'Omosexy': The biggest film star you’ve never heard of
Omotola Jalade Ekeinde, aka 'Omosexy’, is the queen of Nollywood. She’s appeared in more than 300 films, pulls in 150 million viewers for her reality-television show and has been named one of the 100 most influential people in the world.
Actress and singer, Omotola Jalade Ekeinde Photo: KATE PETERS
By Ben Arogundade
2:18PM BST 28 Aug 2013
She scores a zero on the Hollywood Richter scale. She has never starred in a major motion picture. Her most recent film, Last Flight to Abuja, means nothing to devotees of Netflix and LoveFilm.
When she sat next to Steven Spielberg at a Time magazine dinner earlier this year he didn’t know her name. Yet Omotola Jalade Ekeinde was attending that dinner because, like him, she had been honoured in Time’s 2013 list of the 100 Most Influential People in the World.
Alongside Kate Middleton, Michelle Obama and Beyoncé.The star of more than 300 films, Omotola – or “Omosexy”, as she is known to her legions of fans – is bigger across the African diaspora than Halle Berry.
Her reality-television show, Omotola: The Real Me, pulls in more viewers than Oprah’s and Tyra’s at their peak, combined, and she is the first African celebrity ever to amass more than one million Facebook “likes”.
Omotola is one of the biggest stars in Nollywood, the low-budget, high-output Nigerian film industry that churns out more English-language films than Hollywood or Bollywood (1,000-2,000 a year). Some have cinematic releases, but most are for the straight-to-video market.scared.”output Nigerian film industry that churns out more English-language films than Hollywood or Bollywood (1,000-2,000 a year). Some have cinematic releases, but most are for the straight-to-video market.
When I watch her Stella photo-shoot from the sidelines it is immediately apparent that everything about her is BIG. Big body, big hair, big personality, big laugh: she comes across like Oprah’s sister.
She is here with her own film crew, who are recording for a future episode of her television show. Which means there is also a big, superstar delay – three hours – before our interview can start.
Many of her fans think her real name is “Omosexy”, she tells me, laughing, when we finally get to speak, but it was a nickname given to her by her husband, an airline pilot.
“He bought me a car back in 2009, and that was the plate number,” she recalls, speaking with kinetic, girlish excitement, rattling off sentences in fast, extended flurries.
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