How make-up help actors to express roles

10/5/ 2025

Nigeria cinematic make-up artist, Oby Kinika, aka Creative BMO, who was recently nominated for the Africa Magic Viewers Choice Award, has said that make-up artists help actors internalise their roles better.

Speaking about her experience working on movie sets, she told Saturday Beats, “Many people do not value make-up the way they feel they do. I always let people know that make-up helps the actor ‘feel’ their role. If you’re to act as a prostitute and then I do a shouty make-up and put chewing gum in your mouth, you start to feel like one. On screen, because of that make-up, everybody will notice. It actually makes people see the character for who they are. Make-up really helps you embody the character to the audience.

“However, some people believe that some jobs on a movie set are more important than others. I quarrelled with somebody one time. It was because of the way I answered someone by saying, ‘You don’t know what make-up is.’ Then all of a sudden, the producer came to me and asked why I talked to the production coordinator like that. I said it was because I was defending my craft.

“You hear them say there is no hierarchy and we are all the same on set, but that is a lie. We are not the same, and we all know that. They feel like actors are the ones on screen; we aren’t. So, actors are meant to be fed, but we have to eat anything they give us. That is wrong.

“An actor can say they are not in the mood, and everybody should pause for them to rest. But a crew member can never take a break. Even among crew members, there is hierarchy.”

Reacting to her AMVCA nomination, the artist said, “I’ve won an award before as ‘Best Creative Make-up Artist’, but that was when I was in Port Harcourt (Rivers State). So, this one is the biggest of them all.