterwards your adrenalin goes down. And you're cycling that, day in and day out.

I saw some people who would arrive in the morning and say "I can't do this anymore," and they would go out in that episode. They mentally couldn't cope. 

MasterChef is 50% emotions and 50% cooking. I don't think people realise that. There is so much pressure, there is so much pace. Everything is remembering, you don't have time to casually start thinking when the clock starts about your recipe - you're eating into the time you're supposed to be cooking.

If your brain or heart is not in that zone. I won't name names but there were three people who said they feel down and one person even said "I won't be surprised if today I go home" - that day they went home.

I'm very strong emotionally. I took a company through Covid. My factory - I had an over R3 million wage bill a month and I couldn't invoice out of my factory when Covid hit. The mental strength that I needed to work with my business partner to get that business through, prepared me for MasterChef SA because that was months of brutality.

But I did get to a point where I was properly exhausted. I was feeling a little bit "gatvol" of the process and it was just after chef Michael Cook's episode of this past Monday.

I wasn't going into that challenge in a bad space but coming out of it was brutal. The producers were actually polite in what they showed. 

There was a lot more heartache and a lot more brutality that they gave, let's call it a "nicer version". And even the nicer version was still brutal. As I finished that episode I'm pretty glad they didn't show it. I started crying. I was so frustrated with myself because I'm so hyper performance-driven.




What was your calculus to try and win if you were up against Andriette, or up against Tarryn?
Shawn: Tarryn is very good on balance, on stronger Asian and Indian and Malay flavours. She gets her balance right.

I created a decision tree. I had decision-tree dishes. Below main and in dessert, I had two options. I studied those recipes to the tee and depending on if it was either Tarryn or Andriette, I would go either left or right at each of those decision trees.

If it were Tarryn I was going to make sure that I was not going to go down any Asian or any Malaysian flavours because I knew she would do it hands down better. Then if it was Andriette I knew she would beat me hands down on dessert but I'm stronger on the savoury side of things.

What I decided to do was go simpler on dessert and go harder technique on my mains. 


How irritating is it when the judges come to your station to talk and you just want to use the time to cook?
Shawn: It's not just the judges, there are the content directors as well and there are there of them. 

It's a double whammy, and it's really irritating. I'm very hyper-focused and I would shield out and box myself. If you watch while I'm cooking, people said that they would often talk to me and I wouldn't answer, and some of it was actively and some of it was just I didn't even hear them.

In the beginning it kept throwing me, but you get better. Later on it feels like you know more what you're doing and when they ask a question you feel you can kind of walk and talk at the same time. It gets better but it really did irritate me.




In the show you're a dad of two but now you're a dad of three and you said you want to win for your kids. What do you take away from this experience?
Shawn: My third born is now 6 weeks on Friday. I've got a 4-year old, a 2-year old and now a 6-weeks old. 

It was a huge sacrifice for me to go on the show. People see my pregnant wife in the show. She entered me and said "you're a good cook, you need to go on this show. You're very ambitious, you're very focused, you'll do well".

She entered me, but I knew the sacrifice that it was - heavily pregnant with two toddlers on your own ...
So I went in there knowing that I wanted to cook for them because it was a sacrifice that I was away for nearly six weeks. 

I felt there's something that I want to teach my children, and also other dads out there. 

There's often this thing where entrepreneurs and people running a business - they separate their families and they're very separate from their families. I wanted to prove that you can do both. You can be a good father, you can be linked to your children, and you can also do business.

The third thing I felt was really important is, I don't think to be successful you have to be the smartest in the world.

You have to really work hard at something. And you have to be motivated enough to believe that you'll succeed. And sometimes you don't have to be the smartest, but if you combine passion, you work hard at something and you know you want to get to the winning goal, you can get there. If I can give that as a gift to my children, that will feel like job done on MasterChef SA. 

I don't know who they'll turn out to be. They might be the smartest in the class or they might not be. But if I can teach them tenacity, and that hard work will get you somewhere, they'll go places.
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