Yvonne Jegede reveals she nearly rejected iconic role in 2Baba’s “African Queen” music video.
The Nollywood star says acting was her main goal, not appearing as a video vixen.
Nollywood actress Yvonne Jegede has revealed how she nearly turned down the chance to feature in 2Baba’s legendary music video, African Queen.
Speaking during a recent episode of the Nollywood on Radio podcast, the actress explained that she originally had no interest in appearing in music videos. At the time, she was focused solely on her acting career and said her involvement in a few music videos happened by chance.
The 41-year-old actress admitted she wasn’t even familiar with 2Baba’s solo career back then, shortly after he left the group Plantashun Boiz.
“When the director of African Queen first called, I bluntly just said, ‘no, I am not interested.’ And then, much later that same day, because they were supposed to film the next morning at about 9 a.m., he (the director) said, Okay, let me know if you change your mind,” she said
.“And Tuface had just broken out of the Plantashun Boiz, and I had not heard any of his solo songs. So, I did not know what ‘African Queen’ was; I wondered, what is ‘African Queen’, and which song is that?
“And a friend of mine and I were speaking later that evening, and it just popped in my head, and I was like, hey, Michael, somebody said I should come and do one stupid thing, and I just said ‘African Queen’, the guy just screaming, I love that song, go and do it.“
“And I said, okay, let me call the director. And I did, and that very night, he gave me the address, told me what to do, and how to get my hair prepped for the shoot. I got the address and went.”
“And lo and behold, I saw that legend Tuface, for the first time, I am like, ‘Ooh, so this is real’. But no, I did not want to be a vixen after that. I just wanted to act; I kept telling everyone, ‘I just want to act.”
She went on to explain that the only other time she appeared in a music video was in Djinee’s Ego, and it was simply as a favour to a friend.
“But doing ‘Ego’ for Djinne at the time was more like doing something for my friend. And he was the director of ‘Ego’, who was also shooting music videos for Styl Plus at the time. So I was supposed to be in the video for ‘Olufunmi’, but I was late. I was stuck in traffic.
“So I missed that one, so that would have been part of my CV, but yeah, I missed that. But no, after those two, I just did not want to do anything dancing; I just wanted to act. But really, you had a double-edged approach to film.
“And you could have chosen any one of them. Now that you have chosen acting, you want to act. Has it been fulfilling so far? I mean, that you’ve come this far in your career. You’ve seen a lot, you’re one of those who have seen a lot and are still seeing. Is it fulfilling enough? It has been fulfilling, I am not going to lie. It has been.”
