By: Seli Baisie
Ghanaian Playwright, Author, Artistic Director, and lead writer at Roverman Productions, Uncle Ebo Whyte has disclosed that he got into theatre arts by accident.
“I got into theatre by accident. In secondary school, form three. In those days, the final year students of school of performing arts were sent out to the schools to produce a play. And so one of them came to our school. He was a final-year directing student, so he had come to direct a play with the students as his project work.
“Now, I was not part of the drama troupe. I was a very timid boy. I kept very much to myself, but I was fascinated with what they were doing. And so I would stand in the window and watch them doing what they are doing, wishing I was in there, but knowing that I didn’t have the courage to walk through the door,” Mr. Ebo Whyte recounted.
He continued: “The production was going badly, rehearsals were going badly, he’s desperate, they come for rehearsals and the main character is not there, but everybody in the room had a role to play at the time, so he could not ask anybody in the room to read any part for them.
“And he looks round and in desperation, he sees me in the window and says, hey, you, come in. And even though I was alone in the window, I still look behind me, because I couldn’t believe that he called me. Who would ever call me?
“So, I looked behind me, He said, Why are you looking behind you? You’re the only one there come. So, I timidly walked in and then he gives me the script and says, Read this for us. I said okay. So, I take the script, ten minutes later, he stopped the rehearsals and asked me, have you done this play before? And I said no,” Uncle Ebo noted.
The award-winning playwright mentioned that within three weeks of watching the director direct the play, he was able to memorize everything and could act without using the script.
“The three weeks I’ve been standing in the window, I had memorized the whole play. Okay? So, I wasn’t using the script. But not only that, I had memorized the directions he was giving the main character, and the guy was struggling with it.
“I could do it without him having to tell me, move right, move left, use this hand, don’t use this other hand. I had memorized those things,” he stated.
“Well, long story short, 20 minutes later, when the young man walked in, he had lost the role. Yes. That is how I got an introduction to theatre,” Uncle Ebo Whyte made this revelation on Legends Of Our Time, a late-night show on GBC News.
