I missed lucrative gigs to earn master’s degree – Mr Macaroni

Nigerian comedian and actor, Adebowale Adedayo, popularly known as Mr Macaroni, has spoken about the sacrifices he made to combine his entertainment career with academic pursuits, following his recent graduation with a Master of Arts degree in Performance (Acting), with distinction, from the Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts in London.

The entertainer said he had always wanted to further his education but could not immediately pursue a master’s degree after completing his undergraduate studies because of work commitments.

Speaking with Saturday Beats, he said, “I’ve always considered doing an advanced actor’s training, a master’s in performance, specifically, because I do already have a BA in theatre arts. But after my studies at the university in Nigeria, I got into work immediately, so I did not really have the time.

“After having done a lot of work and thinking that I needed to refresh, I thought it was the best time to go ahead and further find what’s new, what’s different from what we’ve been doing before.

“The achievement means a lot to me. I’m very happy that I have been able to finally do it. Of course, knowing that I finished with a distinction made me really excited, really grateful, especially because I had a lot of responsibilities to marry with the course. Of course, I’d always come to Nigeria to film, to create content, and come back to London to carry on with the training.”

He explained that returning to the classroom required sacrifices, including missing lucrative acting jobs in Nigeria while balancing his professional and academic commitments between Lagos and London.

Mr Macaroni further said his dissertation explored the use of Theatre of the Oppressed alongside Afrocentric performance techniques to offer audiences solutions to resisting sociopolitical oppression.

He explained that his interest in the subject was driven by his desire to use entertainment as a tool for social change, adding that he had always sought to educate and enlighten audiences through his creative work.

The actor said the programme also exposed him to new acting techniques and performance skills, which he hopes to incorporate into his work in content creation, film, theatre and public engagement.

Speaking about how he intends to apply the knowledge acquired, he said, “I am just learning new things, adding new skills to my toolkit so that when occasion demands, I can make good use of it.

“But, of course, I’ve been able to gather amazing techniques that I believe will also be instrumental to the work that I do in Nigeria, be it from content creation to acting, stage and theatre performances, entertainment, and public engagement, generally, as it were.”

He added that the new skills would help him expand his creative abilities without losing his identity or abandoning the techniques that had shaped his career.

Reflecting on the challenges of combining work with his studies, added, “But yes, of course, there were personal sacrifices, such as jobs, gigs, that if I was to be in Nigeria, I would have jumped on, made good money. So I wasn’t making as much as I was, but I was spending even more. And because, of course, I was in London and doing the course, so it’s just that balance, balancing between that Lagos and London life while doing the work. This is the journey called life; sometimes it gets overwhelming, and this is what I say: you just have to continue to find ways to navigate this journey.”