Now that FELA! In Lagos is over, A REVIEW!!!

Ok so I wanted to post a major spoiler the very night I got to go see the show, but didn’t wanna ruin it for everyone else who hadn’t seen FELA! (In Lagos). To cut the long story short, FELA! is an amazing show which is not just a memorable experience, but a very educative masterpiece that gives guests more insight into the life of the Legend Fela Anikulapo-Kuti and history of our country Nigeria. I personally didn’t know Fela’s mom, Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, played such a big role in Fela’s life until the show. Patti LaBelle player her role towards the end of the show on Broadway late last year, but obviously didn’t tour with the cast outside the US. There were also details of Fela’s life, like the declaration of the Kalakuta republic, his mom’s fatal injury during a military raid and his stubborn political activities, that I might have forgotten about.

Ok so lets get into the review of Will, Jada and Jay-Z’s latest cash cow. To start with, Lagosians didn’t disappoint as they came out in herds to Eko Hotel. My first observation was how the VIP line was much longer than the regular ticket line. Hmm…naija, we no dey gree. On the way in there was free cold Cowbell milk being hawked. Yuck! Anyways, on getting into the Expo Center, the hall was far from full. There were very well laid-out seating sections with labels and Nigerians seemed to be “obeying” the instructions. This was either us respecting ourselves or having the fear of being “bounced” from an unauthorized seat. Then the ushers were all wearing some nice Ankara and were very friendly. Some were forming unnecessary accents but whatever. There were two bars where anyone could go get drinks, and me and the people I was with did go get a lil “sippy sippy”, in the words of Kanye. After this we got seated. The hall still wasn’t full, and it was almost 9pm. The next thing you know, the ushers ask everybody in regular seating to move inwards into the VIP seats.  Wow. I was still looking around to see what was happening and before I knew it regular ticket peeps had grabbed better and more central seats than me, lol. All of a sudden N35k peeps and $10k peeps became mates o, thats if the N10k peeps didn’t even become senior.

The show then starts. Two shrine “area boys” come in and give us some old skool Lagos swag moves, one of them with a cigarette in his hand. They do several dances and shakara gestures and mock the crowd like why are you guys here, make una go sleep now, all this without uttering a word out loud. Then the cast all troop in through the crowd. One thing I noticed was the cast kept the audience well engaged all through the show by running through the aisles singing and chanting. Fela comes up and the show begins. There was a huge portrait of Fela’s mom Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti to the right of the set, but little did I know that she was about to become the second most important character in the show.

The resident band for the show also did not dull for one moment. Antibalas played Fela’s tunes almost better than the actual recordings or performances, and the fact that this was a bunch of Non-Africans made it all more impressive. The stage set was two-story, with ladders and stairs that members of the cast kept going up and down of. Funmilayo appeared several times walking across the top level clothed in white and with saintly lights shining on her. Played by Lillias White, she sang Palava at the top of her voice in a very heavenly manner, always either giving warnings to her son Fela or giving him instruction. Fela also always seemed to heed to her warnings, and listened to her. The stage lights were awesome, with clips and newspaper cuttings coming on the screen every few minutes.  There were also mentions of several past heads-of-state like Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, Gen Olusegun Obasanjo, Shehu Shagari etc.

There was a 15 minute recess during which I went out to take a leak and you wont believe what I saw, some guy held a stick of weed and was smoking it openly right there in the Eko Hotel walkway.  It sure wasn’t a cigarette. I’m thinking like, ok, this isn’t exactly the Fela Shrine you know, but I doubt if the dude was bothered. Fela had actually lighted up one during the first part of the show, with the help of one of his wives, lol, but I doubt it was real. This guy outside’s own, on the other hand, was real. Back inside, there was one crazy person yelling one funny thing or the other every now and then, but to the far back right it seemed the people on one particular VIP table had drank a bit too much, and theirs was more than others. Speaking of tables, I heard they cost N1m each. Ooookaaay, since I also heard the entire show was paid for my some chairmen, all of that was just bonus douche.

Sandra, the girl Fela met in the US who was an afro-centric Black Power supporter was probably the next supporting cast member after Funmilayo. Apparently she taught Fela about the American culture and drew him into reading a lot about Malcom X, Martin Luther King, the struggle of the slaves, freedom fighting and so on. This changed Fela’s mentality, and his music. Further strong influences on Fela’s music were Tony Allen, James Brown and local Yoruba highlife. The key elements of Fela’s music were told to be the horn, the drum and the women (well actually this was described as yansh during the show). Kere Kay was probably the most energizing number of the night, with the fast chanting and incredible dancing by Fela’s wives. The show wouldn’t be anything without the dancers. They captivated me all through the show with their very Nigerian style dancing and attire. They definitely crossed over from choreography to reality.

Overall, the only flaws I could notice in the show were Sahr Ngaujah‘s (who played Fela) slightly off accent, but still good for a Ghanaian, considering the show was meant for Broadway where most viewers don’t know the difference between a Ghanaian accent and a Nigerian one. One of the dancers also held up one of the activism signs upside down, which I forgive her for, lol. The entire show was brilliant and should have been on for a longer period. I’ll definitely want to watch it again sometime if its still showing, probably in a different part of the world. Shout out to KB, Koye, The Editrix, Sol and everyone else who was at the show that night.

If you attended the show please leave your comments below.

[xrr rating=9/10]

Trivia: Did you know Fela and Wole Soyinka were first cousins? I guess activism runs in their family shey?