Agaba beat stiff competition to win 2021 African Movie Academy award

There was an upset at the 2021 African Movie Academy Awards (AMAAs) that took place on November 28, in Lagos Nigeria. Barely five years into the profession, 26-year-old Joan Agaba, competed with six other actresses from across the continent, including two Nigerian superstars and won the AMAA 2021 award for Best Actress in a leading role. Her skillful performance in Morris Mugisha’s ‘Stain’ was to thank for the award.  

The headlines that followed the event proved how big a deal this was. A casual internet search shows that the category that Joan Agaba won made the biggest headlines in the industry.

The BBC’s headline in Nigerian dialect stated: “AMAA Awards 2021 winners list: Joan Agaba beat Funke Akindele, Rita Dominic to win Best Actress for this year’s African Movie Academy Awards.” That is just one of dozens of stories that circulated.

Agaba’s win was obviously one of the biggest stories from the ceremony. Both Funke Akindele and Rita Dominic are prolific silver screen icons with portfolios that stretch back to the 1990s. Both are multiple award-winners, and both have won in this particular category; Akindele in 2008 and Dominic in 2012. Both were this year’s favourites to win and both were trounced by Agaba.

Agaba could not attend the red carpet ceremony as she was nursing her newborn baby. Morris Mugisha, the director of Stain picked the award on her behalf at the Marriot Hotel in Lagos.

In his acceptance speech, he referred to Agaba as the powerhouse of the industry. Out of the seven categories that the film had been nominated for, only Agaba’s category brought home a win.

Initial hesitancy

It is interesting that such stellar talent only bumped into the acting vocation by accident. Agaba is a human resource professional (with a master’s degree) who, by her own admission, despised the acting craft, until she escorted a friend for an audition.

“A friend invited me for auditions and since I did not have the interest, I forwarded the invite to another friend who had this immense passion for acting. On the actual day, she requested me to escort her, which I gladly did. On request by another person, I found myself in the audition room. A few hours of assessment and my name was on the pass list,” she says.

Well, it is not always love at first sight. Sometimes what you think will stop at the coffee date with the not-so-good-shoes guy ends up being the marriage made in heaven. This analogy describes Agaba’s path into the film industry.

That first role was small, but she cut her teeth into it nonetheless. Ironically, she still harboured her indifference to the craft. “Even after that first role, I still looked at this movie thing as the biggest career joke,” she says.

Bitten by the bug

But then one day, the proverbial bug bit her. She says she was involved in another production, where the main actor was treated like royalty and suddenly, her aspirations switched. “I decided that one day, I would get that treatment,” she says.

And that opportunity came in 2017, when Agaba got her first lead act in the film, Torture. Rehearsals began in earnest. Agaba was not initially cast in the main role of the film.

“My initial role was minor but I gave it my best shot. At some point, during the five months of rehearsal, the actress who had cast for the main role disappeared for a few days. The director then asked me to read the main part in her absence.

I worked hard to assimilate the character. It consumed me. I almost lost my mind doing so. By the time she came back, it was too late for her to compete with me,” she says.

That role revealed to Agaba that she had it in her to act. “And it was on that set I realised how deeply I had fallen in love with acting without even noticing it,” she says.

In 2017, the same year Torture was made, Agaba would go on to win Best Actress at the Uganda Film Festival and Best Actress at Festicab in Burundi for that same role. So the win at the AMAAs was not the first one, neither was it accidental.

Agaba juggles her acting gigs with her human resource job at a Kampala-based international non governmental organisation. In the two films she has featured as main act, she has two Best Actress awards in each, two for her role in Torture, and two for her role in Stain, which she won at the AMAA 2021 and another at the Uganda Film Festival 2020. One might be accidental but twice is a trend to watch.

With two major roles in two films over a short period of time, the skies look clear for the youngster.

On the film Stain

Morris Mugisha says when he met Agaba, he knew there was something special about the young actress. “I had kept away from film and television after Hand in Hand, and when I decided to get back to the industry, I thought I would take a shot at producing.

I met many artists and among them was Joan, who I spotted during rehearsals. I watched other films that she had acted in and I knew she had a talent. When I finished the script of Stain, I was convinced she would take on the role of Mina and execute it religiously,” Mugisha says.

And indeed when she auditioned for the role, she came on top of the list. “Agaba is gifted with wit and energy. She took the script, conceptualised it, owned the character and made transformation required of an exceptional actress. She is a force to reckon within the film industry,” says Mugisha.

What the AMAA means to Agaba

Agaba is elated at winning the award, especially because she was up against big super stars from an established industry. “Do you know what it means to outcompete Nollywood’s big actresses Ritah Dominic and Funke Akindele?” she asks rhetoricallly.

She says the award has awakened hope in her future as an actress and in the Uganda film industry. Agaba believes that such small steps will push the industry forward, propel the public to appreciate Ugandan talents and film productions and ultimately result in better policies and financing avenues.

Beating the odds

Agaba believes her background in human resource management has helped her in handling the different personality types on and off film sets.

“One of the biggest challenges is that people outside the industry tend to associate us with horrible and demeaning titles, but as a person who is trained on how to manage people, I have managed to block such negative energy,” Agaba says.

For women who want to become actresses, Agaba’s advice is to start and stay consistent. “Don’t mind about those baby steps (the minor roles), as long as you keep going, you will make progress,” she says.

Uganda’s film industry is nascent and almost unknown to most Ugandans, which is why you never heard of this AMAA award. But the wheels are turning. There is award winning talent, the likes of Joan Agaba and Morris Mugisha working odd hours to make it happen on their own volition. They are barely making any living out of it, but the same was once the case with the comedy industry, let alone the music industry. People like Agaba are trailblazers and legends in the making.

About the actress

Family and education

• She was born in Mengo to Mr and Mrs Israel Kalyango. She is the second last born of six children.

• She completed Primary Seven in 1999 at Bweyogerere Central.

• She attended Taibah College School, from the years 2000 to 2005.

• She also has a first class Bachelors degree in aircraft and rocket engineering, from National Aerospace University, in Ukraine and  a masters in Business studies from University of the People, in the US.