What is your background? What are your activities?
I knew nothing about cinema when it crossed my path. I was trying to find my place between music, writing, and photography… I had made a few music videos. I was sensitive to "culture," in what it brings to everyone and especially to our communities with fragmented identities.
At the age of 20, I met an inspiring producer who passed on her passion and knowledge to me.
In 2018, I moved to Ivory Coast. Since then, I have been devoting my commitment and skills mainly to projects on the continent. I do a lot of production management, but I am also a screenwriter, producer, and director.
What major projects have you worked on?
I have worked on numerous feature films and series. It would be difficult for me to classify them. In Abidjan, I am best known for the MTV SHUGA and SKY GIRLS series, but I have also worked on local executive productions of French and Belgian feature films such as SEULES LES BETES by Dominik Moll and MON KET by François Damiens. I was also part of the directing team for the Canal+ series MAMY WATA.
Can you tell us about your job as production manager?
Production management consists of establishing a solid and comfortable framework so that the desires of the directors and production team can take shape within the material constraints of the project. We are financially and legally responsible for the successful execution of the project. It is necessary to be familiar with every aspect of filmmaking and to listen to everyone's requests in order to make the best human and financial arrangements that will enable the project to be carried out to the highest standard.
I believe that the keys to this profession are curiosity, listening skills, empathy, firmness, and precision.
How did you train for this job? Did you learn on the job?
Like many people, I learned on the job. They say that luck is when preparation meets opportunity. I seized mine. I was offered a small job, making photocopies and sorting papers. I hated administrative work, but I loved everything I saw and heard in those offices, where people and art were at the center of everything. I wanted to explore everything, learn everything. The wonderful thing about our profession is that you never stop learning; there are always new challenges and new dreams to pursue. I continue to learn a little every day.
What are the main challenges you face on a daily basis? What gives you the most satisfaction?
When you choose film production, you're not choosing a job, you're choosing a lifestyle that is demanding, possessive, and jealous. It doesn't leave much room for personal and family life. We work extremely long hours and we're never really on vacation.
It is the job of an alchemist, a tightrope walker. It is always a question of finding the balance between different priorities. Art and money. People and material things. Rigour and flexibility. Intolerance and sensitivity.
It involves a great deal of responsibility, self-sacrifice, and hard work for modest recognition.
Therefore, each project is a mission, and sometimes things don't go as we would like, and we don't have a steady income.
In return, we experience exciting adventures filled with art, encounters, and travel.
But over time, our colleagues become our family, and every successful project is a challenge we have overcome, which we celebrate as a collective and personal victory.
Since you started out on the continent, how do you see your profession evolving?
For some time now, I have been developing more projects than I am shooting. I learned filmmaking from very demanding professionals, and I try to maintain that high standard in my work to offer quality content that can be watched anywhere without people thinking, "This is low-budget" or "Africans still have a long way to go." Even today, it's difficult to set up ambitious projects under good conditions, but we're fighting for it!
It's frustrating to see all the talent and stories we have to tell clash with our financial realities. The sector is booming, but quantity is favored over quality, and we don't always come out on top. But we're managing to get by.