Purple Plaza 1

A new television drama series entitled Purple Plaza recently hit the airwaves. The drama series, written and directed by Bimbo Manuel, was created by the Management of NTA Plus with the aim of entertaining and enlightening Nigerians in a way they understand.

The television series which replaces Area Eleven Center which shows on the NTA Plus network for more than two years is the story of our everyday as depicted by five outstanding characters, Aspappy, Wireless, Kunta, Uche, Musa and Mama Philo amongst other minors.

“Purple Plaza is all about the people” said the Writer and Director. “We have people like Musa and Uche for instance who are from very diverse cultural and ethnic backgrounds. Yet they are in the market selling individual things. They are selling totally different things. They are friends. They are constantly quarrelling and constantly making up. Nothing last. They work to understand each other. For me, it’s depictive of the Nigerian society. For those who are able to see beyond the laughter, they would be able to ask the same question that we are raising, if truly that is how we live on the street and we don’t remember the tribe where the other person come from. We are forever killing ourselves bothering about religion and tribe while in reality we live and work in the same place. You see, Nigerians really don’t care which religion or tribe you belong. People want to eat. They want wake up in the morning knowing that there breakfast is guaranteed; they can look forward to supper and lunch is taking for granted. That they can ride on the road without anybody chasing them down” he narrated.

Explaining further about the characters in the drama, the University of Port Harcourt trained theater director explains that Purple Plaza is unique and important because people are always going to be able to find themselves in the different characters in Purple Plaza.

“There are the good, the bad and the ugly. Nobody deliberately set out to be evil. Even the good people are not committing themselves to goodness. Musa wants to be Musa. Uche wants to be Uche. They all have aspirations. They are chasing something. Mama Philo is there. Wireless has her goals. Asppapy has objectives. It is about objectives. All of them are chasing their goals. They are traveling somewhere but how they get there is different from person to person. That’s also the strength”

Produced by Saidu Ismaila Ahmad, the comedy drama series parades such excellent Abuja based actors as Victor Maji (Kunta), Amaka Agwu (Mama Philo), Jovita Anyanwu-Chukwuemeka, Kalu Agunwa (Uche), Musa Ibrahim (Musa) and Adesewo Fayaman Bay (Otison) with Pa Kasumu, the Lagos based actor as Aspappy.

Purple Plaza which hits the airwaves last Monday will show on NTA Plus by 7.30pm every Monday.