Welcoming Adam’s Apples to Nigeria

The first two chapters of Adams Apples, a 10-chapter movie series set in the city of Accra, Ghana and its suburbs, are now showing in cinemas in Lagos. The movie, premiered in Accra in April, was first seen in Lagos on Wednesday at the Ozone, Yaba.

It was created and directed by Shirley Frimpong-Manso, who won the ‘Best Director’ during the African Movie Academy Awards 2010, with her movie The Perfect Picture, and was produced by Ken Attoh.

The story, filled with intrigues, follows the lives of four ‘Adams’ women: the widow of ‘David Adams’, an ex-diplomat and her three daughters who are in their 30s - “Adam’s four apples,” according to Frimpong-Manso. It highlights these women’s struggles to be successful and happy in a fast-paced 21st Century Ghana. They keep striving to bury their individual pasts, which constantly threaten to destroy their present career and romance.

As the story goes on, it becomes more complicated and unpredictable, with one character linking to another, sometimes in the most unprecedented ways.

The cast include, Naa Ashorkor, Mensah-Doku, Jocelyn Dumas, Yvonne Okoro, Anima Misa Amoah, Ajetey Anang, and John Dumelo.


“Adam’s Apple is quite different from every other film that we have done. It is a 10-chapter movie and it has created quite a buzz in Ghana and we are hoping that it will do the same here. The story gets crazier as it goes and we are hoping to get people into the cinemas to watch it,” Frimpong-Manso said.

According to the Attoh, the first two chapters will show in cinemas in the country till the end of June. The third will premiere in July, and then one new chapter will be unveiled every month, until February 2012 when the last chapter will be released.

“As you have seen, each chapter will leave you with a hook and you want to come back and continue with the next chapter,” Attoh said.

Concerning their decision to run the movie in cinemas, Frimpong-Manso who wrote the largest part of the story, said their aim was to get people to the cinemas every month.

“We know the cinema experience is beginning in Africa. But unfortunately, we don’t have a lot of local productions in the cinema. We get a lot of foreign productions and people also enjoy something from home. So, we began to think: how are we going to be able to send people to the cinema every month? That is how the idea was born,” she said.

Anang, who won the Best Supporting Role Actor in AMAA 2010 with his role in The Perfect Picture, took the role of a low-income teacher and single parent faced with the possibility of losing the house that he had lived in all his life. He said it was particularly very challenging for him acting as a single parent, considering that he is not a parent and lives in a big family house with lots of uncles and aunts.