Benita Nzeribe--Late JT Tom West Influenced My Career

Interview

Benita Nzeribe is a Nollywood star actress who started as a teenager in the late 90s. And at the age of 28, she has become a veteran of sorts having put behind her close to two decades of acting. The Anambra State-born actress who recently landed a multi-million naira deal as the face of Nigerian Airspace Management Agency (NAMA), has appeared in many movies including her block buster performance in a TV drama series 'Beyond Our Dreams' . In an interview with SAMUEL ABULUDE, the gap-toothed thespian spoke about what she's been up to and other sundry issues.

With your deal as NAMA ambassador, can we say Benita has arrived?

I have always been there. Remember I started early?

I became a star as a teenager and I grew up in the industry.

So the issue of saying I have arrived does not arise at all. I have always been there.

So what is acting to you, was it by talent or you learnt the trade?

I can't say I learnt the act of acting, it is natural. It's what I can call in-born. I started acting when I was very young. Nobody was born acting but to me it is just natural. Like I told you earlier, I actually started very long time ago. I started as a teenager that was in 1998, when I was just 13 years old.

So I never learnt or studied it. I actually went to study English at the Abia State University, and not Theatre Arts as many people expected me to have done. When I joined the industry, I knew I did not make a wrong choice but that did not make me to go to university to study Theatre Arts. Instead I went to study English.

That means somebody must have influenced your choice of acting?

Hmm! I will say the late JT Tom West. He was so influential to my career

Did you ever encounter sexual harassment when you joined the industry?

God designed me in a good way. I was not sexually harassed simply because I was picking up in the soap opera drama series. Though I heard it happens but it never happened to me. But in actual fact, other profession also experience sexual harassment. It is not only in our industry. It happens every where.