By Steve Agbota
Cofounder of Zintra Media, Rex Moses has said that there is need for Nigerian artistes must possess technological skills and proper training to boost the nation’s entertainment industry.
Rex who spoke with Daily Sun in an interview in Lagos, said modern technology has changed the face of entertainment industry across the world, hence, Nigeria must invest in modern technology in order to be in the same league with their foreign counterparts.
Rex Moses who is also an IT savvy, noted that Nigerian entertainment industry is not yet where it ought to be but has improved tremendously over the years.
“Well, where we are right now in the entertainment industry, I will say we are not there yet. But nevertheless, we have actually moved and progressed far from where we were five or ten years ago,” he added.
According to him, looking at entertainment industry, of course, it cuts across different areas such as music, movie production and a lot of things are actually involved.
He said Nigerian entertainment industry has become an integral part of the nation’s economy and creating opportunities for people to earn a living, saying that a lot still need to be done to develop the industry to attract high rating in the world.
He said due to the impact of the industry in people’s lives and the economy, there is need for more investment in the area of modern technology to boost quality of movie and music production even talent management and among others.
“Presently, there is acceptability of the industry, our content is now being accepted in Nigeria even outside Nigeria. We now have some of our artists who are Grammy award winners. We now have movies that are now outright purchased even on Netflix.
“We have actually involved in terms of storytelling, production, quality and in general in terms of our content, we have improved though we are not there yet but we have improved tremendously,” he explained.
He said one of the challenges the entertainment industry is facing today is lack of talent management, saying that are a lot of talents out there that need to be well managed by experts that possessed talent management skills, which are few.
“However, we need experienced talent managers to train and manage raw talents in the industry. This will also help to improve the standard and rating of the industry. Somebody can just wake up the following morning and says I’m an actor without proper training. Somebody can even wakes up tomorrow and says I’m now directing without any experience. Where did you get your training? Where did you gather your experience? I know that there are some people that have natural talent but you need a training to go with your talent and now come out excellently well.
“In the next few years, Zintra media is planning to own an entertainment academy where we train people in cinamatography, acting and to even talent management, knowing how to manage talent because we have some celebrities or some persons that are difficult to manage. But if you are well trained as a talent manager, you will know that there’s nobody you cannot manage irrespective whatever temperament the person posses,” he said.