HAD financial requirements been in place, Garvey’s Wives, a play by Dahlia Harris, would have been shown at last month’s inaugural Jamaica Film Festival.The play traces the lives of Amy Ashwood and Amy Jacques, the wives of Marcus Garvey, Pan Africanist and Jamaica’s first National Hero who died in 1940.

Garvey’s Wives premiered on stage last year at the 8X10 Theatre Festival organised by the Philip Sherlock Centre for the Creative Arts at the University of the West Indies, Mona.

The Amys are portrayed by Shanique Brown and Petrina Williams.

Harris told the Sunday Observer that she was preparing to show her work as a 10-minute short at the festival but that hit a snag when funding failed to materialise.

“I would have been doing Garvey’s wives a dis-service by not producing a film that was of the required standard, so I took the decision to wait. It is a period piece, so you would have to think location and costuming appropriate to the time. All that costs money and you have to get it right. What I put forward cannot be mediocre,” she said.

For Harris, the inability to attract funding for a piece she deems rich in history and culture reflects the way our culture and culture is viewed.

“Amy Ashwood was very instrumental in the formation of the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) along with Garvey, while a lot of what we know about Garvey today is based on the writings of Amy Jacques. Both are very important to the civil rights movement which Garvey championed,” she explained.

Harris has not given up on her project.

“I am currently diligently seeking investors as I want to tell the story as a feature length film. Financiers need to understand the importance of film as an investment. They cannot just come in at the back end when the filmmaker has struggled with a low-budget production. They need to come up front and contribute to how the film looks, which will help give it international appeal,” Harris continued.

She noted that the time is right for a film such as Garvey’s Wives, considering the success of films such as Lee Daniels’ The Butler and Selma, directed by Ava DuVernay.

Amy Ashwood was Garvey’s first wife. She was born in Port Antonio in 1897. The two were married in 1919 and divorced in June 1922. A month later Garvey married Amy Jacques, who was from Kingston. She died in 1973. — Jamaicaobserver.

You Might Also Like

Comments

Take our Survey

We value your opinion! Take a moment to complete our survey