Zimpapers Logo

“Maiwe” video

Tafadzwa Zimoyo : Silver screen

You ain’t seen nothing yet! There is a song by Lamont Chitepo featuring Kin where the “Maiwe” hitmaker sings “ . . . ndakafamba babie munyika dzakawanda”. The song reminds me of how much we await the opening of new television stations. The reason I referred to the song is because there is great anticipation for new local television stations.Lamont is based in the United Kingdom and was played on ZBCTV and you could see the great talent abroad.

Obviously, ZBCTV has been there for a while now but still the audiences still yearn for another player just like what has happened to print media where there are multiple voices. While viewers want more television stations that promote diversity, for journalists it means there growth of the media industry.

Quite honestly, the Zimbabwean media is still in its infancy and the number of graduates coming out of university has tripled in the last five years and yet the media industry is not growing.

I don’t wish to rant at ZBCTV for doing what they are doing but it hurts me so much that at times viewers rely on other news channels, especially those on DStv, for news about Zimbabwe.

Channels that include ANN7, SABC Africa and eNCA have made Zimbabwean news their business and yet ZBCTV does not use the opportunity to sell the news to those channels.

Most of these satellite channels rely on SuperSport for sports news coverage and the same could happen to ZBCTV.

At present, Zimbabwe is going through exciting times and there is so much news content which needs to be documented.

These days social media is awash with news on Zimbabwe but it s not happening on ZBCTV.

The best that the powers that be at Pockets Hill can do is to cover the events rather than give viewers blackouts.

Still on coverage of events, local dramas on the telly are a bit awkward these days.

Nobody is following them and there is nothing really exciting about them.

Let’s face it, the days of Paraffin and Mukadota types of dramas are over.

Whoever is producing them should try local telenovelas, game shows, talk shows or reality shows because this is what is trending.

Speaking of trending, DStv recently launched the popular series called “Roots” starring the hugely popular Anna Paquin.

Paquin, who is one of the youngest actors to receive an Academy Award when she won Best Supporting Actress for her role in the 1993 movie “The Piano” (she was 11 years old), is probably better known to South African television audiences for her part as Sookie Stackhouse in the hit TV series “True Blood”.

Paquin’s latest role is playing the part of Nancy Holt in the series “Roots”, currently on HISTORY (DStv 186) on Wednesday evenings at 9pm.

The Canadian-born/New Zealand-raised actress was asked some questions about her decision to get involved with the series.

She plays Nancy Holt, who is the picture perfect fiancé of a Confederate soldier and who has her own agenda when it comes to the handling of slaves. What was interesting to me about this role and the character was it opened my eyes to the power that women had during this era.

When asked why she decided to get involved in “Roots” she said she was almost embarrassed that she would actually never see the original miniseries or ever read the book.

“I mean, most of the literature of that variety that I’ve read, I studied in school. For some reason, that just was a little blank spot in my education. I really relished the opportunity to immerse myself in that period of history through that point of view.

“But also, as far as being not American and jumping onto a project that is so deeply personal for so many people, as intimidating as that was, my thought process was, If I somehow manage to miss this piece of history in this way, then I’m sure there are other people that would have missed it too.

“I think it was an appropriate thing to remake, which I know has a lot of feelings around for a lot of people, but I just was very excited to get to be part of the continuing story of this piece of history that’s so important,” she said.

Feedback: [email protected] Facebook/twitter/instagram: Tafadzwa Zimoyo TheBoss