Wale Ogunyemi

Wale Ogunyemi, OFR (12 August 1939–December 2001) was a Nigerian veteran seasoned dramatist, film actor, prolific playwright and Yoruba language scholar^[2]

Early life

He was born in August 1939 at Igbajo, a city in Osun State, southwestern Nigeria.^[3] He attended the University of Ibadan in 1967 for a year course in drama, the same year he was appointed as a research assistant at Ibadan Institute of African Studies where he later retired.^[4][5][6]

Career

He began his acting career as a seasonal actor with the new western Nigerian television service in the early 1960s.^[7] He later worked with professor Wole Soyinka, a Nobel Laureate and became a foundation member of Soyinka Orisun Theatre.^[8] His credible performance made him a choice for the role he played as "The bale" in The Lion and the Jewel^[9] and Dende in Kongi's Harvest by Nigerian writer, professor Wole Soyinka, a Nobel laureate.^[10] He also featured in The Beatification Of Area Boy, a play by Wole Soyinka premiered at the West Yorkshire Playhouse in 1995.^[11] He had written and co-scripted several drama before his death in December 2001.^[12][13]

Filmography

• The Lion and the Jewel
• Kongi's Harvest
• Sango (1997)
• The Beatification Of Area Boy^[14][15]
• The Ijaye War (1970)^[16]
• Kiriji (1976)^[17]
• The Divorce (1975)^[18]
• Aare Akogun (1968) and Everyman *Eniyan, published in 1987)
• Langbodo (1979)^[19]

Awards

• Member of the Order of the Niger awarded in 1982 by the president of the Federal Republic of Niger
• Majeobaje of Okuku, achieftaincy title conferred on him by his royal highness, the Olokuku of Okukuland^[20]

References